Seeing how our softball season ended in August, it was time for our year-ender... at the end of November. Yes, it was long overdue. However, I think Miss Y played a game in the snow, so I guess it isn't too much of a stretch. How can you see the softball in the snow anyways??? Well, I guess it's easier than golfing in the snow I suppose. So where to eat? Since we'd have a large group and with kiddies in tow, we needed something family-friendly, inexpensive and could accommodate us all. Normally, I wouldn't suggest The Old Spaghetti Factory; yet in this instance, it satisfied all of the aforementioned criteria. Why wouldn't I
choose the TOSF as a primary choice? Well, the pasta is not exactly the type I prefer. Now, I won't be too hard on them since they do cater to families. I'm sure my kids won't care if it is gourmet pasta or not. In fact, they would be much more comfortable with spaghetti smothered in plain tomato sauce rather than some fancy garlic, white wine and olive oil linguine with pine nuts and portobello mushrooms. There would be too many "things" in it for my son. Thus, TOSF serves a purpose and it does it pretty well. Just not a personal favourite of mine, that's all. In fact, I haven't been
there in 15 years! So after we settled on TOSF, it was a case of "which location"? Originally, I suggested the Richmond one at Riverport (yah, it was
my idea... go figure!). However, Miss Y thought that the New West one would be more accessible for everyone. Hey, who am I to argue that? I'm closer to New West anyways.
Boss Woman made the reservation for 5:00pm; but for some reason, Bear thought it was 5:30pm and told Miss Y so. Uh... Like Miss Y needs anymore reasons for being late! She would be late anyways, this just exacerbates the problem. Fortunately, she lives close, so getting lost would
not be an issue this time around. Let's just hope she doesn't order something strange like a clubhouse. She has a habit of ordering dishes that the restaurant is not known for, such as a quiche at the Red Onion. Good thing we had an early reservation because the place filled up pretty fast and in no time, it was absolutely full. Hence, no matter how many people bash the place (including myself), TOSF does what it does well and we can't dispute that. And what exactly does it do well? How about with every meal (including the kid's meals), soup or salad, beverage, bread and ice c
ream are included. Furthermore, most items are on average around $12.00 while the kid's meals are around $6.00. Despite my indifference to the food here, I must admit it is a pretty good value. I have to say I am not indifferent towards the
Sourdough Loaf. For complimentary bread, it is pretty good. Nice crunchy exterior while soft and warm on the inside, the bread comes with whipped butter and garlic butter. As for the soup, there is a choice of Minestrone, Clam Chowder and Baked Onion with the latter 2 available for an extra $2.00. I had the
Clam Chowder and it was more floury
than creamy. However, it had a good clam flavour with bacon and those clams were tender. Viv had a salad; but ended up finishing the kid's
Minestrone (since my son wouldn't eat it anyways). It's more like a vegetable soup than anything. Not bad, it does the job. Despite the inclusive meal, I decided to get an order of the
Popcorn Shrimp to start. This was surprisingly good. Very crunchy and none too oily. We didn't really like the dip though, it was ranch and did not compliment the shrimp very much.
With that in mind, Viv got the
Chorizo Penne. For me, the first thing that came to my mind was
"Boston Pizza". Not necessarily a good thing either. However, there was okay flavour with some spiciness and tartness. The chorizo was alright as well; yet the whole darn thing was "meh". Pasta was overcooked and it is definitely something I could do better at home. I was having a hard time deciding, so I ended up with the
Pot-Pourri Spaghetti which has a combination of 3 sauces - Meat, Mushroom and Clam. Once again, the pasta was far from al dente. On that note, I do understand that TOSF is a family restaurant; thus al dente pasta may not be very kid-friendly. With that being said,
overdone pasta is not something I personally like. I've had this dish before and since the sauces are on top of one pile of spaghetti, it is impossible to eat them separately. What you ultimately end up with is a mixture of all three. It would help if each sauce rested on top of 3 separate spaghetti bundles. Nothing particularly exciting about the sauces. The tomato sauces are predictably tart and very little in the way of depth. The bechamel clam sauce is quite thick and not really my cup of tea; but it's edible.
We ended up getting 2 kid's meals with my daughter having the
Chicken Dippers and Fries. Much like the popcorn chicken, the chicken was fried perfectly. Good colour and crunch with the chicken being juicy and tender. I guess they know how to fry things here. My son had the
Spaghetti with tomato sauce. No picture necessary, it looked much like all the other plates of food with spaghetti. Believe it or not, he actually ate a good amount. See what I mean as in being a kid-friendly restaurant? Milhouse, who is not a kid (well, according to him only), was very indifferent about his
Chicken Neptune. He
thought the veal was overly salty and greasy. Also, the Hollandaise was not really a Hollandaise in his eyes. As you can see in the picture, it sure doesn't look like Hollandaise. He also didn't think much of the overcooked spaghetti and as I quote, "tomato sauce you can get out of a jar of Ragu". Ouch... But I can't argue with him there!
For some reason, Hot Chocolate decided to go for 2 appetizers instead of any pasta. Maybe she knows better? She had the
Calamari first and it was merely passable. It was overly greasy and frankly had not much flavour. I gave it a try and
yah, pretty average. Tzatziki sauce could've used more garlic. She went with the
Garlic Cheese Bread as her second appy. She thought the cheese bread had some white cheese sauce underneath that was too much; but the edges were crispy. If you can get over the artery clogging part, it's great for sharing. Judes opted for the classic
Chicken Parmigiana with spaghetti. Although the chicken was dry and the pasta was overcooked, she echoed the same sentiment - it was okay for the price. With that being said, the breading was still crispy and the inclusion of salad, bread, drink and dessert makes
one forget about the negatives.
Sienna ordered something that I considered at first. Now don't laugh, it was the
Thai Curry Linguine. Yah, the chances of this dish working out is as good as finding great pasta at a Hong Kong-style cafe. Seriously, I wanted to try it to see how bad it could be. On the contrary, Sienna actually liked it. No, she's not crazy nor unfamiliar with Asian food. Rather, she went in with reasonable expectations and the final product was not offensive. The pasta was al dente while the sauce was flavourful with a bit of spice. The
shrimp was cooked nicely while by looking at it, there was probably too much sauce. With that being said, it was probably better than what I had. Boss Woman ended up with the
Meat Lasagna. You might be wondering why the picture is of a vegetarian lasagna then. Well, the picture of the veggie one turned out better, otherwise, the 2 are practically the same except for the meat. Boss Woman didn't feel there was that much in the way of meat in her lasagna and remarked that it was passable. Lots of cheese and sauce though.
Mr. Blueberry decided to go for the classic which was the
Spaghetti and Meatballs. Reminiscent of the one we had at
Nick's, this was ol' skool pasta. Slightly overdone spaghetti with the same tart pasta sauce. He didn't mind the meatballs though. They were well-seasoned and relatively moist. He thought the portion could be bigger; but the portion did fit the price. At the end of the meal, like any meal at the Old Spaghetti Factory, we all got a scoop of
Spumoni Ice Cream. Oh yeah, that brought back so many childhood memories. And that is probably what makes TOSF successful. It really
hasn't changed much in terms of decor, food and even pricing (hasn't gone up very much). Where else can you get a complete meal for around $10.00? Yah, I know, the pasta here ain't exactly gourmet. In fact, it is probably as far from gourmet as you can get. However, let me do a comparison. The pasta is similar to
Nick's (as much as some people might disagree with me); yet it costs half the price. It is most certainly less expensive than
Boston Pizza and don't even get me started on their pasta! So really, as much as I want to hate TOSF for its overcooked pasta with canned-like sauce, I remain indifferent.
The Good:- Kid-friendly
- Inexpensive
- Predictable
The Bad:- Food is generally pretty weak
- Don't expect anything ground-breaking here
Posts
Once again, Viv and I attempted to do all of our Christmas shopping in the states. Hey, with the dollar almost at par, why not? With kiddies stashed at Grandparents and NEXUS ensuring our smooth entrance into Washington state, we did the leisurely drive to the border. Normally, we'd go all the way to the Premium Outlets in Tulalip and even as far at Seattle itself; but not today. We wanted to stay fairly close due to time constraints. Thus, our first stop was Burlington. After an uneventful time at The Outlets (kinda sad compared to the one in Tulalip...), we headed over to Ross. If I had known what we were in for, I woul
d've stayed at The Outlet. With people pushing their carts like rush hour in Richmond and products strewn all over the aisles like an earthquake just hit, it was not for the feint of heart. Sure the prices rock; but to actually find something on the racks where they belong is an exercise in frustration. People! Put your crap back where you found it. Don't put a polka dot bikini in the men's active wear section! After lining up to pay which basically negated any gain from my NEXUS card, we were hungry. Viv thought we should eat right away; but really, in Burling
ton? I suggested we make the drive back up to Bellingham, more choices there. And the choice we made was Boomer's Drive-In.
price ($3.69), this was a fairly large burger with lots of fresh lettuce, tomato, smoky BBQ sauce and an obscene amount of mayo. That was probably a good thing because the burger patty was actually kinda dry. But it turned out to be a pretty solid burger with all the components together. We couldn't be as nice about the Onion Rings though. The breading was far too thick and dense. The end result was a non-crispy product that was a bit hard to eat.
deal in my books. Similar to Viv's burger, the Cheeseburger was not really all that moist; yet the condiments made up for it. It's not a small burger despite the reasonable price. Although the Waffle Fries looked like they were related to Rose McGowen, they were still crispy while potatoey inside. A nice departure from regular fries. We particularly liked the dusting of spiced seasoning salt. Due to the use of hard ice cream, the Vanilla Shake was impossible to drink through a straw, even after sitting for awhile. I was "cool" (forgive my sad attempt at humour) with that though since it meant there was a good 
amount of ice cream used. It was pretty smooth although it could've used more vanilla other than the ice cream itself. Sure, it wasn't perfect; but really what is? For the prices they charge, we were more than satisfied with our meal. While we were there, there was a steady stream of customers from all walks of life with and without kiddies. And this was in the middle of the afternoon too! So obviously, Boomer's is doing something right. That "something" is a blast from the past with reasonable pricing, solid eats in a familiar outfit complete with fireplace in the middle of the dining room.
