Mandola’s preview
Today was a run-through for the staff and for anybody who happened to show up out of curiosity (and there seemed to be many who just came to peek through the windows and then found the doors unlocked). The market’s official opening is Monday at 6:30 am and at that time there’ll be breakfast offerings of pastries and coffee. Full breakfasts will be served on weekends. Today’s weekend-style breakfast included extremely generous and beautiful omelets (with two sides it went for $7), and the Caprese (tomatoes with basil, and fresh made-on-the-premises mozzarella) was a standout. A side order of bacon with that included three giant lean rashers of the best, and the hash-brown potatoes were good as well. Whether this will go on all day, I forgot to ask, but the samples of the pastries were free, and they were beautiful.
Grocery items were not for sale today and the prices were not marked. The wine prices are very reasonable. Mozzarella and riccotta will be made fresh on site and there will be homemade sausage. At the salumeria everything will be cut to order. Everyday breads were visible but not there to be sampled or bought today. It was impossible to try everything, but there were very authentic homestyle cookies and pastries besides fancier ones, including ones filled with dates or figs, and ones made from polenta.
There are giant showy packets of Italian seeds for certain vegetables. For Nutella freaks, among the breakfast items will be French toast stuffed with that dangerously addictive substance plus bananas and hazelnuts.
There will be dining outside and there’s plenty of parking. When the full non-breakfast menu is available, we can’t wait to try the porchetta and the Italian-style pot roast of beef. The official address is 47 West Guadalupe, Suite 12 (telephone 419-9700 for information or to-go orders), among the new apartments at the Guadalupe triangle. This Mandola is the Damian Mandola of the PBS cooking show Cucina Amore.
I visited Mandola’s today, and have to say that as an italian, i was disappointed in a few things. The man who took my order of arancini was completely confused when i pronounced it correctly (ahron-chee-nee) and kept insisting it was ahron-see-nee. i was upset that he refused to accept the correct pronunciation of the word. Then I went to the deli counter to get some meats and the guy behind the counter did not know his coppa from is coppicolla. If Damien wishes to attract the italian america set in austin, he needs to teach his staff the language and really educate them on the fare.
I visited Mandola’s today, and have to say that as an italian, i was disappointed in a few things. The man who took my order of arancini was completely confused when i pronounced it correctly (ahron-chee-nee) and kept insisting it was ahron-see-nee. i was upset that he refused to accept the correct pronunciation of the word. Then I went to the deli counter to get some meats and the guy behind the counter did not know his coppa from is coppicolla. If Damian wishes to attract the italian america set in austin, he needs to teach his staff the language and really educate them on the fare.
I just spotted Mandola’s today as the bus went past it. As a man of Sicilian ancestry (okay, my grandmother is full, but I’m only un quarto — I simply encourage that side of me), I have gotten irate at how much Americans have bastardized the Italian language.
I confronted a clerk at Schlotzsky’s about their use of “Panini sandwiches.” I informed her that the word “Panini” means sandwiches, making their description redundant and misinfomed. “Uno Panino, o Due Panini. Not ‘a panini!'” She stared at me blankly then said, “it’s the style!”
I walked out.
When the Italian-made film “Io non ho paura” was released, I was also offended by the Anglicized title of “I’m Not Scared.” I made sure that the folds at Regal Arbor were aware of the proper translation for the film’s title. The proper title fits the main character perfectly; the American one does not.
I may drop by Mandola’s myself, just to ensure that they get a good dosage of language instruction…
(I may add a t-shirt to my online store: “Panini MEANS Sandwiches!” :-)
Dave
Dave, I get similarly annoyed at places that offer a French Dip (or is that now a Freedom Dip?) sandwich “with au jus sauce.”
I was very disappointed in Mandola’s. The food was decent. On a scale of 1-10 I give it a 7 overall. We ordered several things off of the menu to give it a good try. Most of the dishes we ordered were average. Two dishes stood out. The panini tasted like they bought it at a grocery store. I could get a comparable sandwich from the Barton Creek food court. On the positive side, the pasta was very good. The cheese was top notch. Overall I would give the food a 7 on a scale of 1-10.
Unfortunately the service gets a rating of 2 or 3 if I am generous. The menu referred to a special that could be found “on the board”. When I asked an employee where the board was, he simply said that they did not have a board. The servers that brought us our food were prompt. We decided to order some things to take home. The incompetence behind the counter was absurd. It took two people literally five minutes to bag a loaf of bread for the people behind us. That does not include the minutes spent chatting to a supervisor about the weather.
After waiting for nearly ten minutes to check out, we were told that they had decided to close down the register and we would have to go get in line at another register. When we protested, the guy in a polo (I am assuming a manager) told us that they were closing down the register and we would have to wait.
Overall the food was good, but not that good to compensate for the horrible service.
To Dave Martin who goes around correcting peons at restaurants and movie theatres who have no control of things such as the translation of movie titles and the redundant use of the Italian language I must say:
“Thank God or whoever it is you serve that you are not Mexican. Being of 100% Mexican ancestry, if I went around correcting every gringo in Texas or just in Austin alone on how things are supposed to be said or translated I would lead a most miserable and frustrated life.”
Here here, Brenda! A complaint to Schlotzsky’s corporate headquarters by Mr. Martin may be appropriate, but accosting a cashier is just silly. And rude.