Restaurants
Elisabetta's by Vicki Slotnick
This past Monday night in early April, still ‘in season’ for South Florida, we had a reservation at Elisabetta’s, a three-month-old Italian restaurant in West Palm Beach overlooking the marina at the east end of Banyan. Yikes, was that joint jumping!!! Architecturally, the huge space was quite interesting…from the outside it looked a bit like a yacht, and inside it was a mishmash of old recycled brick on the floors, awesome ceilings and, in between, a huge variety of antiques and repurposed other ‘stuff’. There are three large wood burning fireplaces direct from Italy. Around the entire interior periphery are old photos of who-knows-who-and-what. You really have to see it to appreciate it. There is a fabulous large outdoor patio along the north-facing wall, and overlooking the waterfront, which even has a bocce court. We were seated on the main floor level of the patio promptly, and immediately became quite overwhelmed by the number of guests and the noise level. To its credit, Elisabetta’s has an extensive menu that could probably satisfy almost any appetite. The style of Italian is somewhere between classic and rustic. Several selections of Aperitivi, Antipasti, Bruschetta, Contorni, Salumi, Formaggio, Pesce, E Carne, Speciale del Giorno, Pizza al Forno, and Pasta e Risotto. They also offer a large menu of beer, wine, cocktails, and alcohol from the bar. It was unfortunate that the four of us, along with the waiter, all seemed to have difficulty hearing as well as being heard. Also, it seemed probable that the waiter was not very knowledgeable about the menu. I will cut to the chase with the food. We ordered one of two preparations of calamari…when it arrived, it was the wrong preparation from the two on the menu. The right one then came out almost too fast, and was tasty and very tender, but at best, barely warm. A tricolore and pear salad was very good. A boneless ribeye was underdone and quite thin and smothered in cloves of garlic…[BEWARE!] Grilled shrimp arrived on a very large plate looking lonely, nothing else was keeping the shrimp company, not even a piece of lemon. Eh! Monday night’s special was eggplant parmigiano that looked more like eggplant lasagne… [the communication problems]. But it was delicious in my opinion. Just, FYI on the restrooms: the management needs to do a better job of keeping them clean. Truth be told, we were very anxious to leave the tumult and noise. We’d probably give Elisabetta’s another try a few months from now on a summer weeknight, or maybe a late lunch one day. Location: 185 Banyan Boulevard West Palm Beach FL. Reservations 561-342-6699. You can use Open Table as well.
Elisabetta's
185 Banyan Blvd., West Palm Beach
561-342-6699
