My wife, daughter and I had a passable meal at Carmen's Italian Cafe in Bradenton last night.
The atmosphere in the restaurant was very nice - with warm decor and a very nice waitress - Michelle.
The chef and owner, Carmen, is reportedly from Sicily. The dishes on the menu are from all over Italy. Our food ranged from nice to expensive blah.
We started with the soup of the day - Pasta e Fagioli (Pasta Fazool in Italian-American lingo). That was very tasty.
As an entree, my wife had one of the evening specials - seafood cannelloni (misspelled as "cannalloni"). The pasta part of the dish was homemade and very tasty. HOWEVER, the filling, which was supposed to be lobster, scallops, and shrimp was an indistinguishable mush that could have been anything. It was outrageously priced at $27.99. When we mentioned our unhappiness with this dish, we were told the filling has to be prepared that way!
I had Veal alla Carmen. It was very tasty. It was tender pieces of veal sautéed in butter and white wine with lemon, mushrooms, artichoke hearts, and herbs. It was served over linguini and cost $18.99.
Our daughter enjoyed "Pasta Carbonara" for $12.99. (In Italy, they would use the specific name of the pasta and follow it by the words, "alla carbonara;" e.g., spaghetti alla carbonara.)
Our wine was a 2009 Stemmara Feudo Arancio Nero d'Avola for $24. It was decent, but I've had much better Nero d'Avola. This brand normally retails for about $9.
It took us about 45 minutes to get our entrees after ordering them.
The restaurant should correct the menu's misspelling of "caprece" to caprese.
After dinner, we joined friends in the restaurant's adjoining bar, which was decorated like a tacky rec room, in contrast to the restaurant's nice decor.
The bottom line is that we will not return. If we want Italian food with a Sicilian touch, we'll return to Ortygia in Bradenton. Although its chef was not born in Sicily, his food is much more authentic and has some dishes not normally found in U.S. Italian restaurants.
Carmen's is located at 515 27th St. East in Bradenton. It is in a little strip mall just behind a car wash at the intersection of State Rd. 64 and 27th St. E.
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