The Battle Between Pastas

Olive Garden

With its warm and inviting style, it's easy to see why Olive Garden is vastly popular.  Once you walk through the doors you can feel the energy of the restaurant.  "It's a good place to just go and hang out" says student Chase Meyer.  Originally named the “Green Frog,” the first Olive Garden opened in 1982 by General Mills in Orlando, Florida.  Being the sister company of Red Lobster and having around 700 restaurants currently opened, it is the largest chain of Italian-themed restaurants in the United States. A favorite special called the Never Ending Pasta Bowl is the talk of the town.  For only $8.95, there are over 40 combinations that you can mix and match to create the perfect combination.  There are different types of pasta you can choose from; then you pick the sauce that you want to go with it.  You keep that combination for as many more helpings you can handle.

Pasta isn’t the only thing that’s endless, the popular endless bread sticks or salad readies you for your entree.  With a variety of entrees, every food group is accounted for.  The menu consists of eight sections: Appetizers, soups and salads, pizzas, classic recipes, filled pastas, chicken, and seafood: each filled with great dishes.  The average dish price ranges from $10-$20, but is worth the price.  The seafood is obviously a bit pricier than the other sections because they include scallops, shrimp, crab, and lobster, which usually cost more than everything else on the menu.  The wait for your meal shouldn’t take too long; it just gets you prepared.  When the wait is over, your meal will come out looking vibrant, making the urge to dig in even greater.

Each year many Olive Garden chefs go to the Culinary Institute of Tuscany to learn authentic cooking secrets from Italian Chef Romana Neri.  He teaches the chefs how to use the freshest ingredients, how to layer flavors, and how to combine the food with wines to enhance the dining experience.  The reason they go is to learn skills on staying true to the Italian cuisines.  They not only go for the gaining of knowledge, but for inspiration when they return to their home restaurants.

Olive Garden is big on supporting the community.  They have their own saying of Hospitaliano!

“Investing in our communities is one of the best investments we can make and one with an impact that will last for generations”, their web site reports.  They serve their community by sponsoring charities and schools.  They also do company events, such as Pasta for Pennies, Pasta Tales, and Labor Day Hospitaliano!  These events are driven from the mind of their founder Bill Darden.

When it comes to dessert there are many decisions to make.  There are between 10-15 different desserts (depending on which location you’re at) not including coffees.  As at a lot of places, the check will be accompanied by those thin mints popularly known.  There is food for all ages along with drinks.  Even though it has the style of a serious restaurant, there is also a sense of cheery, excitement.  The Olive Garden motto is perfect for the restaurant.  Olive Garden makes you feel welcomed.  Their motto is a perfect mesh with the style.  As their commercials always say, “When you’re here, you’re family.”

Pastini Pasteria

Olive Garden isn’t the only Italian restaurant in town.  Pastini’s is not a franchise like Olive Garden is, but it has the support to compete with them.  The meals aren’t quite as expensive as Olive Garden’s, only ranging from $3-$13 a dish.  With favorable reviews from newspapers such as The Oregonian, and the Portland Tribune, it is popularly known among the public.  Not only is the food great, the food is healthy and the ingredients are locally bought.  There is a part of the menu that is gluten free.  It is gluten-free, wheat free pastas that are made from brown rice.  There are also gluten-free desserts.  “They also have a good vegetarian menu for people like me” student Keegan Allison explains.  Many food preferences are represented on the menu for the wide variety of appetites.

Pastini’s is also very big on helping the community.  They support over thirteen different organizations, including our very own Portland Public Schools.  Along with PPS, they are also involved in an organization called Friends of the Children.  The organization provides mentors for vulnerable kids in Portland.  The mentors have a huge impact on the kid’s lives which will leave an indent on the rest of their lives.  Another organization they support is the Oregon Food Bank.  Their goal is to feed the hungry people throughout Oregon and Clark County, Washington.

With a much cozier setting, Pastini’s goes the opposite direction by making their restaurants more mature for the less family oriented style.  There are comfortable wooden booths to make your dining more relaxing.  The open kitchen is a cool feature.  It allows you to view everything going on, from the preparation, to the actual making of your meal.  The surroundings are overall comfortable which makes the dinner relaxing and joyful.

The Leading Restaurant

Both restaurants have their own specialties.  Olive Garden has its family-friendly setting and their Never Ending Pasta Bowl promotion.  Pastini Pasteria has a cozy surrounding creating calm, relaxing dining experience.  The food is good at both restaurants, each dish having a special quality different from the other.  The restaurants differ from each other with one being a chain and the other being local.  After a recent survey, Olive Garden came out as being the school favorite.  Pastini’s was not mentioned out of around one hundred people, so it must not be popularly known throughout the school.  Maybe if Pastini’s had the marketing like Olive Garden it might be known better.  Marketing is a lacking component of Pastini Pasteria because it doesn’t get the restaurant’s name out to the public.  If Pastini’s had advertising I believe they would be the school favorite over Olive Garden.  As an ending note, I suggest you take the risk; try the local restaurant.

-Connor Buckley