Dontino's - Akron

Located on a busy street in Akron, there is a rather large parking lot on the side street by this restaurant.  The restaurant is bigger than it looks from the outside.  The decor is nice, updated Italian.  It was very clean.  I felt like I was part of the big Italian family that worked there.  We were there before the dinner rush and everyone was yelling across the restaurant.  I seriously felt like I was at a family reunion.  We sat by the bar and the noise level was fairly loud.  The wine list was typical Italian wines, mostly Chianti and other reds.  We enjoyed our bottle of Chianti Classico, but the glasses were laughably small.  We did not even finish the bottle over the course of the meal, it was harder to drink in our small glasses.  The water glasses were also small, but the waitress was around often to fill them up.  We started the meal with calamari.  The breading was very tasty, but the fish was a little chewy.  Next came our salads.  We got the house dressing because TBG noticed they were selling it at the door.  It was good, but there was too much in the bowl.  I had a pond left after I ate all the salad.  The salad was not all iceberg, and had very good tomatoes and beets on top.  I got the veal tortellini and TBG got cavatelli with meatballs for dinner.  Both were drenched in sauce.  Too much sauce for me but TBG used it all for his bread.  The tortellini was good, but I felt the veal was lost.  The cavatelli were good and the meatball was better than I expected.  For dessert we got the tiramisu.  It was ok, tasted pre-made.  They put a caramel and chocolate sauce on top which I enjoyed.  All in all I would say the meal was average.  If you do not cook Italian at home or know an Italian whose house you can stop by for a meal, this is a great place. I felt that my mother, any of my aunts, or my grandmother could have made this meal (without too much dressing and sauce!)  The noise level would have been the same and I would have really been at a family reunion!

Service____ 7 Chipps

Food____6.5 Chipps

Atmosphere____7 Chipps

Beer List____5 Chipps

Wine List____5 Chipps

Value____7 Chipps