DELUSIONAL

Let’s be honest… there are no great restaurants in Avalon Park!

This low benchmark, creates the right context for this to be considered great, there is nothing special about the food, but in the absence of greatness, it fills the emptiness.

And this complaisance is clearly feeding the owner’s delusion, because they clearly believe they’re great.

It’s just another Neighborhood Italian-American restaurant… being from Naples, doesn’t automatically make the food Neapolitan… and this food is far from being Neapolitan!

The only thing they should be proud of, is finding the right spot to open shop. Oh! The pizza crust is very good, but it’s not Neapolitan as they are selling it.

They managed to find the perfect community eager to eat up the facade.

The complimentary bread service with the herb oil was the only thing worthy of my meal.

My Panzanella salad was made with store bought croutons and the vinaigrette was lacking soul. This salad depends on 2 key elements. Croutons and dressing. They messed up on both accounts. If they used the same bread from the bread service for the croutons, it would improve the salad by 50%.

Carbonara refers to the resemblance of the black pepper on top looking like coal, not tasting burned.

I ordered the Pappardelle Funghi, which is misspelled. It should read “ai Funghi” and it actually felt like the “Funghi” was missing and not the “ai”. This should have been a “wild mushroom” pasta and they relied on cultivated Crimini mushrooms to uphold the dish.

I had to hit it hard with salt and pepper in order to eat it.

My only hope is that they step up their Neapolitan game and make the food as good as their delusion. Or embrace what they are and stop the false advertisement. If they sold it as a family owned restaurant, using their own family recipes, I would have had a different experience.

Context is a big part of the game, and they are the ones creating it by the story they are telling.

Change the story or the food!!!

Whatever they do, they should do it fast, before the food scene improves in the area and their bubble bursts.