Mario's Italian Café — Restaurant in Palm Desert

Very nice, old fashioned Italian restaurant. All your favorite entres and pizza and a bar. Service today was not real attentive. I was running late to meet with friends. By the time I arrived, they had already been served (pizza). After flagging down someone to provide a menu and later flagging down someone again to take my order (chicken parm) and iced tea, My chicken parm was good. The cheese and pepperoni pizza looked good but was too greasy for me. In this area, there are a lot of elderly people. It's far more common for diners to request separate checks than to be presented with a single check for the entire table or group. However, after flagging down someone to ask for the check, the wait person brought a single check. One of the guests requested that the check be split so the wait person took it back. After a while, no check had arrived so we had to flag down someone to check on the check. After a few minutes, the wait person brought 2 checks, one for me and one for the other guests. That was OK and they weren't willing to wait for the wait person to fix it. It was easier to just split it in half. I don't know how many wait staff were there but chances are that they were shortstaffed. Thanks to the host who was able to help expedite things. I'll definitely try it again sometime but I will try some of the other Italian restaurants around in...

This is for the PD location within 100 feet or so across the parking lot from California Pizza Kitchen. The location is not obvious. Second time Lunch . BIG portions! Very fair prices with frequent local repeats, a sign this is a good filling eatery. First visit was for two, 4 Stella's and Buffalo Wings wo Tip below $25. Second visit we had Calimari STRUPS, not the usual chewy rings, these were sizable and render, followed by the biggest Ahi Cesar Salad I have ever seen. Desert was a delicious NY Cheesecake. As you can tell, I didn't try their signature meatballs pizza or fettuccini yet. We met numerous people at the bar and asked everyone how they liked their food, not one complaint in at least 19 people. Saw meatballs sandwiches, Chinese Chicken Salad, lisagna etc all were happy. Good conversations, friendly...

We just left from there and all the other times we have had a great experience but today our server was a snob and when we had left my cousin was in the restroom and my brother was by the door waiting for him to come out our server didn’t know he was still there and was in the back talking to her coworker talking bad about us saying she hates serving those kind of people and how she wishes it was still like the old days when the blacks and Mexicans knew there place straight racism to the max especially in 2024 is crazy to me and all because we said we didn’t want onions on our pizza in the nicest way we didn’t ask them to remake it or nothing but I noticed from the gate she looked like she didn’t want to serve us and now I see why straight...