When putting together our Top 5 lists, Joe and I had many different things to consider. We not only looked at the quality of the food for a particular restaurant, but also good service (and consistent good service), the atmosphere, the amount of options and flexibility in the menu, the presentation of the meal, the value of the meal for its price, and the ease of getting a table. One such place that Joe picked for some of these qualities was Grandpa Sam’s Italian Kitchen in Spencerport. If you recall the entry, however, you’ll notice that this restaurant ended up not in my Top 5 but instead in the honorable mentions section. Maybe since I’m the one writing this, I’m inclined to say that our recent visit to Grandpa Sam’s confirms my placement and not Joe’s. Don’t get me wrong; it’s a good little place to go when you’re craving a hearty pasta dish, but the lack of consistency in the above categories, to me, prevents it from being one of the Rochester area’s best despite its potential.
Joe and I went on a Friday night for a nice convenient date night right down the street. We hadn’t made a reservation, so we knew we would have to wait a bit. Sometimes we’re lucky and can get in almost immediately. Being that it was a Friday, we didn’t mind waiting. Joe entertained me by trying to test my psychic abilities by Googling pictures on his phone and asking me to guess what it was. (FYI: I’m not psychic... at all.) Joe and I waited ten minutes in the small waiting area by the door, which got crowded fast. During times like those, I appreciate restaurants with a decent-sized bar instead of a few uncomfortable chairs squished together. Finally, we were seated by the hostess not in the main dining area but instead in the room off to the side, which had many empty tables when we arrived in there. I’m not sure why we had to wait if they had extra tables available; it could have been that they were waiting for additional waitstaff to arrive at 6:00, but they’re only open for dinner, so I’m not sure that that’s it. I always find it perplexing when you have to wait while tables sit empty, but I’ll give Grandpa Sam’s the benefit of the doubt this time.
The interior of Grandpa Sam’s is a bit rustic and feels like eating at someone’s house. I like the burgundy paint and the Italian style mural on the back wall. The tables are spaced appropriately, so you never feel like you’re eating at someone else’s table (I remember this feeling quite frequently at the now-closed Henrietta Bazil location). The overhead speakers blasted out tinny ’80s Italian pop music, which I don’t think I’ve ever heard there before; it amused me and Joe for a while. Our server came over promptly, and except for disappearing once during dinner, she was consistently attentive and friendly.
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| Dancing to the Italian version of Gunther! |
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| In front of the burgundy door to nowhere... |
For drinks, I stuck with a glass of water while Joe drank a Labatt. I had tried a sample of their pinot noir special for the evening and found it too sweet (it should be dry). After placing our dinner order, Joe and I received a mixed green salad and some freshly baked bread, both of which arrive with any meal you order. One thing I like about the bread is that the server gives you a dish of olive oil, ground black pepper, and grated parmesan cheese for dipping. You can order garlic bread instead for an extra fee, but the fresh Italian bread always tastes wonderful without that extra seasoning. The salad this time, however, lacked ingredients—only a couple of sliced grape tomatoes and too-garlicky croutons were added to it, and the dressing tasted too strongly of vinegar. For being a salad for two people to share, it also seemed fairly small, but given its lackluster taste, I guess we should have been glad they didn’t give us any more. While waiting for our food, Joe continued to test my psychic ability (still not psychic). We then had a disagreement over which Ramone was a conservative, and our friend Ian confirmed via text that I was right about “Kill a commie for mommy Johnny” (Joe said DeeDee—really?). I won $5, which he never actually gave me, and dinner on this date night, which he did pay for; I’m a lucky girl!
Joe noticed that they had new specials. One dish sounded a bit more upscale: grilled salmon with risotto and a pineapple tomato salsa. Due possibly to Joe’s last disappointing experience with salmon at Ellicottville Brewing Company, he opted instead for the other special of lobster macaroni and cheese. The picture showed a dish of creamy macaroni and cheese topped with a rather large piece of lobster, and for the $18 price of the meal, it should have come with something close to that. This dish had the creamy sauce topped with breadcrumbs as in the picture, but the lobster came in small chunks. Joe also guessed, based on taste, that they had stretched the lobster portions of the dish with pieces of albacore tuna and imitation lobster. He said overall his dish was mediocre, and had this not been a special, I bet he would have gone with a bolognese pasta, which is one of his favorites. The menu asked “Need we say more?” after stating that it was a lobster mac and cheese; we would have to say that yes, they could have said a lot more. It just didn’t live up to Joe’s expectations.
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| Joe's lobster mac--not exactly what was pictured on the menu |
I ordered a create your own pasta dish because I wanted to do something I hadn’t done in a while. For some reason that I now forget, I had been craving alfredo sauce all week, so I decided to make that my order. Usually, I’m unable to get past the Butternut Squash Ravioli on their menu, a unique specialty that really makes the restaurant stand out amongst Rochester’s Italian restaurants. This time I ordered fettuccine alfredo with roasted red peppers. I, too, think I should have ordered something else; I’ve had their alfredo before, and I’ve never had a problem with it, but this dish was just too thick and too messy. I couldn’t take a bite without splattering the pasta all over, and the sauce was so full of heavy cream that after only a few bites I was full. I took the rest home, and I’m not kidding when I say it took me two more attempts in the following days to actually finish it. The flavor was good, but it was unnecessarily heavy. The added issue of making a mess trying to get the pasta on my fork didn’t do the restaurant any favors that night, and the presentation could have been better as well. This just looks like a big soupy mess.
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| Say "cheese"! No, say "too much cheese"! |
Our experience that night wasn’t really bad, but it wasn’t really good either. Both of us have had better from Grandpa Sam’s, and whenever we go back we expect better. We’ve had some really good service there, like when we took my Nana to dinner for her birthday in June. We’ve also had some really poor service; on one of my birthdays, Joe waited half an hour for a second (and small) dish of spaghetti on an all-you-can-eat spaghetti night—something that should have taken only seconds to prepare. This evening, our service was merely adequate, and the quality of the food was mediocre, if we’re being nice about it. For that, Grandpa Sam’s receives a mediocre rating, and I think it will be a while before we dare to return for another date night.
Rating: 3/5 stars
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