The Weekly Eater
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How many friends do you have? You'll need them all at Buca di Beppo, which seems to have no trouble feeding an army, plus navy, Marines, a couple of high school bands or any one of Hawaii's multigenerational families with a hanai'd member or two. At Buca di Beppo, amore
is a heaping helping of pastaI'd heard about Buca's reputation for generous helpings of food in advance. Hah! With origins in Ohio, now headquartered in Minneapolis, its managers could not possibly comprehend the extent of our native capacity for the massive platter thanks to years of practice on plate lunches, Chinese and Hawaiian cuisine. Well, five pounds later, I think they know our appetites pretty well, and this is not restricted to food. The decor is part Las Vegas, part Coney Island flash. There is not an inch that is not patched over with color, photographs of Italian icons like Sophia Loren, Gina Lollobrigida, various popes and tenors, flowers, Christmas lights or other element of Little Italy kitsch.
The restaurant is said to evoke the Italian-American supper clubs of the '40s and '50s, but I wasn't around then, and most of those places are gone, so to me the rooms translate as gypsy fortuneteller nook meets movie-set bordello meets Italian funeral parlor meets circus fun house. Though I'm not a Catholic (or maybe because of this), I was drawn to the Pope Room, a gazebo in the center of the restaurant festooned in faux flowers and with a pope bust as a centerpiece of a table for 18.
One of the new restaurant trends is the chef's table in the kitchen, a setup that allows a few guests exclusive, ringside seats. Normally, this would be the noisiest place in the joint, but here, it's the quietest. Outside the kitchen, you'll find yourself yelling to be heard, like at a nightclub with a live band. The low ceilings amplify sounds and evoke the basement ambience as befitting the restaurant name, roughly translated as "Joe's Basement." Chairman, CEO and President Joseph P. Micatrotto's grandfather opened the first Buca in the basement of the family's apartment in Cleveland's Little Italy, and the aim is to re-create the Southern Italian family experience.
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True to the philosophy of demonstrating hospitality through an abundance of food, the menu is on steroids. While delivering value is admirable, a drawback of the big-bang theory is that diners simply don't get to sample much -- unless they want to take home humongous doggie bags, in which case, see your movie upstairs before eating. More problematic: Everyone in your party must generally agree to eat the same thing. How often does that happen when so many are on bizarre diets or suffer food allergies, or won't eat meat, etc.?Bring four people, and one entree of linguine frutti de mare -- with its light marinara sauce, couple dozen mussels, a dozen shelled shrimp, calamari and chopped clams -- will feed all, plus leave enough for all to take home a portion that will feed two, for 12 helpings total. (Big eaters may have to settle for eight.) This dish is $23.95. You do the math. You'll get two pounds of semolina noodles with any of the large pasta dishes.
Fried calamari ($13.95) is one of the house favorites, but I wouldn't get it if you're getting the seafood linguine, because the squid is redundant. Instead, try the bruschetta ($7.95). Nowhere else does this simple starter of garlic-rubbed bread topped by tomatoes, onions and basil turn heads, but here, the eight-slice serving is as big as a deep-dish pizza. Garlic bread ($6.95) is the same size. Actual pizzas are about $17.95.
Meat entrees will feed about three. Buca Chicken Vesuvio ($20.95) offers three pieces of tender chicken sprinkled with Parmesan and herbs and baked with white beans, slices of Italian sausage punctuated by bits of red pepper and rye, broccoli and a lovely mild vegetable ragout. Good, but not very sexy, which makes it true family fare. Accompanying baked potatoes were throwaways that seemed to have come from a freezer.
The veal marsala ($20.95) did not fare as well. It was bad enough that the meat was tough and gristly, but the sauce was like pancake syrup, and certainly not like any wine sauce I've ever tasted. Accompanying mushrooms were left mushy by the treacly liquid.
Large portions keep coming with dessert. A rum-heavy tiramisu ($8.95) is served in a big bowl that can be divvied into eight portions. A giant slab of spumoni ($6.95) can be layered on a pool of chocolate syrup for $1 more.
That's amore, or something.
Ward Entertainment Center / 591-0800 Buca di Beppo
Food 1/2
Service Ambience Value Hours: 5 to 11 p.m. Mondays to Thursdays; 5 p.m. to midnight Fridays; and noon to midnight Saturdays and Sundays
Cost: About $30 to 50 for four without drinks
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Nadine Kam's restaurant reviews run on Thursdays. Reviews are conducted anonymously and paid for by the Star-Bulletin. Star ratings are based on comparisons of similar restaurants:
To recommend a restaurant, write: The Weekly Eater, P.O. Box 3080, Honolulu, Hawaii 96802. Or send e-mail to nkam@starbulletin.com
excellent; very good, exceeds expectations; average; below average.
