Doro's Italian Restaurant — Restaurant in Acworth

3.51 stars. A good attitude and mostly solid dishes tipped it from 3 to 4 stars. Planned to meet some friends at Fusco's, where I haven't been in a few years. Didn't realize that they now work primarily off reservations (should have made one!) so due to long wait we drove over here. First please note, although they are both Italian restaurants I don't think they would consider each other competition, this is more of an upscale pizzeria / family restaurant whereas Fusco's is more white linen. I tempered my expectations accordingly, so don't expect this review to compare and contrast the two establishments, and although I'm a little sad I didn't get my gourmet pork chop, polenta, and mushroom appetizer, I'm not going to take that out on Doro's, which I will judge on its own merits.

Great: complemtary garlic knots, the very best I've ever had. A little undercooked (which I love!) and hot out of the oven. A spinach dip appetizer rated by the table as the best they ever had. The marinara sauce that accompanied the rolls and Calamari was, in my opinion, very good...but no one else seemed to think much of it in one way or another.

Average to Good: chicken parm, veal parm, accompanying pasta... equivalent to Ippolotos or Provinos, very substantial portions. Small wine selection but they have one of all the major "types" which is fine with me, about the same on beers, maybe 10 or 12 popular selections. The Calamari appetizer was fresh and flavorful, seemed like a traditional preparation, nothing exciting about it and nothing wrong with it. The waitress was polite and attentive, but had only been there for 3 weeks. She did say she had been a customer for 2.5 years though, which is good. The prices seemed quite fair for the overall quality of the dishes.

The bad: one member of the part ordered the baked ziti and didn't even eat it, she said it tasted like Chef Boyardee (I didn't taste it so I can't speak to it personally, all the sauces I had were very well executed). They only sent 4 pieces of bread with a huge spinach artichoke dip, and it took about 20 minutes to get more. It seems like on our night they were likely understaffed in the kitchen, with bussers, dishwashers, etc. At one point they ran out of glasses and brought our refills in to go cups. The table to the right of us was not bussed the entire time we were there. The food was brought out one dish at a time with at least 5 minutes between the first and last dish, which leads to people just sitting with their food in front of them trying to be polite. The waitress could use more training on the menu, but she has a great attitude and I'm sure that will come with time.

So, to summarize, would I drive from Woodstock to eat here? No. Would I eat here again if I'm in the area for lunch, or if my Fusco's experience falls apart again, or someone invites me? For sure! I wish this restaurant the best of success, and never change the...

I will start this review off well, the food was very good and came out really hot.

Now here’s where it takes a turn for the worst. I came here tonight, 7/24, with my family of 7. There was another party there of maybe 10?, so they weren’t very busy. I got a beer, it came out and the date on it was past it’s expiration date. They didn’t have any of it that wasn’t expired so I had to order something else. I ordered a different bottle and when it came they already poured it in a glass which I thought was weird, since the last bottle came out in... you guessed it, a bottle. The second was probably expired too but who knows.

We ordered our food before the party there with us, and they received theirs first. They were almost done eating by the time our food came out. We waited for food for probably an hour before it came out, missing a plate, and they didn’t really explain why our food took so long, our server never came to see if it was all okay, or to refill our drinks or to bring extra napkins. Again, the food was good but we were missing a pasta. I went to the person working up front to just tell them to box it because it took so long to finally come out.

All in all, we were there for probably 2 hours, which to me is a little ridiculous. Again, the food was really good, but the wait & service was unneeded, if our server came and told us our ticket got lost or something, that’s a little more reasonable but we didn’t talk to our server once after he took our order. I probably would never sit down here to get service because it was really bad, I would most likely...

We came here with 5 people on a nice Friday evening at about 6:30pm. Parking was limited. We didn't have reservations.

We had no wait and were asked if we wanted to be seated outside, we said yes. They have a neat gas fire pit and 8 tables around a large deck. The server kindly wiped our table of pollen.

The menu has a good selection of standard Italian food. Pizzas, pasta dishes, seafood, and a good selection of salads. The drinks came quickly along with a large basket of garlic buttered bread knots and marinara sauce - yum! We ordered baked ziti, chicken piccata, a pesto cream pasta, and spaghetti and meatballs.

There was a lot of food with each entre'. The food was okay. My ziti was a 3/5, with a LOT of cheese and maybe too much fennel in the sausage. Everyone left food behind as it was a lot of food. Dinner was relaxing outside. Beware of eating the scrumptious rolls early on as you'll fill up quick. The server was very attentive to drinks or anything we needed. We ordered the canoli and tiramisu for take home. They were just okay (but it's unfair to judge 2 hours later.)

We paid $138 for 5 people for decent food and atmosphere, with a few bar drinks and dessert, and no reservations needed on a Friday. That's a good value, specifically as an Italian option in this part of Kennesaw. The service was great as well. This is rated as a 4 as it was 3 of 5 for the Italian food in a nice atmosphere, with...