More of a 3 1/2, but, for the 1 BILLIONTH TIME, Yelp still hasn't listened to my petition to…read moreincorporate half stars, so here we are.
I rounded down instead of up because of my personal experience that night, but I could see that half star going either way.
ANYWHO, Cucina Carini.....a local pizza shop that has an attached dining room that, while pretty small, is also pretty nice. BYOB, which we didn't know heading in, and unless we are missing something, the only beverage options are either water, or whatever YOU bring. (We weren't asked what we would like to drink, nor saw any beverage options on the menu.) SO, water it was, which was fine with ME anyway. ALSO, another thing not listed on the *dine in menu,* is that they DO have a kids menu, which consists of what you would think it does; chicken fingers, fries and the like.
We sit and get to work looking over the menu. We land on crab ravioli for me, (crab meat, asparagus & plum tomatoes in a sherry cream sauce), potato gnocchi for The Misses (With spinach & bacon simmered in a gorgonzola cream sauce,) and the chicken fingers meal for The Little One. Entrees comes with soup or salad (soup for her, salad for me).
Where CC is losing some points is on service. Our server was fine, but the kitchen was very mixed up. When we sat, our Little One was being a kid, so while getting her situated, we ordered all of the mains. About 5 minutes later, when the server brought the bread over, we asked to order an appetizer of fried mozzarella (which I assumed would be the fresh mozzarella, breaded and fried, but instead was the packaged Sams club type breaded sticks variety..the menu says "Fried Mozzarella, Breaded mozzarella, fried golden crisp & served with marinara sauce. Nowhere does it mention "sticks." *shoulder shrug emoji*). In rapid succession after that, the kids meal came out, and then, and I mean probably 3-4 minutes after ordering the mozz *sticks,* THEY hit the table. Still no soup or salad. The mozzarella sticks were made suspiciously fast.
Maybe 15-20 minutes later the ENTREES hit the table. The server does recognize that she never brought the soup or salad, and offers to put them in To-Go containers. *second shoulder shrug emoji*
The entrees themselves were good, not great. Decent flavor, but both dishes underseasoned. A little salt would have gone a long way. I had to add parmesan cheese, red pepper flake, and some salt myself to coax a better flavor out of my ravioli. The Misses's gnocchi also needed some doctoring to bring out some true flavor. The kids meal was a generous portion size, but then again, it WAS $13, so.....
We decided to actually do dessert, as The Little One wanted cake, and I had seen a picture of the Peanut Butter Bomb, and absolutely wanted to try it. One bomb, and one Lemoncello Cake slice was the order. The Lemoncello cake was good, but again, lacking in deep flavor. You got a hint of lemon, then the rest of the bite was chewing on air. It speaks to the lightness of the cake crumb, but the flavor needs to be punched up. The Peanut Butter Bomb however; no notes. Delicious. Chocolate mousse on top of a peanut butter mousse, on top of a chocolate cookie type base, the whole thing covered in chocolate and peanut drizzle (?) and sprinkled with peanuts. Definitely the best thing I ate here.
SO, all things put together, it wasn't a bad night. Service was a little slow, which was only really a problem because we had a squirmy 7 year old. I probably would have appreciated the pace if it were The Misses and I just sipping a bottle of wine. But, the kitchen course timings and mix up, plus the muted flavor of pretty much every dish knocked it down a few pegs.
I could see Cucina Carini easily being a 4 star spot and a go-to, "our spot" type place, it just didn't get there for me on my one visit.
It's a little far from us, but if I'm in the area, I would definitely give it another shot.
