Going to Olive Garden for Italian is like going to McDonalds for a cheeseburger. It’s a cheap fast food restaurant. I ate there once years ago when they first opened. It was terrible!🤢🤮
Italian or not, those calories are mind-blowing. Chicken tortelloni Alfredo 1980 calories. That's basically the recommended calorie intake per day in one single meal. Being an american chain you'll probably have free refills, so we're talking way past 2000 calories in a single meal. Incredible
Some years ago, coworkers wanted to take me to Olive Garden for my birthday. I convinced them I'd rather go to a local Lebanese restaurant - excellent food and less expensive than Olive Garden. Definitely a better choice! And we all enjoyed.
I took my Sicilian mother to the Olive Garden. When it was over, she said in Italian “Don’t ever take me to this place again!” I told the story to my Latina friends at work. They were livid they said why would you ever take your mom to that place? Do you think I would ever take my mother to a Taco Bell? I kid you not. They didn’t talk to me for a week.
When I was young to save money, friends and I would go to Olive Garden, order the cheapest thing on the menu, and fill up on soup and salad and have them box our main dishes for takeout.
I used to work back of the house at the Olive Garden until probably 2015. Usually long pastas (ie: Spaghetti) would have the sauce poured over top while short pastas would be tossed with the sauce to evenly coat. I think Tour of Italy (Lasa, Pasta+Sauce, Chicken Parm) is meant to be a 'sampler'. You know how us AMERICANS can be :D The sauces were mass produced for the line (even Carbonara). We never had eggs in stock so unsure what the Carbonara was made of :P The 'Alfredo' Sauce had a 4 hour shelf life so that was made fresh everyday. The Chicken and Shrimp Carbonara used to have Pancetta. Unsure if they changed it or if the website is mislabeled. You criticized the Eggplant Parm for being 'lightly fried'. Everything that was fried was deep fried. The website said the Lasa is made fresh daily. Unless if they changed things, the Lasa pasta was frozen with a layer of cheese and we thawed it daily. Olive Garden always does monthly specials so you didn't get to see the Tomato Alfredo Sauce which is equal parts Tomato Sauce and Alfredo Sauce mixed together :D The desserts are shipped pre-made. I think us AMERICANS like proteins with pastas because then it makes it feel like a complete meal.
@ the garlic breadsticks are nice and the spaghetti and meatballs are ok so that’s what I usually get. The minestrone soup is very disappointing. It’s only once a year that I go. Pasta sauce is so much better homemade, especially the ones you have demonstrated for us!
Vincenzo! I used to watch your channel all the time, but then, for some reason, I stopped getting your notifications suddenly. Out of the blue yesterday, you popped into my head after a couple months of inactivity, and I thought to myself, "Man, I haven't watched my guy Vincenzo for ages. I wonder what he's up to?" Then, first thing this morning, I wake up and see your Olive Garden review pop up in my feed! I was extra stoked, as I just *knew* it was gonna be a good one, lol! I'm proud to say that I've never had the (dis)pleasure of dining at an Olive Garden establishment in all my 44 years on this earth. Your breakdown of the menu was absolutely "classic Vincenzo" - just not "classic Italian". I really enjoyed this, and it was a delight catching up with you again. I look forward to perusing some of your back catalogue that I've missed over these past few months. Oh, and lastly. re: the Olive Garden "tiramisu" - custard is quintessentially British, lol. I'm American with largely British, Scottish, Welsh, and Irish ancestry. - so, I *LOVE* my dairy! But, as much as a good custard delights me, it still has no place in a legitimate Tiramisu. Absolutely shameful. Glad to have you back in my orbit once again. This brightened my morning. Best wishes for a happy, healthy, and tasty 2025 to you and your loved ones/nearest and dearest! Keep preaching the gospel and educating us. It is always a treat. I'm planning on fixing your Carbonera recipe for my parents one night soon in the near future. I'll lyk how it goes... 🤞🏻
That’s so awesome to hear you’re back in the orbit. I'm glad you liked the review and that you're planning to make my carbonara! Happy New Year to you and your family. Make sure to click the little bell so you get notifications from me😀
Love the review video vincenzo love your content your a amazing UA-camr I love watching your videos they are the greatest and the best and the coolest your content is the greatest and the best and the coolest it always brings a smile to my face watching your content your a amazing and fantastic cook vincenzo😊❤️❤❤❤
We were recently in an 'Italian' chain restaurant in Germany. There was nothing else open, and everybody was hungry. The kids had pizza, which was ok, I had a salad mit burrata, which was actually not bad. My wife had spaghetti aglio e olio, which was horrible. The pasta was like a birds nest, dry and hard. And the sauce was just oil. I think they just cooked the pasta, put it on a plate, and added some oil with garlic on top of it. No mixing of the oil with pasta water, to get a creamy sauce. I think you would have immediately burned that place down.
I would love to see Vincenzo actually going to an Olive Garden, but I'm not sure he would survive the hypertensive episode that his rage would induce. Perhaps it's for the best, because the only redeeming quality of Olive Garden is that they really will stand there grating parmigiana reggiano onto your salad as long as you want. EDIT: And by "from scratch" they almost certainly don't mean it's made in the restaurant; most likely, it's made in a regional factory and frozen for distribution, like the soups we served when I worked at a bookstore cafe.
When I was in uni in the US, I was in a small city with limited authentic Italian. So I was forced to try Olive Garden because it was the only Italian close to campus. It was horrible. Then, I moved to NYC for grad school, and I was introduced to real Italian food and I never again visited Olive Gardens or any other so called Italian food chain. Good job, Vincenzo educating people
TBH, unless it's a super traditional and rustic kind of place, I wouldn't expect most restaurants in the US to do an actual alfredo. It's much, much more likely to be some kind of mornay. I mean, a lot of them will taste good but very few will ever actually be a proper alfredo. A chain restaurant like this, yeah, no way.. they'll be too concerned with mass production, minimal cost, and easiest training. Wouldn't surprise me if most of the food is made in large regional kitchens and distributed out to the individual stores to be assembled/warmed up. It's also sadly way too common in American Italian restaurants to serve up pasta overcooked, waterlogged, and a dollop of sauce on top. It seems to have entered the public consciousness that boiled pasta straight-to-the-plate and then topped with sauce is somehow correct. On the upside, it makes it pretty easy to tell which restaurants are worth avoiding.
Chain restaurants make sauces in hotel pans, and real alfredo sauce is tricky to make and does not hold up well, so they don't do that. What restaurants call carbonara is even worse. I would be surprised to find any actual egg in them. They pretty much just toss a little bacon in the "alfredo". If you want the real deal, you should probably cook it at home. In general, you can make better food at home than you can get at a restaurant, so save yourself some money and polish those skills.
McD is like this for ingredients but assembled at each location. It makes is very easy. Just push flip and wait for the second beep. They all have huge walk-in filled with regionally prepared ingredients or national for items like their shake which come in a huge carton you dump in back. That machine just runs 24/7 like their coffee which is why the coffee is at 180F.
I love the content! As a person who lives in Texas, I can get why you hate the Olive Garden menu and I am not really a big fan but, Most of the items don't taste bad. Infract they taste better than many chain restraint's. We also have many "Mexican restaurants" that are in no way authentic but have amassing food.
There is good real Italian in Australia, absolutely the majority of it is rubbish. As a whole, I'd say it has improved, though, in the last 10 years, but still too many restaurants getting away with referring to themselves as Italian when they are not even close.
Lol You don’t know how excited I was that you were reviewing Olive Garden!!😆 You’re right btw all the soups are from the can and most of the stuff in general.
I'm pretty sure that nobody in the US thinks that Olive Garden is even remotely authentic. They're catering to people who grew up eating jarred pasta sauces. It fills a carbohydrate-shaped hole, if you have one, but for most people, Olive Garden is the place you go when nobody can decide which superior restaurant they want to go to. I avoid the place because they put garlic in everything that is not a dessert, and garlic is a migraine trigger for me. That said, I do like the salad.
@@berelinde Most Americans have never been to Italy, so how could they possibly distinguish between real and fake Italian food? They are easy prey for big chains like Olive Garden.
@@galoki5654 Nothing wrong with American Italian food, but serving low quality garbage and trying to pass it off as genuine Italian food I find pretty offensive - and I'm not even Italian.
We have an Olive Garden on the way home from church that we have frequented because my husband loves the soup. We know which waiter to request. He makes all the difference. My son, who lives across the country and tried one there even remarked afterwards that Abdul makes all the difference. He knows how we like our favorites and what we like to drink. Sometimes, the wait staff makes the experience even if you know the food is inauthentic.
I think angel hair pasta is popular with Americans because they often have their pasta bare, with sauce placed on top. Since they don't cook the sauce with the pasta, the sauce doesn't stick very well, but a thin pasta will increase the surface area, and hold a sauce better when cool.
I grew up in southwestern Connecticut. I remember going there on purpose a couple times as a teenager (so 30+ years ago) but the only times I've been there in my adult life have been because someone else was paying.
Still, real Italian is hard to find, Nick's makes real Bolognese but the Carbonara is a joke and everything is wrong at Grazie, the risotto is cement, the Bolognese is fake, no meat is in the sauce and then add it after, all their pasta is as white as the customers. Name 1 decent place, I have tried others too, just from their menu you can eliminate most. I think I found 3 to try and I mam afraid to visit expecting disappointment.
Having been a road warrior for many years, the thing I had to give Olive Garden is that if one was near my hotel when I wanted to faceplant after a long day traveling, I could get a full meal which almost certainly wouldn't give me food poisoning. It made a break from Chili's in all those mid-sized towns. Some of the laughably inauthentic food isn't awful, the flavored iced teas are okay, and the bread sticks can be a meal in themselves. Of course, I also stuck to the cheddar biscuits at Red Lobster and the cornbread at Cracker Barrel when dragged into those, so what do I know?
Thank you, Vincenzo for taking on one of the worst excuses for Italian food and doing it charitably! Medagonis come out of that place, thinking that they were served Italian food? 😮 Thank you, God for our culinary delights! Love you, Vincenzo.
The worst is when they're making the German dish Spaghetti mit Schinken Sahne Sauce (spaghetti in a ham and heavy cream sauce, but mostly they're actually putting Tortellini into that sauce) and present it as Carbonara. (Actually, even without them disguising it as Carbonara, because it just doesn't taste good, but then, I wouldn't even order it) This happened to me as a kid on a vacation in Italy, once, we went out to dinner in a restaurant and I became curious about a dish including eggs, speck, Parmigiano, but then decided (and I still regret that decision) to order something else and to order Carbonara the next day instead. Unfortunately, my parents took us to a place which was frequented by lots of German tourists (I was maybe 12 or 13, so I didn't really read much into it, and what such an audience could implicate about this place and their 'cuisine') and when I ordered it, I got spaghetti in a disgusting milky sauce and with cubes of processed ham mixed into it. Yikes. No eggs, no pancetta/guancale (nor even the speck it was supposed to contain, as we were in Northern Italy), no Parmigiano/Grana/Pecorino, (aside from the Grana served in a metal dish on the table), just heavy cream and processed ham, disgusting. It just looked like the thing in the thumbnail. I never went to Olive Garden, but I guess the issue with this place isn't just the lack of authenticity, but also the fact that it's merely just empty calories, it's much more unhealthy, contains more carbs, saturated fats, sugars, dairy, cholesterol, artificial stuff, etc and less vegetables and vitamins than authentic Italian cuisine. Food can be inauthentic, but at least healthy (or not unhealthy), which definitely isn't the case here.
You can have great food in Italy - and bad food. The latter especially in touristy places but that's easy to avoid. When it comes to Germany: same. Outside of Italy you don't find so many Italian chefs in Italian restaurants anyway.
Ho visto altri video di Olive Garden che conosco soltanto tramite voi youtuber ....e per fortuna che li sto vedendo perchè quando verrò in US non ho intenzione di stare male 😅
What would be your favourite combination of pasta and sauce? My favourite for ages was Fusilli but recently I'm loving Penne Rigate or Rigatoni. My local Tesco has a line of more expensive dried pasta that I will now pay the higher price because you have explained pasta bianca indicates better quality.
You should review Outback claiming to be an Australian restaurant. Chains in the states do this everywhere. Put sour cream on tacos, put chicken in pasta, put sugar in fried rice, and so on.
I hope you try Olive Garden soon and see what you think of the food. I have personally only been to an Olive Garden twice in my life and I honestly didn’t dislike it. The salad I thought was really good and so was the breadsticks. Both times I ordered chicken Alfredo which is something I actually do like quite a bit, even though it might give Vincenzo a heart attack lol. The atmosphere at the restaurant was pretty relaxed and seemed quite professional to take your family to.
The main issue with Olive Garden is its name. While staying in Muncie for the MultiGP International Open, we found Olive Garden to be a convenient dining option in this small country town. However, the first salad we received had only two olives but came with an abundance of breadsticks-a trend that persisted throughout our visit. Every single time, regardless of whether two or more of us were dining there, we would consistently get just two olives in the salad and an overload of breadsticks. It shouldn’t be called Olive Garden; a more fitting name would be Breadstick Garden!
I’m glad you’re covering this restaurant. I get a little upset every time someone calls this Italian food in America. The “Tour of Italy” doesn’t have a single Italian dish on it!
I'm also Mexican, and when I lived in Texas 20 years ago I suffered so much trying to find real authentic Mexican food, but all I had was the abomination that is tex mex.
Americans don't have traditional food, when I think about american food I only think of hamburguers or hot dogs, really sad. And when they try to make food from any country they make it their own way creating a distorted version of it.
As a European living in the US, I have visited there. My favorite is probably zuppa Toscana. It's a nice hearty soup, and has the best flavor compared to the actual foods. I have tried some of the ones you mentioned, and they are palatable, but I know they are not authentic.
Fun fact: Even in Las Vegas where I live, people joke about Olive Garden being terrible! 😂😂🤣🤣 This city was built by the Mafia, so believe it or not, we've got some great REAL Italian food here!
I once went to an Olive Garden with a friend of mine. When the waiter came, I asked him if he could check with the cooks to see what they might recommend which didn't have either onions or garlic. The waiter came back and said that I might wish to go to another restaurant 🤣.
Most restaurant food in America is made in factories, frozen, then shipped to restaurants especially chain restaurants. I've never gone to an Olive Garden on purpose but have only been there twice. Once they mixed up the order and I ended up with garlic chicken which was horrendous. The first time was so long ago. I don't even remember what I had. But restaurant food in America has become all corporate. It's what corporate America thinks Americans will believe is Italian. Believe me, it's full of chemicals and sugars and salts.
I'm gonna fight you on the chicken tortellini. That used to be served on top of fettuccine with Alfredo. Probably the best thing I'd ever eaten there. Lol
@@vincenzosplate Because they do everything wrong but it's still good enough. The cheeses and sauces and ingredients and dishes are not executed properly but it's good enough that most people think it's good.
@@jamesburrell677 Good enough as what?😳 I lived in Italy for more than 3 years when I was in the Navy. Never seen anything there like what they're serving at Olive Garden!😳
It's an Italian-American restaurant, my friend. Italian-American cuisine is a thing unto itself. Once this distinction is admitted, O-G is a great place for drunk food. Same goes for a New York slice. Buon appetito.
THANK YOU!!! My wife's family just loves this place. I am deathly allergic to processed cheese and they put that S*^t in everything. If I HAVE to go, I get the Steak or Salmon and broccoli.
Every fast casual Italian styled restaurant here in the states serves their version chicken alfredo. You can buy it in the freezer section of every grocery including the cheap "dollar" stores. Extremely popular dish
Olive garden is American food (inspired by Italian food for looks). It tasted really good to the American taste buds in the 90s cause the quality of how they're making it and the ingredients were much higher back then. Since one of the major chain conglomerates bought them (there's only a handful of companies that own all chain restaurants in the US), they've drastically cut costs since then (profit motive) and kept the prices high. A lot of them are empty now compared to before but they stay in business cause the cost they put in is so low and the price they charge so high, that they can survive with fewer customers now. Basically, any chain owned by these companies aren't there to serve tasty food. They are there to squeeze as much money from you while reducing the cost in making that food as much as they can. It's trash now Would be hilarious if we had a video of you eating that garbage. You would be horrified!! The pasta stick completely to one another and the sauce has 0 flavor lol
I've never actually eaten in an Italian restaurant in England and i am glad i haven't especially after seeing Vincenzo reactions to olive garden , I now do pasta dishes Vincenzo way and my pasta dishes have never tasted so good , thanks Vincenzo cause of you i eat tasty pasta dishes because of you , God bless you and your beautiful family Grazie 🙏
My Bolognese was close, just add Passata now. Carbonara, I now use a better method than he first showed, use a separate bowl to mix, no cooked eggs, it takes 30 seconds to go from cement to creamy.
I have been to Olive Garden only once, because it was someone else's idea. I had a weird chicken breast thing, and it came with mashed potatoes. I asked the waitress if they had polenta but she had never heard of it. Olive Garden had a TV commercial for their "pasta in a bread bowl." I thought, why not a baked potato stuffed with rice? As for serving pasta that is not mixed with the sauce, US restaurants always serve salad and dressing separately. They expect you to toss the salad and dressing in the little dish.
Vincenzo..................I would like to share a few things with you about Olive Garden. 1.) Jay Leno used to make jokes about how terrible it is regularly on The Tonight Show. Maybe once a week lol. 2.) In a big city like Houston, there are at least a dozen Italian restaurants that are FAR better 3.) Probably 30% of Olive Garden's business comes from the soup, salad and breadsticks special. Most people know the pasta is terrible, and if they go they just get that as the salad is not great, but edible. 4.) In rural mid-America outside of mid size and big cities, sadly this is the un-cultured American's Italian food experience. 5.) People with Italian heritage never go to this place. 6.) Uncultured white Americans and new arrivals (Hispanics) are Olive Garden's customer base. 7.) The last time I was in an Olive Garden was probably 16 years ago. I got the salad and breadsticks deal. The current day menu is far worse than what I remember. Far worse.
They're in S. America, too. People here think it's good, but then they also think that Outback is Australian and that putting a ton of salt on meat before cooking it is the best barbecue.
Vincenzo i have a question about ragu alla bolognese....how much fat should be on top after its finished cooking. Just generally a speaking, a little, alot? thanks my friend.
It is normal to have some fat on top of the ragu and its a good thing because it adds flavours. But if there is too much its best to scoop it out. Balance is the key
It's kind of like the Italian version of tex-mex. If it weren't for the claim of being Italian (rather then being Italy inspired) Some of the dishes are quite nice. However, my own Italian cooking I've learned from you and Pasta Grammar is better! Thank you Vincenzo!!
I’m not saying it’s authentic Italian but when the food is made right I love it. Their breadsticks are awesome and salad is great. For pasta I like the 5 cheese ziti and fettuccine Alfredo. Also I agree u don’t mix steak with pasta. I never even did that. Perfect steak dinner is with a baked potato and asparagus.
The U.S. usage of entrée dates back to when it was used to describe a large course served after soup. It eventually became synonymous with main course in the U.S.
Occasionally Olive Garden has actually had some REALLY good choices. They had this pork with a crust on it and these ravioli one time that was so damn good. They always get rid of their best choices. Pisses me off. It may get a bad reputation but I'm telling you. That place has had some really damn good food on the menu at times.
Not only is the menu gross, it is not exactly cheap. Vincenzo, 3 weeks ago i had a meal in a Trastevere osteria -- small plates, mostly fish. My God, so good.
Vinny, I like Olive Garden. I've eaten in authentic Italian restaurants, and their ok. But normally, I make my own Italian food at home. Most of your recipes.
I would never have pasta with steak! Potatoes and steak always. If they advertise authentic Italian food, I'd never eat there again. Being a Texan, I love Italian food. I use yours and Pasta Grammers recipes. Having a happy wife, eating real itaian food, makes my world. Thanks Vinny, long time follower.
I don't like olive garden however one dish I love. Not sure if it's an actual Italian dish but it's yummy. Steak gorgonzola. I make it at home now because it's so good. Give it a try.
One thing that matters is what happens when the incomes of poor Italians by and by increase. Let's have a look at two such cases; a) The situation Italian immigrants in America were in around 1880-1940 and b) The decades following WWII in Italy. In both cases, many Italians were under- and malnourished to begin with but gradually experienced rising standards of living. What are the first food items such Italians start consuming more of as their economic situation improves? Often eggs, milk and cheaper sorts of seafood. If they find themselves able to spend even more money on food, they'll start buying chicken meat, pork, cream, butter, sugar (around 1900 high sugar consumption was seen as a sign of prosperity) as well as more expensive seafood, intestines and cheaper cuts of veal, beef and lamb, next step is to consume more expensive cuts of veal, beef and lamb. The final step is becoming picky about what should be used in 'authentic' dishes. At this point, you start hearing battle cries like "No cream in carbonara!" and similar ones more frequently. The demand for high quality and locally produced traditional food products increase. These stages of development can be seen in both a) and b). But there also are differences. In a) chicken made its way into pasta dishes, but not in b). In Italy, chicken is almost never found in pasta dishes (two exceptions are gnocchi con sugo di gallina and gnocchi al ragù di pollo, chicken giblets also appear in some pasta sauces, for example in ragù alla bolognese where chicken liver is sometimes but not often used). What about cream? During the period of 1945-1990 cream was popular in a lot of Italian dishes, including carbonara. In the decades following WWII, cooking with cream was often experienced as luxurious. Today, cream in savoury dishes is seen as 'untraditional' in Italy, despite the fact it was rather traditional during a long time. But lets not exaggerate here, there have always been Italians who disapprove of using cream in that way. Back to the basic question, why does American Italian cuisine often feature chicken and cream (in contexts where it's not found in Italian cuisine). While eating preferences among immigrants from Italy probably matter, it's also important to remember that Italians inter-married with spouses from other ethnic groups, that American Italian restaurant owners had to adapt their menus according to the preferences of guests from other population segments and that the food industry, restaurant chains and the media have been influential in shaping what is seen as Italian food in America. There are other explanations, but I would say these factors explain a lot.
@@toriless Yes, today that is the case. A very popular carbonara recipe from 1989 by the famous Italian chef Gualtiero Marchesi calls for over 60 grams of cream per serving! Other highly influential Italian chefs like Luigi Carnacina (1960) and Renato Gualandi (1944 according to his own, later claims) also used cream in carbonara. In sharp contrast, the first published carbonara recipe known, an American recipe presented by Patricia Bronté in a 1952 guide to Chicago, contains no cream at all. When it comes to peas, L'Accademia Italiana della cucina/the Italian Academy of Cuisine and the Chamber of Commerce of Bologna approves of using peas in a ragù alla bolognese as an optional ingredient. Perhaps Jamie Oliver and Gordon Ramsay made them do so? 😂
@@torilessIn the 60's and 70's it was extremely common to use cream to stabilize sauces in restaurants, and Italy was no exception to that trend. For some reason, despite cream being very uncommon in both modern American and Italian cooking, it still shows up in pretty much all American "Alfredo" and "carbonara" preparations. (In America use of cream outside of very few dishes puts the recipe in the same category as a "Jell-O salad"; it's something alien and kind of disgusting that you vaguely remember Great Aunt Bertha bringing to a family picnic 25 years ago. )
Vincenzo. I live in CA and there an Olive Garden a couple of miles from my home. It is American Italian food on a budget. Some of their plates taste like they came straight out the frozen isle section. But other plates are just ok at being American Italian fusion food. There are way better American Italian and restaurants that serve authentic Italian food as well. I would never take an Italian to this place but I wouldn’t mind going out there on a Friday night when nobody wants to cook at home and we are tired of eating pizza, burgers or Chinese food. Love your Chanel and all the recipes.
Now I understand why I always agree with you. We are not only of Italian origin, but we are both of Abruzzese origin! As my grandmother would say, we are "Frate Cugini!"
Vincenzo, for a laugh sometime check out comedian Eddy Burback- he did a video called (paraphrased) "which is better, olive garden or italy?" where he went to an olive garden before going on vacation to italy 😂
Please God don’t blame Texans for that restaurant. It’s a national chain that’s on its way out. It was founded in Orlando, Florida (Disneyville )12/13/1082 for General Mills.
I dont think it's on its way out. Its always filled with highschool/college kids. My sister goes there atleast once a month with her family. And when you see other people that aren't younger that are in there you think "yes. These types of people would eat this
Ah Texass the place who claim to have invented chilli? then said mexico meanwhile it was the Canary Islands off the coast of africa...(besides that whole state motto "everyithing is bigger in texas...penile complex if ever there was one......(please do blame texas, America's "Quebec" )
Chicken Scampi? I went to Olive Garden while visiting North Carolina in the late 1990's. Can't remember the exact location. I had a spaghetti with meat sauce I think they called it. I remember it having a bit of a greasy feel to it, was very heavy. Wasn't the best, had a bit of a reheated nature about it. The workers were great though! Although we are quite spoiled with Italian restaurants in Glasgow, a lot of little gems, if you avoid the chain type of carry on.
G'day Vincenzo, I have a request for you. I have learned about a Roman recipe called Trippa alla Romana. Maybe one day we can explore this? Thanks, and have a great day! -P.S. Olive Garden is that restaurant that only serves you to get full and throw up later.
G'Day mate what a beautiful request. Trippa is one of my family favorite dishes. I recorded a recipe with my mum (the master) about 9 years ago. Here is the video ua-cam.com/video/GU7QlpQBxJg/v-deo.htmlsi=rlFhzqUZYEz8W8XA That olive garden is so bad. Not sure why people go and why its so popular
As an Italian-American I can tell you Vincenzo that Olive Garden is the absolute WORST! Thank you so much for making this video! Big fan of your videos. Wishing you, and your family all the best❤️
Btw Vincenzo, I did try delverde pasta for the first time. I tried both penne, and spaghetti Personally, I did like them. Very good pasta brand. But, because it’s pricier and much more difficult to find than for example La Molisana? I don’t think I’d have it very often But I am glad I tried it :)
i have two restaurants to introduce to you. d'vinci's, there used to be more of them open, and this is where i first had chicken fettuccine alfredo. the other is a more expensive place that has more of your favorits in it, it is called buca di beppo.
I think if you look at it as an "American-Italian" restaurant chain, serving American-Italian dishes you might feel better. Italian and American-Italian cuisines are related but quite different. Like Irish cuisine and Newfoundland cuisine. Both come from the same roots but we went in a different direction once we crossed the Atlantic. IMO the American-Italians did too
Pro tip, if you guys want the chicken with your alfredo, an alternative is to serve the alfredo first per tradition and enjoy your chicken with veggies after. Pasta makes a great first dish before your main.
As a European, i see Olive Garden as fusion food. They´re just not aware of it. Actually, i find the creations inspiring - not original, but creative. 😆 I do understand Vicenzo though. If an American restaurant would butcher my own home country‘s dishes, i would cry so much. 😭
i came here to see Vincenzo going into an actual olive garden restaurant and suffering eating the food.
We need this 🤣
If he actually did go there, he'd never survive to make a video about it.
I think poor Vincenzo would have a heart attack 😅
I don’t think he would try more than one bite!🤢🤮
Going to Olive Garden for Italian is like going to McDonalds for a cheeseburger. It’s a cheap fast food restaurant. I ate there once years ago when they first opened. It was terrible!🤢🤮
Italian or not, those calories are mind-blowing. Chicken tortelloni Alfredo 1980 calories. That's basically the recommended calorie intake per day in one single meal. Being an american chain you'll probably have free refills, so we're talking way past 2000 calories in a single meal. Incredible
Incredible indeed
True, if you cook those dishes normally at home, they'll have like half those calories, possibly even only 1/3.
They would finish starvation in the whole world in a couple weeks
I WAS THINKING THE SAME THIIIING!!!
Why is everything in the US so high in calories?? Everything
@@Nana-jl3en basically added oil/butter and trans-fat in everything on the menu. And high sodium too.
Some years ago, coworkers wanted to take me to Olive Garden for my birthday. I convinced them I'd rather go to a local Lebanese restaurant - excellent food and less expensive than Olive Garden.
Definitely a better choice! And we all enjoyed.
Lebanese food is so good!
At least its Mediterranian...👍
I took my Sicilian mother to the Olive Garden. When it was over, she said in Italian “Don’t ever take me to this place again!”
I told the story to my Latina friends at work. They were livid they said why would you ever take your mom to that place? Do you think I would ever take my mother to a Taco Bell? I kid you not. They didn’t talk to me for a week.
What an interesting story. Thanks for sharing
😅😅😅
Why take here there? Was it meant to be a joke?
I'm surprised she didn't walk out and sit in the car lol.
@@johnclawed no. True story.
The best part is he thinks the PICTURES LOOK BAD.
Vincenzo, the pictures are 1000 times better than the food they actually make.
Really? That is not a goof thing at all
Yeah, it doesn’t look a thing like the website
FACT! The only thing I have ever eaten there is the calimari. Nothing authentic about it. Lots of great taco trucks in Texas though.
@@vincenzosplate the food is absolutely disgusting. everything tastes like cheap garlic powder.
When I was young to save money, friends and I would go to Olive Garden, order the cheapest thing on the menu, and fill up on soup and salad and have them box our main dishes for takeout.
Good memories for you I believe?
I tried olive garden while visiting the US, that soup was really tasty to be fair.
I used to work back of the house at the Olive Garden until probably 2015.
Usually long pastas (ie: Spaghetti) would have the sauce poured over top while short pastas would be tossed with the sauce to evenly coat.
I think Tour of Italy (Lasa, Pasta+Sauce, Chicken Parm) is meant to be a 'sampler'. You know how us AMERICANS can be :D
The sauces were mass produced for the line (even Carbonara). We never had eggs in stock so unsure what the Carbonara was made of :P The 'Alfredo' Sauce had a 4 hour shelf life so that was made fresh everyday.
The Chicken and Shrimp Carbonara used to have Pancetta. Unsure if they changed it or if the website is mislabeled.
You criticized the Eggplant Parm for being 'lightly fried'. Everything that was fried was deep fried.
The website said the Lasa is made fresh daily. Unless if they changed things, the Lasa pasta was frozen with a layer of cheese and we thawed it daily.
Olive Garden always does monthly specials so you didn't get to see the Tomato Alfredo Sauce which is equal parts Tomato Sauce and Alfredo Sauce mixed together :D
The desserts are shipped pre-made.
I think us AMERICANS like proteins with pastas because then it makes it feel like a complete meal.
I go to Olive Garden once a year: on November 11. Because they offer a free meal for veterans!
That's very thoughtful of them! Which dishes have you tried and liked?
@ the garlic breadsticks are nice and the spaghetti and meatballs are ok so that’s what I usually get. The minestrone soup is very disappointing. It’s only once a year that I go. Pasta sauce is so much better homemade, especially the ones you have demonstrated for us!
@@doubanjiang Spaghetti and meatballs is a strange combination in my humble opinion. 😟
Vincenzo! I used to watch your channel all the time, but then, for some reason, I stopped getting your notifications suddenly. Out of the blue yesterday, you popped into my head after a couple months of inactivity, and I thought to myself, "Man, I haven't watched my guy Vincenzo for ages. I wonder what he's up to?"
Then, first thing this morning, I wake up and see your Olive Garden review pop up in my feed! I was extra stoked, as I just *knew* it was gonna be a good one, lol!
I'm proud to say that I've never had the (dis)pleasure of dining at an Olive Garden establishment in all my 44 years on this earth. Your breakdown of the menu was absolutely "classic Vincenzo" - just not "classic Italian".
I really enjoyed this, and it was a delight catching up with you again. I look forward to perusing some of your back catalogue that I've missed over these past few months.
Oh, and lastly. re: the Olive Garden "tiramisu" - custard is quintessentially British, lol. I'm American with largely British, Scottish, Welsh, and Irish ancestry. - so, I *LOVE* my dairy! But, as much as a good custard delights me, it still has no place in a legitimate Tiramisu. Absolutely shameful.
Glad to have you back in my orbit once again. This brightened my morning.
Best wishes for a happy, healthy, and tasty 2025 to you and your loved ones/nearest and dearest! Keep preaching the gospel and educating us. It is always a treat. I'm planning on fixing your Carbonera recipe for my parents one night soon in the near future. I'll lyk how it goes... 🤞🏻
That’s so awesome to hear you’re back in the orbit. I'm glad you liked the review and that you're planning to make my carbonara! Happy New Year to you and your family. Make sure to click the little bell so you get notifications from me😀
Love the review video vincenzo love your content your a amazing UA-camr I love watching your videos they are the greatest and the best and the coolest your content is the greatest and the best and the coolest it always brings a smile to my face watching your content your a amazing and fantastic cook vincenzo😊❤️❤❤❤
Thank you so much for your kind words, it means a lot to me!
We were recently in an 'Italian' chain restaurant in Germany. There was nothing else open, and everybody was hungry. The kids had pizza, which was ok, I had a salad mit burrata, which was actually not bad. My wife had spaghetti aglio e olio, which was horrible. The pasta was like a birds nest, dry and hard. And the sauce was just oil. I think they just cooked the pasta, put it on a plate, and added some oil with garlic on top of it. No mixing of the oil with pasta water, to get a creamy sauce. I think you would have immediately burned that place down.
Probably Asian chefs, in the US 80% are Hispanic and take the bus home or carpool.
Chicken with shrimps riminds me a dish from France : Poulet aux écrevisses (Chicken with crayfish). You have to taste it if you come visit
I surely will, thanks for the suggestion😊
I would love to see Vincenzo actually going to an Olive Garden, but I'm not sure he would survive the hypertensive episode that his rage would induce. Perhaps it's for the best, because the only redeeming quality of Olive Garden is that they really will stand there grating parmigiana reggiano onto your salad as long as you want.
EDIT: And by "from scratch" they almost certainly don't mean it's made in the restaurant; most likely, it's made in a regional factory and frozen for distribution, like the soups we served when I worked at a bookstore cafe.
Olive garden - school cafeteria quality with a price tag.
Perfect description 😂
When I was in uni in the US, I was in a small city with limited authentic Italian. So I was forced to try Olive Garden because it was the only Italian close to campus. It was horrible. Then, I moved to NYC for grad school, and I was introduced to real Italian food and I never again visited Olive Gardens or any other so called Italian food chain. Good job, Vincenzo educating people
There are a lot of minuses to NYC but the Italian food you can get there is definitely a plus.
Vincenzo. As a Kentuckian I apologize for Fazoli’s, but you should review it next.
Haha thanks for the suggestion my friend, let's see what I can do 😊
Fazolis ain't even worth his time for a review
TBH, unless it's a super traditional and rustic kind of place, I wouldn't expect most restaurants in the US to do an actual alfredo. It's much, much more likely to be some kind of mornay. I mean, a lot of them will taste good but very few will ever actually be a proper alfredo. A chain restaurant like this, yeah, no way.. they'll be too concerned with mass production, minimal cost, and easiest training. Wouldn't surprise me if most of the food is made in large regional kitchens and distributed out to the individual stores to be assembled/warmed up. It's also sadly way too common in American Italian restaurants to serve up pasta overcooked, waterlogged, and a dollop of sauce on top. It seems to have entered the public consciousness that boiled pasta straight-to-the-plate and then topped with sauce is somehow correct. On the upside, it makes it pretty easy to tell which restaurants are worth avoiding.
Chain restaurants make sauces in hotel pans, and real alfredo sauce is tricky to make and does not hold up well, so they don't do that. What restaurants call carbonara is even worse. I would be surprised to find any actual egg in them. They pretty much just toss a little bacon in the "alfredo". If you want the real deal, you should probably cook it at home. In general, you can make better food at home than you can get at a restaurant, so save yourself some money and polish those skills.
McD is like this for ingredients but assembled at each location. It makes is very easy. Just push flip and wait for the second beep. They all have huge walk-in filled with regionally prepared ingredients or national for items like their shake which come in a huge carton you dump in back. That machine just runs 24/7 like their coffee which is why the coffee is at 180F.
@@berelinde bet they don't even put pea's in it
I love the content! As a person who lives in Texas, I can get why you hate the Olive Garden menu and I am not really a big fan but, Most of the items don't taste bad. Infract they taste better than many chain restraint's. We also have many "Mexican restaurants" that are in no way authentic but have amassing food.
look at the Italian restaurants and their menu's in Australia.. Most use bacon and cream and are like olive garden
I'll make sure to check some out, I hope this isn't true 😅
@@vincenzosplateyes Vincenzo it’s true unfortunately look at a place called nonnas Italian and many others
There is good real Italian in Australia, absolutely the majority of it is rubbish. As a whole, I'd say it has improved, though, in the last 10 years, but still too many restaurants getting away with referring to themselves as Italian when they are not even close.
That’s why I just learn how to cook authentic Italian recipes myself.
@@keltecdan i make mine vegan but authentic in the way its made and what i use in style
Lol You don’t know how excited I was that you were reviewing Olive Garden!!😆 You’re right btw all the soups are from the can and most of the stuff in general.
I'm pretty sure that nobody in the US thinks that Olive Garden is even remotely authentic. They're catering to people who grew up eating jarred pasta sauces. It fills a carbohydrate-shaped hole, if you have one, but for most people, Olive Garden is the place you go when nobody can decide which superior restaurant they want to go to. I avoid the place because they put garlic in everything that is not a dessert, and garlic is a migraine trigger for me. That said, I do like the salad.
@@berelinde Most Americans have never been to Italy, so how could they possibly distinguish between real and fake Italian food? They are easy prey for big chains like Olive Garden.
It very hard to stuff up a salad..😮
@@berelinde They're successful because most Americans view it as the real deal. Their guests are like lambs lead to the slaughter.
you'd be surprised how many people think it's real Italian...I find myself "intervening" more often than I should.
@@galoki5654 Nothing wrong with American Italian food, but serving low quality garbage and trying to pass it off as genuine Italian food I find pretty offensive - and I'm not even Italian.
We have an Olive Garden on the way home from church that we have frequented because my husband loves the soup. We know which waiter to request. He makes all the difference. My son, who lives across the country and tried one there even remarked afterwards that Abdul makes all the difference. He knows how we like our favorites and what we like to drink. Sometimes, the wait staff makes the experience even if you know the food is inauthentic.
I think angel hair pasta is popular with Americans because they often have their pasta bare, with sauce placed on top. Since they don't cook the sauce with the pasta, the sauce doesn't stick very well, but a thin pasta will increase the surface area, and hold a sauce better when cool.
I’m from the Northeast, so I abstain from Olive Garden for common decency.
I grew up in southwestern Connecticut. I remember going there on purpose a couple times as a teenager (so 30+ years ago) but the only times I've been there in my adult life have been because someone else was paying.
@@riseofthesugars5312 anywhere between Chicago and the East Coast has excellent family Italian restaurants
Avoid chains, like anything else
Still, real Italian is hard to find, Nick's makes real Bolognese but the Carbonara is a joke and everything is wrong at Grazie, the risotto is cement, the Bolognese is fake, no meat is in the sauce and then add it after, all their pasta is as white as the customers. Name 1 decent place, I have tried others too, just from their menu you can eliminate most. I think I found 3 to try and I mam afraid to visit expecting disappointment.
Smart choice!!
Having been a road warrior for many years, the thing I had to give Olive Garden is that if one was near my hotel when I wanted to faceplant after a long day traveling, I could get a full meal which almost certainly wouldn't give me food poisoning. It made a break from Chili's in all those mid-sized towns. Some of the laughably inauthentic food isn't awful, the flavored iced teas are okay, and the bread sticks can be a meal in themselves. Of course, I also stuck to the cheddar biscuits at Red Lobster and the cornbread at Cracker Barrel when dragged into those, so what do I know?
Thank you, Vincenzo for taking on one of the worst excuses for Italian food and doing it charitably! Medagonis come out of that place, thinking that they were served Italian food? 😮 Thank you, God for our culinary delights! Love you, Vincenzo.
I'm glad you're enjoying the video
The worst is when they're making the German dish Spaghetti mit Schinken Sahne Sauce (spaghetti in a ham and heavy cream sauce, but mostly they're actually putting Tortellini into that sauce) and present it as Carbonara. (Actually, even without them disguising it as Carbonara, because it just doesn't taste good, but then, I wouldn't even order it) This happened to me as a kid on a vacation in Italy, once, we went out to dinner in a restaurant and I became curious about a dish including eggs, speck, Parmigiano, but then decided (and I still regret that decision) to order something else and to order Carbonara the next day instead. Unfortunately, my parents took us to a place which was frequented by lots of German tourists (I was maybe 12 or 13, so I didn't really read much into it, and what such an audience could implicate about this place and their 'cuisine') and when I ordered it, I got spaghetti in a disgusting milky sauce and with cubes of processed ham mixed into it. Yikes. No eggs, no pancetta/guancale (nor even the speck it was supposed to contain, as we were in Northern Italy), no Parmigiano/Grana/Pecorino, (aside from the Grana served in a metal dish on the table), just heavy cream and processed ham, disgusting. It just looked like the thing in the thumbnail. I never went to Olive Garden, but I guess the issue with this place isn't just the lack of authenticity, but also the fact that it's merely just empty calories, it's much more unhealthy, contains more carbs, saturated fats, sugars, dairy, cholesterol, artificial stuff, etc and less vegetables and vitamins than authentic Italian cuisine. Food can be inauthentic, but at least healthy (or not unhealthy), which definitely isn't the case here.
You can have great food in Italy - and bad food. The latter especially in touristy places but that's easy to avoid. When it comes to Germany: same. Outside of Italy you don't find so many Italian chefs in Italian restaurants anyway.
Ho visto altri video di Olive Garden che conosco soltanto tramite voi youtuber ....e per fortuna che li sto vedendo perchè quando verrò in US non ho intenzione di stare male 😅
What would be your favourite combination of pasta and sauce? My favourite for ages was Fusilli but recently I'm loving Penne Rigate or Rigatoni. My local Tesco has a line of more expensive dried pasta that I will now pay the higher price because you have explained pasta bianca indicates better quality.
Love the video ❤
Thanks so much!
You should review Outback claiming to be an Australian restaurant. Chains in the states do this everywhere. Put sour cream on tacos, put chicken in pasta, put sugar in fried rice, and so on.
If you don't eat 2 day's in a raw and the 3rd day you drink some beer then this menu looks delicious 😂
I can see how that would be the only way to like their menu😂
I hope you try Olive Garden soon and see what you think of the food. I have personally only been to an Olive Garden twice in my life and I honestly didn’t dislike it. The salad I thought was really good and so was the breadsticks. Both times I ordered chicken Alfredo which is something I actually do like quite a bit, even though it might give Vincenzo a heart attack lol. The atmosphere at the restaurant was pretty relaxed and seemed quite professional to take your family to.
I thought it was a real Italian food, until I started watching your channel. Apart from that, food is somewhat tasty!😅
The main issue with Olive Garden is its name. While staying in Muncie for the MultiGP International Open, we found Olive Garden to be a convenient dining option in this small country town. However, the first salad we received had only two olives but came with an abundance of breadsticks-a trend that persisted throughout our visit. Every single time, regardless of whether two or more of us were dining there, we would consistently get just two olives in the salad and an overload of breadsticks. It shouldn’t be called Olive Garden; a more fitting name would be Breadstick Garden!
You got to make a video where you actually go to one and eat it. I bet you'll hit a million views just from that alone
I’m glad you’re covering this restaurant. I get a little upset every time someone calls this Italian food in America. The “Tour of Italy” doesn’t have a single Italian dish on it!
I'm Mexican, and Olive Garden is just americanized Italian food, just like tex mex is americanized Mexican food, absolutely horrible.
I'm also Mexican, and when I lived in Texas 20 years ago I suffered so much trying to find real authentic Mexican food, but all I had was the abomination that is tex mex.
Americans don't have traditional food, when I think about american food I only think of hamburguers or hot dogs, really sad. And when they try to make food from any country they make it their own way creating a distorted version of it.
I couldn't find a single 100% italian recipe 😅
Tex Mex is fusion, and for me is great. Swept Scandinavia in the 90's, and of course we didn't have access to Mexican cuisine.
@@wazawaza8005what do you think bbq is? That’s pretty American cuisine.
As a European living in the US, I have visited there. My favorite is probably zuppa Toscana. It's a nice hearty soup, and has the best flavor compared to the actual foods. I have tried some of the ones you mentioned, and they are palatable, but I know they are not authentic.
As Tuscan born and bred i still wonder why they call that abomination "tuscan soup"... 😂
I'm glad you didn't suffer through an actual visit to the Olive Garden, Vincenzo -- but it would have been fun to watch.
I haven’t eaten at an Olive Garden in 30 years, and for good reason. They’re the McDonalds of “Italian” restaurants.
More like Taco Bell.
Yes, they can go wrong with calamari. In my area, they put chopped onions on them.
Oh no 😂
Fun fact: Even in Las Vegas where I live, people joke about Olive Garden being terrible! 😂😂🤣🤣 This city was built by the Mafia, so believe it or not, we've got some great REAL Italian food here!
Jos Italianos
😅
Vincenzo, Switzerland 🇨🇭 is Olive Garden free. I guess there are too many Italians living here ,
Thank you very much for sharing your video with us.
Thanks my friend for the comment
I once went to an Olive Garden with a friend of mine. When the waiter came, I asked him if he could check with the cooks to see what they might recommend which didn't have either onions or garlic. The waiter came back and said that I might wish to go to another restaurant 🤣.
Haha! I guess they didn't have anything for you to eat!😅
Most restaurant food in America is made in factories, frozen, then shipped to restaurants especially chain restaurants. I've never gone to an Olive Garden on purpose but have only been there twice. Once they mixed up the order and I ended up with garlic chicken which was horrendous. The first time was so long ago. I don't even remember what I had. But restaurant food in America has become all corporate. It's what corporate America thinks Americans will believe is Italian. Believe me, it's full of chemicals and sugars and salts.
Chain restaurant food.
He should try the bologna Parmesan, it will blow Vincenzo’s mind! Life changing meal!
Hate all you want but this is a hugely successful business that people have fallen in love at and get engaged! Lol Vicenzo it was a great video 😂
Thanks for the compliment on the video!
I'm gonna fight you on the chicken tortellini. That used to be served on top of fettuccine with Alfredo. Probably the best thing I'd ever eaten there. Lol
Well at least you've had a good experience there
@vincenzosplate I usually do. But that was also long before I started making my own pasta! 😆 🤣
When I was in Dallas, I would see a long line of people waiting outside to get into Olive Garden. It was insane.
Olive Garden is a tribute to the greatness of Italian cuisine. They get it all wrong but to be honest it's still pretty good.
How can their menu be a tribute to Italian cuisine? 😂
@@vincenzosplate Because they do everything wrong but it's still good enough. The cheeses and sauces and ingredients and dishes are not executed properly but it's good enough that most people think it's good.
@@jamesburrell677 Good enough as what?😳 I lived in Italy for more than 3 years when I was in the Navy. Never seen anything there like what they're serving at Olive Garden!😳
I had to laugh when you said in Italy the chef says “you are eating my food.”
Have you ever seen the movie “Big Night”? You will absolutely love it!!
It's an Italian-American restaurant, my friend. Italian-American cuisine is a thing unto itself. Once this distinction is admitted, O-G is a great place for drunk food. Same goes for a New York slice. Buon appetito.
THANK YOU!!! My wife's family just loves this place. I am deathly allergic to processed cheese and they put that S*^t in everything. If I HAVE to go, I get the Steak or Salmon and broccoli.
Olive Garden is nothing but a Denny’s with Italian paint on it.
This is great lol
😂😂😂😂
@@vincenzosplate
A response from Vincenzo himself? Bravo, grazie!
Every fast casual Italian styled restaurant here in the states serves their version chicken alfredo. You can buy it in the freezer section of every grocery including the cheap "dollar" stores. Extremely popular dish
Olive garden is American food (inspired by Italian food for looks).
It tasted really good to the American taste buds in the 90s cause the quality of how they're making it and the ingredients were much higher back then.
Since one of the major chain conglomerates bought them (there's only a handful of companies that own all chain restaurants in the US), they've drastically cut costs since then (profit motive) and kept the prices high. A lot of them are empty now compared to before but they stay in business cause the cost they put in is so low and the price they charge so high, that they can survive with fewer customers now.
Basically, any chain owned by these companies aren't there to serve tasty food. They are there to squeeze as much money from you while reducing the cost in making that food as much as they can.
It's trash now
Would be hilarious if we had a video of you eating that garbage. You would be horrified!! The pasta stick completely to one another and the sauce has 0 flavor lol
I've never actually eaten in an Italian restaurant in England and i am glad i haven't especially after seeing Vincenzo reactions to olive garden ,
I now do pasta dishes Vincenzo way and my pasta dishes have never tasted so good , thanks Vincenzo cause of you i eat tasty pasta dishes because of you , God bless you and your beautiful family Grazie 🙏
My Bolognese was close, just add Passata now. Carbonara, I now use a better method than he first showed, use a separate bowl to mix, no cooked eggs, it takes 30 seconds to go from cement to creamy.
Thanks for the support my friend. Your comment made me smile
Would definitely appreciate Vincenzo's expert review of the Maggia nos chain....
Thanks for the suggestion! Let me see what I can do 😊
I am confused about parmesan, pecorino Romano and grana padano? Which one do I lut on pasta 😅
Which pasta are you trying to cook?
I have been to Olive Garden only once, because it was someone else's idea. I had a weird chicken breast thing, and it came with mashed potatoes. I asked the waitress if they had polenta but she had never heard of it.
Olive Garden had a TV commercial for their "pasta in a bread bowl." I thought, why not a baked potato stuffed with rice?
As for serving pasta that is not mixed with the sauce, US restaurants always serve salad and dressing separately. They expect you to toss the salad and dressing in the little dish.
Vincenzo..................I would like to share a few things with you about Olive Garden.
1.) Jay Leno used to make jokes about how terrible it is regularly on The Tonight Show. Maybe once a week lol.
2.) In a big city like Houston, there are at least a dozen Italian restaurants that are FAR better
3.) Probably 30% of Olive Garden's business comes from the soup, salad and breadsticks special. Most people know the pasta is terrible, and if they go they just get that as the salad is not great, but edible.
4.) In rural mid-America outside of mid size and big cities, sadly this is the un-cultured American's Italian food experience.
5.) People with Italian heritage never go to this place.
6.) Uncultured white Americans and new arrivals (Hispanics) are Olive Garden's customer base.
7.) The last time I was in an Olive Garden was probably 16 years ago. I got the salad and breadsticks deal. The current day menu is far worse than what I remember. Far worse.
They're in S. America, too. People here think it's good, but then they also think that Outback is Australian and that putting a ton of salt on meat before cooking it is the best barbecue.
I wanted to buy some items from your amazon shop,but I see that they don't ship to my country...😔
Oh no , sorry about that! What did you want to order?
@vincenzosplate Pasta. It is hard to find it in my country. I want to cook carbonara properly...
The entree calorie count admitted to on the menu is absolutely astounding.
OG's cx Alfredo, breadsticks, and salad are my guilty pleasures.
Vincenzo i have a question about ragu alla bolognese....how much fat should be on top after its finished cooking. Just generally a speaking, a little, alot? thanks my friend.
It is normal to have some fat on top of the ragu and its a good thing because it adds flavours. But if there is too much its best to scoop it out. Balance is the key
@vincenzosplate okay thank you so much.
It's kind of like the Italian version of tex-mex. If it weren't for the claim of being Italian (rather then being Italy inspired) Some of the dishes are quite nice. However, my own Italian cooking I've learned from you and Pasta Grammar is better! Thank you Vincenzo!!
I’m not saying it’s authentic Italian but when the food is made right I love it. Their breadsticks are awesome and salad is great. For pasta I like the 5 cheese ziti and fettuccine Alfredo. Also I agree u don’t mix steak with pasta. I never even did that. Perfect steak dinner is with a baked potato and asparagus.
The U.S. usage of entrée dates back to when it was used to describe a large course served after soup. It eventually became synonymous with main course in the U.S.
Occasionally Olive Garden has actually had some REALLY good choices. They had this pork with a crust on it and these ravioli one time that was so damn good. They always get rid of their best choices. Pisses me off.
It may get a bad reputation but I'm telling you. That place has had some really damn good food on the menu at times.
Not only is the menu gross, it is not exactly cheap.
Vincenzo, 3 weeks ago i had a meal in a Trastevere osteria -- small plates, mostly fish. My God, so good.
Vinny, I like Olive Garden. I've eaten in authentic Italian restaurants, and their ok. But normally, I make my own Italian food at home. Most of your recipes.
I would never have pasta with steak!
Potatoes and steak always. If they advertise authentic Italian food, I'd never eat there again. Being a Texan, I love Italian food. I use yours and Pasta Grammers recipes. Having a happy wife, eating real itaian food, makes my world. Thanks Vinny, long time follower.
I’m glad to know you’re making my recipes at home🥰
WAY TO GO VINCENZO LONG LIVE ITALY 👍👍👍👍👍🇮🇹🇮🇹🇮🇹🇮🇹🇮🇹🇮🇹🇮🇹🇮🇹🇮🇹
"You get shot if you do something like that" 😂😂😂😂
I don't like olive garden however one dish I love. Not sure if it's an actual Italian dish but it's yummy. Steak gorgonzola. I make it at home now because it's so good. Give it a try.
Thanks for sharing your experience
I don't understand where Americans get idea that chicken and cream are soooo "Italian".
They are Italian American. The problem is when they go to Italy expecting to find the same food
One thing that matters is what happens when the incomes of poor Italians by and by increase. Let's have a look at two such cases; a) The situation Italian immigrants in America were in around 1880-1940 and b) The decades following WWII in Italy. In both cases, many Italians were under- and malnourished to begin with but gradually experienced rising standards of living. What are the first food items such Italians start consuming more of as their economic situation improves? Often eggs, milk and cheaper sorts of seafood. If they find themselves able to spend even more money on food, they'll start buying chicken meat, pork, cream, butter, sugar (around 1900 high sugar consumption was seen as a sign of prosperity) as well as more expensive seafood, intestines and cheaper cuts of veal, beef and lamb, next step is to consume more expensive cuts of veal, beef and lamb. The final step is becoming picky about what should be used in 'authentic' dishes. At this point, you start hearing battle cries like "No cream in carbonara!" and similar ones more frequently. The demand for high quality and locally produced traditional food products increase. These stages of development can be seen in both a) and b). But there also are differences. In a) chicken made its way into pasta dishes, but not in b). In Italy, chicken is almost never found in pasta dishes (two exceptions are gnocchi con sugo di gallina and gnocchi al ragù di pollo, chicken giblets also appear in some pasta sauces, for example in ragù alla bolognese where chicken liver is sometimes but not often used). What about cream? During the period of 1945-1990 cream was popular in a lot of Italian dishes, including carbonara. In the decades following WWII, cooking with cream was often experienced as luxurious. Today, cream in savoury dishes is seen as 'untraditional' in Italy, despite the fact it was rather traditional during a long time. But lets not exaggerate here, there have always been Italians who disapprove of using cream in that way. Back to the basic question, why does American Italian cuisine often feature chicken and cream (in contexts where it's not found in Italian cuisine). While eating preferences among immigrants from Italy probably matter, it's also important to remember that Italians inter-married with spouses from other ethnic groups, that American Italian restaurant owners had to adapt their menus according to the preferences of guests from other population segments and that the food industry, restaurant chains and the media have been influential in shaping what is seen as Italian food in America. There are other explanations, but I would say these factors explain a lot.
Italians use very little cream, it is American, same for the British pea invasion
Italian 1 oz, US 1 cup
@@toriless Yes, today that is the case. A very popular carbonara recipe from 1989 by the famous Italian chef Gualtiero Marchesi calls for over 60 grams of cream per serving! Other highly influential Italian chefs like Luigi Carnacina (1960) and Renato Gualandi (1944 according to his own, later claims) also used cream in carbonara. In sharp contrast, the first published carbonara recipe known, an American recipe presented by Patricia Bronté in a 1952 guide to Chicago, contains no cream at all. When it comes to peas, L'Accademia Italiana della cucina/the Italian Academy of Cuisine and the Chamber of Commerce of Bologna approves of using peas in a ragù alla bolognese as an optional ingredient. Perhaps Jamie Oliver and Gordon Ramsay made them do so? 😂
@@torilessIn the 60's and 70's it was extremely common to use cream to stabilize sauces in restaurants, and Italy was no exception to that trend. For some reason, despite cream being very uncommon in both modern American and Italian cooking, it still shows up in pretty much all American "Alfredo" and "carbonara" preparations. (In America use of cream outside of very few dishes puts the recipe in the same category as a "Jell-O salad"; it's something alien and kind of disgusting that you vaguely remember Great Aunt Bertha bringing to a family picnic 25 years ago. )
Vincenzo. I live in CA and there an Olive Garden a couple of miles from my home. It is American Italian food on a budget. Some of their plates taste like they came straight out the frozen isle section. But other plates are just ok at being American Italian fusion food. There are way better American Italian and restaurants that serve authentic Italian food as well. I would never take an Italian to this place but I wouldn’t mind going out there on a Friday night when nobody wants to cook at home and we are tired of eating pizza, burgers or Chinese food. Love your Chanel and all the recipes.
Thank you for sharing your opinion and following ☺️
Now I understand why I always agree with you. We are not only of Italian origin, but we are both of Abruzzese origin! As my grandmother would say, we are "Frate Cugini!"
Ciao da un cugino Molisano
@force-09 già! Anche i Molisani sono Frate Cugini! Una volta Abruzzo e Molise erano gli Abruzzi!!
Thank you for the support my friend!❤️
Vincenzo, for a laugh sometime check out comedian Eddy Burback- he did a video called (paraphrased) "which is better, olive garden or italy?" where he went to an olive garden before going on vacation to italy 😂
I wouldn't be surprised if there were Americans going on vacation to Italy and saying: This isn't Italian food! It's nothing like Olive Garden!
Please God don’t blame Texans for that restaurant. It’s a national chain that’s on its way out. It was founded in Orlando, Florida (Disneyville )12/13/1082 for General Mills.
I know they mistyped 1982 but really it would be successful for it to be 943 years
The 1082 made me laugh! It’s sad because even though the food was always American and not authentic, it tasted a lot better. It’s no longer fresh.
not fast enough, whose home was used to make their sauce, do they allow bums to live in their factory so they can claim it was made in a home.
I dont think it's on its way out. Its always filled with highschool/college kids. My sister goes there atleast once a month with her family. And when you see other people that aren't younger that are in there you think "yes. These types of people would eat this
Ah Texass the place who claim to have invented chilli? then said mexico meanwhile it was the Canary Islands off the coast of africa...(besides that whole state motto "everyithing is bigger in texas...penile complex if ever there was one......(please do blame texas, America's "Quebec" )
Chicken Scampi? I went to Olive Garden while visiting North Carolina in the late 1990's. Can't remember the exact location. I had a spaghetti with meat sauce I think they called it. I remember it having a bit of a greasy feel to it, was very heavy. Wasn't the best, had a bit of a reheated nature about it. The workers were great though! Although we are quite spoiled with Italian restaurants in Glasgow, a lot of little gems, if you avoid the chain type of carry on.
G'day Vincenzo, I have a request for you. I have learned about a Roman recipe called Trippa alla Romana. Maybe one day we can explore this? Thanks, and have a great day!
-P.S. Olive Garden is that restaurant that only serves you to get full and throw up later.
G'Day mate what a beautiful request. Trippa is one of my family favorite dishes. I recorded a recipe with my mum (the master) about 9 years ago. Here is the video ua-cam.com/video/GU7QlpQBxJg/v-deo.htmlsi=rlFhzqUZYEz8W8XA
That olive garden is so bad. Not sure why people go and why its so popular
I appreciate they have the real Italian Salmon.
I still remember the last time I saw a lot of Italians fishing Salmons in the Tiber 😂
Hahahaha very funny! This made me laugh😂
This "menu" scream FROZEN right into my face.
Phew, you didn’t actually eat there.
Redemption ❤️😁
Reading their menu was enough for me 😂
Ciao Vincenzo! Im Filipino and i also hate that freaking angel hair pasta 😂😂😂😂
I don't know why people love it😂
As an Italian-American I can tell you Vincenzo that Olive Garden is the absolute WORST! Thank you so much for making this video! Big fan of your videos. Wishing you, and your family all the best❤️
Thank you for the support! ❤️
Who's gonna tell him that the number 1 side dish for brisket is pasta (Mac&Cheese)?
Macaroni and cheese is an American dish inspired by 18th century French cuisine!
I get that from a food truck, the brisket is smoked all day, they probably just add some Lawry's for smoke without the rest.
You just did! 😂
Btw Vincenzo,
I did try delverde pasta for the first time. I tried both penne, and spaghetti
Personally, I did like them. Very good pasta brand.
But, because it’s pricier and much more difficult to find than for example La Molisana? I don’t think I’d have it very often
But I am glad I tried it :)
I am glad to hear that you liked it!
Now you gotta visit it and make a video about it 😊
Me? Oh no! I'm staying two continents away from that nightmare 😂
After I've read their menu I'm not stepping a foot there 😂
i have two restaurants to introduce to you. d'vinci's, there used to be more of them open, and this is where i first had chicken fettuccine alfredo. the other is a more expensive place that has more of your favorits in it, it is called buca di beppo.
Thanks for the recommendations! I'll definitely check them out.
VINCENZO IM VERY PROUD OF MY HERITAGE IS ITALIAN 🇮🇹🇮🇹🇮🇹🇮🇹🇮🇹🇮🇹🇮🇹🇮🇹🇮🇹🇮🇹
You should be! Which Italian recipe is your favorite? 🇮🇹
I think if you look at it as an "American-Italian" restaurant chain, serving American-Italian dishes you might feel better. Italian and American-Italian cuisines are related but quite different. Like Irish cuisine and Newfoundland cuisine. Both come from the same roots but we went in a different direction once we crossed the Atlantic. IMO the American-Italians did too
Olive garden to Italians is like breaking the Spaghetti. My Sicilian ancestors would be most upset if i ever stepped foot in an Olive garden.
Pro tip, if you guys want the chicken with your alfredo, an alternative is to serve the alfredo first per tradition and enjoy your chicken with veggies after. Pasta makes a great first dish before your main.
Thanks for sharing this tip! Which pasta recipe is your favorite? 🍝
Pro tip. Don't assume everyone enjoys the same food you do or the same way you eat it. To each their own.
@@vincenzosplate Thank you, sir. Personally, I'm a carbonara guy, but pasta alla gricia sometimes makes me question my loyalties.
@@johnnyblazers alright, rephrased to sound less snobbish. 😘
"looks like an Americano to me." This absolutely cracked me up!
Well it does 😂😂😂
Wait, he didn't actually try something? Maybe ordering delivery? don't know.
As a European, i see Olive Garden as fusion food. They´re just not aware of it.
Actually, i find the creations inspiring - not original, but creative. 😆
I do understand Vicenzo though. If an American restaurant would butcher my own home country‘s dishes, i would cry so much. 😭
Who's they? Nobody in America thinks Olive Garden is authentic food
Vincenzo! When you see this sign, you Run! As fast as you can the other direction, they are the McDonalds of Italian food .
😂😂😂 I didn't like anything from their menu