About a week ago, we attempted to go to Chester’s with about 7 of us in attendance, on a Saturday night at about 6:00pm without a reservation. This was a mistake, the wait was about 2 1/2 hours. We gave up on it, instead choosing to go to City Cafe, a very good restaurant (and Rochester’s best place for seafood yet). Tonight, however, we didn’t have any problems. For starters we only had four people and more importantly, it was a Sunday night. There were plenty of tables free, we got seated right away. The service so far was a bit questionable, the hostess didn’t really indicate to us that we were supposed to follow her. I had to ask another hostess if in fact we were supposed to do this. In the end, we were supposed to follow her, it just wasn’t clear at the time.

Chester’s has adopted a open kitchen theme, a la Macaroni Grill (*taps plays softly in the background*) with very hip wallpaper, muted earthtones and funky music. The atmosphere attempts to be very hip and trendy and in most ways succeeds very well. It felt like a more laid back Prescott’s, or rather the way Prescott’s should have laid out their restaurant. The spaces are broken up nicely by barriers and plants and the lighting is varied and modern. There were nice cloth napkins rolled around silverware on the table, but they were in a pile rather than at each diner’s position, not something I would expect. Then we got to the menus, very nice cloth wrapped outer (think hardover book), however the inside was just a plastic pocket with the menu behind it. To me, this was kind of tacky and not becoming of the hip and trendy style they were going for. Furthermore, when the waitress arrived, she started talking about their happy hour and drink/wine specials, however there wasn’t a wine list on the table, and when it came it was a laminated piece of paper. Again, not what I was expecting.

Now on to the food, they had the typical American type cuisine, pasta, steaks, chicken, some fish, and burgers. Appetizers ranged from pizzas to crab cakes to seared tenderloin with blue cheese sauce (oh ya!). We skipped the appetizers and went right for the main courses. I ordered a blue cheese burger (of which I have to try at any restaurant I visit). with cottage cheese and some grilled onions on the side, Darcy had the spagettini primavera with a side of home made pickles. Adam had a Vermont white cheddar burger and Amber had the rotisserie chicken.

The food came in a timely fashion and was presented nicely, not gourmet, but also not Applebees either. One thing I can say, the portions are nothing to shake a stick at, Amber basically half a chicken and one pound of mashed potatoes. It could be easily shared by two people. My burger was juicy and flavorful and quite excellent. The food was very tasty and I would go back just to try some of their other entrees, there were lots of gorgonzola and blue cheese themed dishes, my kind of place!

Now onto dessert, the highlight of this meal. They only had a few items, but the one that stuck out for me was the banana cream pie. I’m a sucker for a good cream pie, because if done well, its absolute heaven. Let me tell you, if you try this banana cream pie, prepare to be transported. It came out less in a pie form, than a blob of banana custard, cream crust and fruit. This was the purest banana cream pie I’ve ever tasted, the custard was unbelievable, it was not too sweet with just enough banana and cream flavors. The crust was something of a crushed cookie that had a slightly salty taste to it and to top it all off, there was a cooked banana on top, that was done to perfection. I could just keep going on and on about this masterpiece. Trust me, get this if you ever go there, you will NOT regret it.

The service was fairly good throughout, the waitress was a bit new as she attempted too much small talk. It reminded me of Seinfeld I saw one time. Small talk can be great, but it can always be awkward, this bordered on the latter.

In conclusion, I have mixed feelings about Chester’s. The service is still in the “learning phase”, as is usually the case with any new restaurant. The food is outstanding and the desserts, sublime. With a few finishing touches here and there, one to the menu and wine list, it could win perfect marks in some categories. This post went on for a while, but I may just be still feeling the high of the banana cream pie.

Ratings (out of 5)
Atmosphere: 4.5
Service: 3.5
Food: 4.8 (so close to a 5, the banana cream pie must be wearing off )
Fun: 4.0

Overall: 4.2

One of the menu items that flew off the menu at me immediately was the Pear and Gorgonzola Salad, with its pear, Gorgonzola cheese, candied walnuts and balsamic dressing, almost the perfect salad. I didn’t actually try it this time, but it is on my list when I go there next. Once I do, I’ll have to compare it to my reference salad, the Pear and Ama Blue salad at Prescott’s.

We decided to go with 3 slices of pizza, each of us getting a slice of the Mediterranean and sharing once slice of American. The Mediterranean was brilliant, pesto as a base, with eggplant, kalamata olives, sun-dried tomatoes, and roasted red peppers, all topped with a good helping of feta. If I had one drawback with this pizza, it is that the eggplant is cut rather large and tends to come off all in one piece. The American was pretty good, basically a supreme pizza with some good tasting sauce. It is reminiscent of Papa John’s, but a bit less sweet and more fresh tasting. The thing that set this pizza apart though was the crust. Not too thick, not too thin, with a good flavor. It had a wonderful chewiness that I have come to love in a pizza crust.

All in all we will definitely be back, maybe not all the time, but frequently. One of the nice things about zpizza is the amount of seating, there is ample seating inside and even more seating outside in the mall area. Which makes it a perfect place for going and getting some lunch with our larger-than-usual groups, that we sometimes have.

Ratings (out of 5)
Atmosphere: 4.0
Service: 4.0 (the cashier was personable)
Food: 4.5
Fun: 3.5 (it’s a pizza spot, thats about it)

Overall: 4.0

Next time I may consider using a flash.

We’ve been going to Prescott’s in Rochester ever since they opened, and we’ve never been disappointed. We went again last weekend, and I was happy to see how popular they were, even if I had to wait for a table. As always, it was incredible. And I took a few pictures just to remember this meal by.

I also tried a bite of Andy’s pheasant. I don’t even like game, and it was quite good. I’m getting hungry just writing this.

For the inaugural post, I am going to review BB’s Pizzaria, which is a new pizza place next to Chateau Theatres, in the shopping mall that seems to kill anything unique that goes into it (e.g. Kona Coast, TCBY,…). With that, I wish BB’s luck because it looks to have some potential. The first thing I noticed was the name, Pizzaria, an obvious misspelling, however it did get me and my party to chat about it. This is a good sign for a new place, at least in my opinion, because it makes it somewhat unique and gets people to remember it rather than just blending in to everywhere else to eat.

So we get in and it’s like everyplace else built in the last few years in NW Rochester, very open, funky light fixtures and Earth-toned paint. Another thing that hit me right off the bat is that it feels a lot like Mr. Pizza, at least the NW Rochester one. This makes sense since according to Jeff Kiger, it’s owned by former employees of Mr. Pizza. They have mostly tables, booths around the sides, with some booths being able to accomodate 10 or more, depending on the size of the person. There are TVs around the place which were playing sports, nothing too surprising here.

So we seated ourselves at a clean table and took a look at the menu, garlic toast, nachoes, and other appetizers. For the entrees there was hoagies, and of course, lots of pizza. The pizza came in a few crusts, thin, traditional medium, whole wheat and pan. They had fountain soda drinks, coffee, beer and a small selection of wine. All of us went with water, the water had crushed ice in it which you don’t see that much, but Darcy really liked it. We had 5 people, so we figured we needed a couple pizzas. Darcy and I ordered a half order of garlic cheese toast and a medium thin crust Margherita pizza. Jon, Adam and Amber ordered a pepperoni and half italian sausage pizza on traditional medium crust. Amber also ordered a side salad for a reasonable price.

Our garlic cheese toast came and it was pretty good, quite simple though. Just a french bread with a lot of cheddar (I think?) and mozzarella cheese melted on top. I couldn’t really taste the garlic all that much, it could have used a bit more. After we had finished the toast, we realized that Amber hadn’t gotten her salad yet, we flagged down the waiter and he apologized and had it out after a few minutes. I am chalking this up to only being open a few weeks and the wait staff still learning the ropes. After a bit the pizzas came, the Margherita pizza came out first followed in 5 minutes by the pepperoni and sausage pizza. I was quite impressed by the Margherita pizza, it had bite size chunks of fresh tomatoes, mozzarella, basil and a light sauce, all on a crispy thin crust. Very tasty. I didn’t try any of the other pizza, however it did look rather tasty. Large pieces of sausage with lots of cheese, but it didn’t look overly greasy. I’ll have to try one of these later, perhaps the taco pizza, which I saw going out to another table and looked to be quite a good pizza.

After we had filled ourselves up, we paid at the register and then ventured towards the back to look for the game room. I was in the mood for a good game of pinball. We found the game room, it had about 6 arcade games or so and the obligatory claw drop machine. Lo and behold, they had a pinball machine, it was kinda old but it was still pretty good. The rest of the games were pretty generic, they did have Ms. Pacman and Galaga, which is pretty cool. I stuck to pinball and even though I’m not good, I had a good time.

In conclusion, BB’s Pizzaria offers a pretty good selection of pizzeria type foods and pizzeria type entertainment. The service was so-so, but I expect that to get better as they are open longer and work out the kinks. So if you’re tired of going to Mr. Pizza and want something like it, but still a bit different, give BB’s Pizzaria a try.

Ratings (out of 5)
Atmosphere: 4.0
Service: 3.5
Food: 4.0
Fun: 4.5, yeah so this gets this score solely because of pinball.

Overall: 4.0