My overall impression is that Nana Rosa has bit of an identity crisis which could keep someone from trying them out for a meal. If you go to the website, it's not clear that the business actually includes a restaurant. The home page has listings for biscotti, and yet there is a large photo of cannoli. There is no clear mention of a restaurant. This led to a bit of confusion on our part as we were preparing for our visit. However, the menu can be found here after a bit of search on the home page.
The location itself was difficult for us to find in the dark. Rest assured it truly is at the southeast corner of W Main and Walton Ferry Road, next to a knitting shop in a strip mall. I wish I'd known that as we were trying to find the restaurant. We're probably the last people in the US to not have a GPS system.
The inside of the restaurant is homey and pleasant, and we were greeted by a kind waitress. We were given sliced Italian bread with olive oil for dipping, but when I asked about where the bread was made, things began to get dicey. My inquiry was met with, "oh, it's great, isn't it!" which really felt like an attempt to avoid the question. Nevertheless, we placed our entree orders. All of our entrees came with a salad which was not too special, just chopped romaine with a few scattered tomatoes and olives. Josh got a special entree of the evening, garlic-sauteed shrimp on pasta, I got the veal and sage ravioli with half marinara and half alfredo sauce, and Josh's mother got the mascarpone cheese ravioli. And I have to say that everything was just okay, not really interesting. The mascarpone cheese ravioli was made with a purple-tinted pasta dough. I asked the waitress what might be in the pasta to make it that color and she said she had no idea. The bread and the pasta color descriptions (or lack thereof) make me suspect that a lot of the food is coming from frozen sources and is not made fresh on site.
And that's the main issue for me. When I'm choosing where to dine, I like to know where the food on my plate is coming from. It's nice to support local businesses, but to me, if the food that is served comes from food service companies, it's not that much different than eating at a chain restaurant. But maybe I just went on an off night and asked too many questions. And despite our opinion of the food, we really appreciate the excellent service we received at Nana Rosa. And like Nashville Restaurants reported, it appears to be a good place to take kids. We just can't heartily recommend Nana Rosa when you're looking for good-quality, authentic Italian dining. The reviews on places like Urbanspoon are enthusiastic, but when the commenters are raving about the "red gravy," you have to question what they were looking for in the first place.
Nana Rosa
109 Walton Ferry Rd
Hendersonville, TN 37075
M-F 11am-9pm
Sat 8am-9pm
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4 comments:
Gravy? You do know about gravy in the Northeastern Italian context, no?
My late sister in law did not make red sauce - she made gravy - period.
http://blogs.kqed.org/bayareabites/2008/04/19/giving-up-sunday-gravy-a-lost-food-tradition/
Yazzwho,
Point taken, but I'm pretty sure the person who made that comment wasn't talking about THAT kind of red gravy. They were referring to Nana Rosa's meatless marinara sauce.
Heather,
You say you had a hard time finding this place, openly admitting you don't own a GPS, now who's fault is that? :) I am not sure what you meant by an 'identity crisis', we are talking about an italian restaurant here?
As a restaurant owner, and recurring customer of Nana Rosa, having excellent service and an authentic home cooked italian dish prepared upon request sounds pretty good to me. :) To my knowledge, when a customer questions a dish, bread, sauce etc. an employee will NEVER leak a secret, and furthermore the customer has all the right to go to the main source, the chef! If it bothered you that bad, why didn't you consider this?
Overall, it seems as though you were "digging" for a problem rather than just enjoying the fact you are fortunate enough to get out and enjoy a sit down meal with loved ones. Gratitude goes a long way. :)
I personally have never had a bad experience. The staff is friendly and knowledgeable, the dishes are delicious, fresh, and authentic, and the atmosphere, warm and inviting. I would highly recommend Nana Rosa to anyone who has never been! Enjoy :)
Best Wishes,
Brenda Williams
Hi Brenda,
Thanks for your comment. We usually don't have any problems finding places, but we just wanted to point out that at night the location is not very obvious and we wanted to give a heads up about that. It's probably really easy to spot during the day. And it's still okay to get around without GPS sometimes. :-) As for the identity crisis, we're referring to the fac that their website emphasizes the biscotti on the home page and it's not so obvious that they have a restaurant upon viewing that home page.
Actually, part of my disappointment began when we asked about the bread. We did so because we in fact enjoyed it very much and were eager to know the story behind it. We try to ask about who's making the food and how they do it to show our interest. Contrast our experience with Nana Rosa to when we asked about who was making a divine tart we had recently at Marche Artisan Foods. Our server told us exactly who made it, what his specialty was, etc. That was a big difference than the evasion we got at Nana Rosa.
We went there really wanting to like it, as we had heard good things from friends. We were very happy overall with the service and appreciate kindness. However, there's a big difference in what the "Italian" in Italian restaurants means.
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