Carboni's Ristorante — Restaurant in Winters

Tried this restaurant on a Thursday evening for my wife's birthday because they had sent us a flyer in the mail. We had not been to Winters since before the pandemic, so it turned out to be a great choice for a change-of-pace dinner.

Their physical layout is clean and open, making me wonder if they were newly-opened (apparently, they've been there for about 4 years!). We were seated in the center of the large single room, arranged in an odd 4-way back-to-back booth seating configuration that made me self-conscious that the people behind me could hear our conversation. I shouldn't have worried though, because the screaming toddler at a different table drowned out any competing noises. With the smooth surface acoustics of their architecture, I'm not sure what the decibel level would be on a crowded weekend evening, but it was pretty quiet after the child was calmed.

Our server, Leslie, was very knowledgeable about the menu and made several great recommendations. Best yet, when I asked if the meals were served "Italian style" (appetizer/salad, pasta dish as the primi, followed by the secundi), she advised that we could order several dishes in that order and split each one (normally, the pasta dish would be its own entree, as would the other entree we ordered). That "pacing" was absolutely the right choice for our 2-person dinner, although it might also work for larger groups if you ordered several dishes and shared them "family style." As it turned out, a slight miscommunication resulted in us getting an extra appetizer (which was then given to us gratis), so we ended up getting a little "log-jammed" in the appetizer stage, but we certainly didn't feel rushed to clear out (again, this was a Thursday).

We really enjoyed our intended appetizer (a peach and heirloom tomato with burrata, a caprese-like salad), although I also enjoyed the one we got by accident (another burrata with tomatoes and olive tapenade over foccacia - much more savory). The recommended mushroom gemelli we ordered as our primi was also delicious and felt rich without being overwhelmingly heavy (perhaps because we split the order). In contrast, the dish we ordered as our secundi was relatively underpowered (shrimp wrapped in prosciutto on risotto) - pleasant, but missing "oompf."

Because I had a birthday cake waiting for us at home, we skipped the desserts, but they sounded good, and we passed their several flavors of gelato on the way out of the restaurant to see the hotel lobby (the restaurant is on the ground floor of Hotel Winters) - I can't vouch for their taste, but it definitely looked like Italy.

We're not really food photo folks, so nothing to see in this review. But my wife was happy, and you know what they say...

Our children reserved a table for Mother's Day dinner. We were seated at 5:50 p.m. The waiter immediately told us they were out of lasagna, the hamburger, chopped salad, the soup and the eggplant entry. There was a 2 man band playing and they were too loud. This hardscape restaurant was already very loud and it was difficult to have a conversation. Our waiter came back only after 15 minutes and we had to wave him over. We had to ask him for bread. Over 1 hour after arriving, we still had no food. First the waiter told us that they were short on cooks. He came back and suggested they were going to take 40% off our bill. 70 minutes after being seated, a man came to our table to apologize. He did not introduce himself, or state his role (manager? owner?). He proceeded to make excuses including that it was Mother's Day and they were busy. I pointed out that 40% or more of the tables were vacant/no diners. He said, "we have lots of tickets in the kitchen." He told us that they should have told us that we could expect a long wait for our food. He came back with scallops (appetizer) because our food was still not ready. They were burnt...very poorly cooked...not seared, burnt. He said our food was coming in 3 minutes and it would be comped. We almost left, but decided to stay 3 more minutes. Our 4 entries arrived 3 minutes later. They never brought the salad we ordered. My wife's ribeye was undercooked and really tough. Daughter's pasta was undercooked. Son's pasta was not hot, delivered on a cold plate. The mushrooms on my chicken marsala were not cooked enough. The asparagus was the diameter of a pool cue, charred black on the outside and not cooked in the middle. The manager had offered us dessert, comped. We did not even stay for it. Sadly, this was the poorest dining experience I've ever had in my 60+ years. Wait staff seemed poorly trained. I recommend avoiding the restaurant unless and until things change dramatically. Very sad. Spoiled...

I really appreciate the effort to prepare dishes with simple ingredients that are made local and from scratch. This is really wholesome.

The restaurant is beautiful and a classy spot to gather for date night and with friends and family. It's nice to not be hovered over, but not nice to feel forgotten by the server!!! The experience we had was poor on server attentiveness. Though the restaurant was fully staffed.

The food came out in courses; very nice. But the time gap between was very long. So we drank the whole liter of water and waited for plates and no refill on drinks or water. When we needed anything I had to find our very absent server and tell her, then she still forgot after being asked twice.

The food: The plates come out very pretty. The menu items could get more flavorful even though they are simple. That being said not bad tasting, just lacking seasoning. Food, Not mouth watering or delicious, just bland. Some things in the dishes don't go together, like sliced radishes over a creamy sauce that had the flavor and consistency of milk instead of a creamy bechemel sauce. I eat together all things on my plate so I hope they mix nicely on my tongue.

It will set this restaurant apart from other fine dining experiences if the main courses have more flavor. The Manager definately needs to watch to insure the servers are more in tune with customer care and their whole experience. I really wanted this to be my go to place for date night. I will try again in a...