PASTArrific — Restaurant in Kokomo

An absolutely terrible experience.

I admit it, I was curious. With the name like that who wouldn't be? My partner who lives in town told me to lower my expectations, but I still went in really excited for what was going to happen. Because even a bad Italian meal is still edible? At least I thought.

First off The post-COVID dining room was pretty empty. There were only about six tables worth of customers. However one of the tables was occupied by what looked to be a manager's meeting in action. Three women gathered around the table looking over a menu and having discussions about product and schedules. A little odd to see that but okay.

Right away it was clear that there was some kind of drama going on with a wait staff. Something about they're not being enough people, or too many people, I have no idea. This put my waitress in a foul mood before she even got to my table.

I had ordered drinks for my partner and myself, and then once my partner arrived back at the table the waitress promptly came up and said "What Do you want for an appetizer?" And in a pretty foul manner. She was straight up rude. Every interaction that I had with her was some sort of mean.

I ordered the peach tea, because I like that sort of thing, and it was terrible. Gross. The couple's empty for about 5 minutes before I eventually flagged her down, asking for another tea. "Yeah I have one in the back for you but I'm going to get it." And she said this in a sort of rushed and frankly mean tone. I blinked, honestly surprised, explaining that I would like to try the raspberry tea next. So she brought me the raspberry tea, and it wasn't much better but at this point in time I was just wanting anything.

So we ordered the ravioli, and it was just meh. I can make better at home in my own air fryer. The marinara sauce was runny, and not very good. So we asked for a bowl of alfredo thinking that would improve the situation. It took her 5 minutes to bring that bowl of alfredo, along with my aforementioned raspberry iced tea. Additionally it took her that long to bring us breadsticks. And I know that this is odd because there was a table with an eyesight, under another waitress, that had gotten two servings of bread And the time it took us to get one.

The Alfredo only marginally improved the ravioli.

And then there is the bread. I feel like bread is the easiest thing to get right at an Italian restaurant. You can't start there in a good place What do you even doing? Out of the first two sets we got, one was a tick away from being burnt, the other was dry and crusty, and the other two were barely edible. I ended up getting another round because why not, and the third round was better. But we still got four barely edible breadsticks. (Yes we ate them, because the ravioli wasn't good and we were hungry).

My partner ordered the gnocchi, and I ordered a cordon bleu pasta thing.

I'm lo and behold the food was just okay. It took us a while to get it but both of our dishes, But both were edible.

Less than a minute after our food was brought to us The waitress, standing at the POS system directly behind us, half-heartedly asking if everything was good. And I, in my admittedly bratty state said something like "It's as good as it's going to get". she looked at me, very frustrated and threw her hand out to her side as if a position of surrender, making an exacerbated sigh before hastily walking away. We had no more interactions with her during our time there.

I got to be honest I wasn't really in the mood to eat anymore. But the food was edible so I figured the best we could do is still pay for it. So we did and I walked out only having taken a few bites of my food.

Even my partner said that the last time that she was here it was not that bad. But this was one of the worst restaurant experiences that she had ever had, and I have to agree with her.

So don't go to Pastarrific. The name is catchy, using how bad can pasta be, turns out It takes more than pasta to make a decent...

I said I was just going to speak to the manager privately and not post anything public about my sheer distaste for the restaurant. Yet after making two attempts to kindly express all the disapointments we experienced with our service,once in person while paying my bill and still leaving a very nice tip, and secondly after I got home, to ensure privacy and anonymity, I received a very unsatisfactory response. There was no apology made, nor even a free dessert offered. . .I was reassured that she would just follow up with her server and the kitchen.Unacceptable. First of all I don't really care for the updates this used to be a nice restaurant with a quiet and relaxed atmosphere. Our purpose for visiting was my mother's 80th birthday and she does suffer from Alzheimer's , to be honest neither one of us are fans of kids! There must have been three 2 year olds that were ill-mannered and loud, playing loud videos or squealing. Personally that's a huge turn off, children in nicer restaurants. The worst part about not being apologized to offered some sort of free dessert or the woman even speaking to my mother considering it's probably the last birthday she's going to remember was just terrible.. professionalism is not a strong suite for Pastarrific! The crowd, general ambiance,quality of food, and service has drastically changed! I politely and discreetly whispered to a waitress/ hostess to ask if they would do any sort of singing or if they would surprise my mother with the card and flowers I got for her for her birthday ...she then came back and told me out loud they don't do any singing for birthdays and announced it to the whole table 🤦🤨🙄 Later this same server stepped right in the way when we were trying to get a photo, she came back by our table multiple times making odd comments, she truly had no social graces and was incredibly awkward!!! My fiance who had worked all day and was quite hungry could not eat his meal, he complained of his alfredo sauce being very chunky and floury and when I tried it ,sure enough I could have done a better job making my homemade batch! He left over half of his food on the plate and didn't even bother taking any of it, to go, and I don't blame him. Not typical of him. I ordered the eggplant parmesan and I noticed on the new menu it said it comes with one side, so I inquired to my waitress and she said sure it comes with a side now, so I ordered the asparagus. When they brought my food out I have never in my life received eggplant Parmesan with no pasta or sauce, but that is definitely what I received. Two slices of battered eggplant and 5 Spears of asparagus!!! OUTRAGEOUS! I asked where my pasta was and my server said ,oh " well you told me you wanted asparagus, I didn't think you wanted pasta"! First of all honey when I asked about it coming with a side you should have said yes the side traditionally includes the pasta. Also I ordered mother a peach sangria, which she did not agree to drink any of it and didn't even try one sip, you could tell the drink was untouched so I asked the waitress to please take it back and get my mother and unsweetened tea when I get the bill I'm still charged for a $7 glass of peach sangria!! Again what a terrible pathetic business practice. I don't know how they do business there let alone, stay in business but I'm sure it won't be long. Another patron said the restroom was pretty disgusting and there were two stalls out of order , that's pretty indicative of a business crumbling to me, we would have been much better off going to a chain restaurant like Olive garden! Best part, I was told that if I wanted any extra cherry tomatoes in my salad I would be charged because they only come with one!!!...

I wasn't very impressed with much here. We came in at around 7:40 and there were not many people there. Interior was overwhelmingly dark and décor was overdone and appeared very dusty. Regardless, it took quite long to be seated. From that point our waiter was MIA until someone who appeared to be the manager on duty came over to ask if we had been helped. Then, magically, almost instantly a waiter appeared. I should probably add that we were in the middle of the restaurant, not tucked away somewhere.

I've been a career waitress for 3+ years, I'm familiar with how to do the job and how to know when people aren't doing it well. Our waiter was not friendly, and did not do a good job at checking on drinks, how we liked the food, etc. through the meal. It appeared that they would rather be doing anything else which hey, I get it but maybe don't air out your grievances in ear shot of your tables. Don't do it in the front of house period. It's not an easy job and oftentimes it is extremely frustrating but that doesn't excuse being so obviously rude.

Drinks came very slow, 15+ minutes, and our food order wasn't taken for about 20 minutes after that. I personally felt like the food was very greasy, and my friends stated that their food tasted "not fresh". Mind you, we went on a dead Friday night right after the rush but not anywhere close to close at 10:00. I couldn't get through half my meal before feeling awful due to how greasy it was. The portion size was good for the price, but the price was high compared to the quality of the food you get.

I would say if you want mediocre to average at best "Italian" at this price point, save yourself the time and money and just go to Olive Garden. I don't even like Olive Garden. However, if it this was the alternative I wouldn't hesitate to go almost...