Carmela's Bistro — Restaurant in Lincoln

Look I’ve been here a few times over the years, my family introduced me to the place and it was immaculate. It’s been over a year since I had last been in and I was feeling a delicious meal. I took two of my friends who have never been and strongly recommended that they need to try this place. We arrive and are immediately greeted by a very nice hostess, while she prepares our menus another gentlemen makes sure we had already been helped. Our hostess seats us and let’s us know our waitress would be out soon. Well she wasn’t out soon, we had time to read through every menu option, ponder which meals each of us were going to get, talk between each other, decided to split a Mac dish and locked in our orders all before she even provided us waters. Thankfully we were ready to order right then and there because frankly I think she would’ve taken another 15 minutes to get back to us. Our waitress didn’t provide the best customer service, she was direct and short with her speech and didn’t use the nicest tone towards us. My friend, who ordered first, nicely asked her to repeat a question which she responded with a rude tone while talking louder and slower towards him. She also schooled him on how salmon was cooked before he could even tell her how he wanted it cooked. In all we ordered the Whiskey Filet (medium), Steak and Potatoes (medium), Poblano Salmon (medium) and the Mac. Before leaving us our waitress said she would be right back with some fresh bread. About a half hour later she brought the bread, just 3 pieces with no apology on how long it took it was a little hard and not very warm. It took about an hour from when we ordered to get our food which we were disappointed in. The filet and the rib-eye were both on the rare side not medium, the salmon was ok and the mac was a big let down. There was barley any cheese sauce and was very basic. The noodles weren’t drowning in the sauce like they were the previous times I’ve eaten here. The presentation on all the food lacked, the only dish that had a decent presentation was the Poblano Salmon. The filet was still good but portions were small. The truffle fries I substituted were a let down. The Brussels sprouts weren’t anything special. Our waitress would periodically stop in and fill waters not even saying a word. We also noticed she was being friendlier to the groups around us, which go figure, were older people. Why is this, I don’t know. Come time to pay she was a bit friendlier because that’s the most important part for her and in hindsight our group left a very generous tip for the quality of her service and the quality of the meal. I was disappointed, especially with the mac. For $15 it was a huge let down from last time, I would rather get some mac from noodles and company for $6. However, like I said, the previous times I’ve been here have been great, I hope this time was just a flake because if service is the same next time I go in, it will be my last time going in. I hyped this place up so much to my group just for it to be a flake, that’s disappointing. I’ve also never felt obligated to write a review on a restaurant until my last experience here, that’s saying something. 3 stars is generous it deserves 2 for this experience, the only reason I gave an extra star is for the customer service of the very...

What is going on inside this place? 3-4 years ago my girlfriend (now my wife) randomly decided to eat here for the first time. We heard from countless people that it was great so we figured why not. We walked in to a cheugy, Cracker Barrel-esque atmosphere (think dimly lit Hobby Lobby vibes), where most tables were empty. It took us 30 minutes to get seated. Our waiter was fine. Neglectful, but fine. Menus were plopped down, food and drinks were ordered. After that we discovered that specials existed. We were not offered this. Should I have asked? Sure. Should they have been mentioned? Couldn’t have hurt. We got the food and I swear to you I thought we were being Punk’d. I was waiting for Ashton Kutcher to run out laughing. My wife’s drink arrived with a gnat in it. We are reasonable people, these things happen to the best of us. We ordered the cheese and fruit plate as a starter. This had clearly been made WAY ahead of time. The fruit was old and not edible, shriveled grapes, the strawberries could have been considered freeze-dried because they had been exposed to air for so long. The cheese was hard, and not because it was ‘hard’ cheese but because it had also been sitting out so long the air had gotten to it. The pizza we ordered was also so terrible we barely touched it. We ate what was edible of our food, paid, and wrote this place off. It could have been an off night. That brings us to today. Tonight my wife and I decided to go on a date and use some gift cards we got from our wedding. We started laughing when we saw we had 2 gift cards to Carmela’s. We thought about re-gifting them but didn’t want to be associated with the potential bad experience we got last time and decided to give it one more try because just MAYBE they just had an off night years ago. As fate would have it, we got sat in the SAME SPOT. We started laughing instantly. My wife is pregnant and ordered a mocktail - it tasted terrible. Either the ginger beer or lime juice had gone bad. I got a simple pasta, my wife ordered a steak. The pasta was bland, zero flavor and the chicken tasted like a grill and oil. No spices. My wife’s steak however tasted rancid. I’m not just saying that to be dramatic. She took a bite and immediately gave me a look. I took a bite to test this look. She’s pregnant and has been sick at home for two months only to have one of her first outings make her want to throw up more. This steak was not right. I wish i could describe it to you but there’s a reason only 2 bites were taken. We decided not to order dessert. We we never offered a refill on water, which was too bad because it ended up being the highlight of the meal. My wife had to get up and go to the car because she was feeling sick from the food. It took 15 minutes for me to get my check, pay it, and leave. The reason for the delay? The gift card machine wasn’t working…the whole reason we dared try this place again in the first place. I don’t know what we expected honestly. The second time wasn’t AS bad as the first but only by a small margin.The best thing about this place was the one glass of water we got and the ketchup. Do yourself a favor and just go elsewhere. It’s definitely been a ‘experience’. Clearly the years have not been kind...

The best part about this restaurant was the wine wall.

Discovered this place a couple months ago and thought it looked really cute with the outdoor patio. We kept it in the back of our minds until date night.

We were sat pretty quickly but we were only given a food menu by the host and we had to ask our server for a wine and cocktail menu when they had a chance to greet us. The Pom Fizz cocktail was fruity and refreshing. The crème Brûlée Tini cocktail was ok but generally bland.

All the food sounded amazing on the menu but completely missed the mark. Ordered the Arancini for our appetizer. The Arancini risotto balls might as well have been three fancy unseasoned and not-that-cheesy mozzarella balls. The best part of the dish was the marinara sauce accompanying the underwhelming rice balls.

For entrees we ordered Poblano salmon and Bistro Filet. Both entrees came with risotto, which was depressingly bland. The risotto was so thick it had the consistency of porridge and was desperately craving some salt. Both vegetable sides were simply sautéed in butter, but not a milligram of seasoning touched either side dish. The Poblano Salmon was supposed to be blacked but was generally, (you guessed it) bland. The bistro filet was cooked to perfection and was enjoyable. The filet was the best part of the entree course but still desperately needed seasoning. It had great texture, which was mostly because it was a decent cut of meat.

Service itself was slow with the entrees taking almost 45 minutes to come out after the appetizers. We agreed to skip dessert after such a disappointing first and second course.

Long story short, food was really bland and extremely overpriced at over $120 for two drinks, an appetizer, and two entrees of mediocre caliber at best. I have had more seasoned food at Applebees. We will...