Al Dente Ristorante — Restaurant in Boston

I had the pleasure of visiting Al Dente on my trip to Boston, or as I like to call it: The Euro Simulator. Sadly the only al dente here was the name, but not the pasta.

I tried the Insalata Caprese, a wonderful classic Italian dish with tasty mozzarella and flavorful tomato. Weirdly enough, they served it with thin slices of red onion and the whole dish drenched in balsamic vinegar. Now, if you like red onion and balsamic vinegar, this is absolutely your dish! But as you might have guessed, the subtle flavors of mozzarella and tomato, the real stars of dish, were overpowered by the stronger opponents.

My choice for main course was osso bucco, a very good measure of any chef’s skills, and here they had placed it as the first dish in the entrees, with a hefty price on it, so they must be very proud of it.

Osso bucco came with plentiful meat, there was also bone with marrow in it, quite delightful. The meat itself was a tad under-seasoned, but still perfectly cooked and quite enjoyable.

That’s what you really want in an osso bucco, that nice meaty experience. And this is where the story of this dish should end, but sadly, it doesn’t.

First of all, the osso bucco was served on a grossly over-cooked linguine, that was swimming both in it’s under-seasoned boiling water, and the under-seasoned tomato sauce of the dish. Even more weirdly, the plate was covered in mushy, over-cooked long slabs of carrot and… get this: CELERY. Over-cooked celery is really something you’d never expect to get in an Italian sauce, but here it was.

To their defense, the celery was mentioned in the menu, and they do advertise themselves as being Italian-American, so if that is your thing, you’ll probably love your over-cooked, under-seasoned celery here.

But Europeans beware, go somewhere else, this is not okay. Also pasta portions here are wastefully huge, nobody in our party got even close to finishing theirs.

Why are Americans so afraid of salt?

What it comes to service, the dude at the front of the house physically pushed me out of the restaurant because I wasn’t standing exactly where he wanted me to be. The other staff was doing the bare minimum, and luckily didn’t ask how the food was, as I’m sure they’ve tried...

My husband and I had a wonderful time here and will definitely be going back for the homemade pasta! But 1 minor complaint. We both got large servings of food and left completely full even though we skipped appetizer (we meant to order soup but got distracted talking). The food was really delicious and everyone around us seemed to be enjoying their meal a lot. Our server, Annette was the most pleasant and friendly person! We love her! The dining area isn't the biggest so try to get a table away from the door (otherwise it gets a chilly draft). The only minor small complaint I have is, the owner of restaurant is the doorman/host and he made a small comment/joke when we walked in. He said, "Don't stay all night, we have a lot of people to serve." Or don't stay all night, it's very busy. Something like that. My husband laughed it off and told me to forget about it. But to be honest, I didn't find it funny. I thought it was a little rude, but he WAS being sarcastic. I asked an employee about him and apparently it's true: he likes people to get out fast so he can seat more tables. I get it! It's a business! You don't want people staying for 6 hours when other people are waiting. But he shouldn't have made that comment. It was my first time going there and first impressions mean a lot! But I love the food and the servers, so I'll go back, but I'm going to ignore Mr. Grumpy-pants.

"Don't...

First, I choose this restaurant because of the raving reviews of their attention to detail for people who are gluten free or have Celiac disease. I personally have Celiac disease, so finding an Italian restaurant that is authentic and understanding of cross contamination is super important to me.

I had the gluten free pasta and gluten free garlic bread. The garlic bread was not what you would imagine; it was more like a dense flat bread. It was worth the purchase though. I had the pasta dish at the top of the house specials page with veal, shrimp, and chicken in a garlic wine sauce. I thought it was rather tasteless and the gluten free pene was nothing better than I could've bought from any grocery store. Pretty disappointing for close to $30. Maybe it's because we came 30 minutes before the kitchen closed? But I felt that we were early enough to not be THAT customer.

Al Dente is my girlfriend and her family's favorite Italian restaurant. I had only been here once before about year ago. I would try it again, but more because it's safe place I can find sustainance for myself and that it has awesome food for people without Celiac disease. I wouldn't return simply to enjoy their food on my own though.

Celiac friendly? Yes. Delicious? Meh. Go cook your own Udi's pasta...