Mr. Guido Says: ****
Food: (Multiple Visits) Chicken Francese, Chicken Marsala, Chicken Piccata, Pasta Vesuvio Usually we arrive here early and manage to get the "early bird" special, which includes soup, salad, entree, side dish, dessert, and coffee or tea. Onion soup is usually quite tasty and potent. Salad is fresh and the bleu cheese dressing is quite good with chunks of bleu cheese-I typically find myself dipping the garlic bread in it after I finish my salad. Chicken francese is very good. Sauce is quite lemony, though not as lemony as Mama Lombardi's. Chicken is tender, but not quite as tender as the best I've had. Chicken Marsala was excellent, sauce was very tasty, and it may have surpassed Piccola Bussola's as my favorite Marsala sauce. Chicken Piccata was above average. While not the absolute best Italian restaurant we've been to, I would consider it to be in the upper tier. Early bird special presents an excellent value, with a lot of food for the money.
Mrs. Guido Says: ****1/2
Food: (Multiple Visits) Eggplant Rollentini, Chicken Francese, Chicken Marsala, Chicken with spinach and prosciutto. At this point, it almost seems like it's impossible to write a review for Mario's, since we have been there upwards of 10 times at least since our first visit last summer. As we are an "old" couple, apparently, we have to take advantage of the wonderful early bird menu that the restaurant offers. For a reasonable price, you can get from soup to nuts, and all of the standard italian fare is included in the choices. The onion soup is nearly always spicy and has a dark, rich broth. Occasionaly they offer the option of upgrading to french onion, but generally it is served plain. The bleu cheese dressing for the salads is one of the best I've sampled; the dressing is creamy but not overpoweringly so, and the cheese is chunky and delicious. It tastes wonderful spread over the garlic bread that is served with the meals. Sometimes there is an upcharge for the dressing, but only once has the waitress actually warned us so. My usual entree is the eggplant rollentini, which is fail safe. The eggplant is served in two large, breaded rolls, with a light consistency chunky tomato sauce and a flavorful riccota filling, all topped with a melted mozzarella. I usually get a side of fries with all my meals instead of a pasta, and the fries are lightly battered and tasty. By the time I'm done with the soup, salad, garlic bread, and one rollentini, I'm completely satisfied, and take the remaining rollentini and fries home for a nice lunch the next day. Of the chicken dishes I've sampled, the Marsala was probably of the best quality, with its dark, rich sauce and flavorful mushrooms. The francese was of an above average nature; lemony, not bland, yet not spectacular. I must admit on our first visit over a year ago at this point, I decided to be adventurous and try a chicken dish in a white wine sauce, that had spinach, prosciutto, and melted cheese. The sauce was slightly oily and had no real flavor to it. The menu description neglected to say that the prosciutto was whole pieces, so I found the flavor to be too overpowering for my taste. The type of cheese used also did not satisfy my tastes. However, I'm glad I did not let this experience deter me from trying the restaurant again, since every time since has been enjoyable, once we got past our paranoia that the owner did not like us and purposely sat us at tables that were not manned by any of the waitstaff or stuffed in a corner somewhere.
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