Category Archives: Florida

Huey Magoo’s Chicken Tenders

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Exterior

Interior

Counter and menu

Magoo’s favorite salad

Buffalo chicken salad

**** (4 stars)

When I read about a new chicken tenders place I imagined something like Chick fil a, which I despise, but Huey Magoo’s is much, much better. For one thing, if you get the chicken grilled rather than battered, it’s actually healthful.

We tried two different salads. Magoo’s Favorite, mixed greens with grilled chicken, cranberries, walnuts, grape tomatoes, & raspberry walnut vinaigrette dressing. The chicken was a bit bland, but the dressing was excellent.

Even better was the Buffalo Chicken Salad ordered with grilled chicken. It included bleu cheese crumbles, and grape tomatoes. Unlike the menu description it was made with mixed greens, not romaine.  And rather then jalapeño ranch & spicy Magoo’s dressing it came with a wonderful blue cheese dressing. Thanks to the Buffalo sauces, this chicken really had a lot of flavor. This was really a top-notch salad, far beyond expectations for a quick serve restaurant.

They have a Coke freestyle machine.

While there isn’t table service, the staff was attentive.

Huey Magoo’s Chicken Tenders
7538 W Sand Lake Rd
Orlando, FL 32819
(407) 203-2051
http://www.yelp.com/biz/huey-magoos-chicken-tenders-orlando

Bella Italia Ristorante

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Exterior

Bar

Interior

Clams Casino

Fettuccine Alfredo

Eggplant Rollatini

***** (5 stars)

Bella Italia is definitely a level above what you’d expect in a strip mall location. The decor, food and service are all top notch.

We started with the Clams Casino, a generous portion with a delicious lemon and garlic broth.

Fettucine Alfredo was equally generous, nigh on to huge. It needed a bit of salt to bring out the flavor, but had plenty of butter, cream and cheese.

Eggplant Rollatini was a nice improvement on Eggplant Parmigiana, with grilled rather than breaded eggplant, stuffed with four kinds of cheese, baked in marinara sauce, and topped with melted mozzarella.  It was delicious. The accompanying spaghetti was fine, but not needed.

All of these dishes were less than $9 at lunch, a great deal. Lunch also came with a basket of fresh bread and an excellent pesto/olive oil mixture for dipping.

Service was friendly and attentive.

Bella Italia Ristorante
13848 Tilden Rd
Ste 192
Winter Garden, FL 34787
(407) 347-3277
http://www.yelp.com/biz/bella-italia-ristorante-winter-garden

Taste of Peru

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Pescado a la Chorrillana

Ceviche Mixto

Causa de Camarones

Exterior

Interior

***** (5 stars)

This is the best Peruvian restaurant I’ve found in Orlando. In fact, the quality of the ceviche approached our benchmark, which we had in Lima Peru.

The place is small and decorated in dark woods and black fake alligator table tops, but it’s not at all grungy as one review seemed to imply. In fact, it’s quite clean, and even a bit edgy looking. I would vote to lose the really annoying Peruvian travel videos, though, which inexplicably have a soundtrack that sounds like Russian marching band dirges.

We started with the Causa de Camarones, which was a good as any causa I’ve had. It was missing a couple of layers that are usually present, but had a delightfully piquant quality and excellent sauce accompaniment.

Ceviche Mixto was a huge mound of mixed seafood in a mildly spicy creamy lime sauce. The shrimp and fish were good, and the calamari was excellent.

Pescado a la Chorrillana is a large serving of nicely battered and fried fish topped with onions, tomatoes and cilantro, and served with a mild sauce. The flavor of the cilantro came through nicely.

Service was very friendly, and the kitchen is extremely quick, obviously preparing everything from scratch, but at lightning speed. Pricing is reasonable, especially considering the generous portions.

Taste of Peru
9521 S Orange Blossom Trl
Ste 114A
Orlando, FL 32837
(407) 857-2734
http://www.yelp.com/biz/taste-of-peru-orlando-6

sushigami

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Dragon Roll

Flamingo Roll

Reptile roll

Salmon

Conveyor

Interior

**** (4 stars)

Although this place is literally out in the center of the mall I walked past it twice looking for an overhead sign on a storefront! The signage is quite small, in contrast to the sprawling conveyor belt system that transports the sushi.

Like all “revolving” sushi places, the offerings are on plates color-coded for price, from $3-6. When you’re finished eating they simply tally up the plates to calculate your check.

I liked the sushi here much more than I was expecting. The ingredients were fresh and the offerings were quite varied. My favorite item was the flamingo roll.

Each serving is essentially half a roll, so the pricing is typical to slightly high. On the other hand, because it is half a roll you can try twice and many things, which is great, especially if you and your companion disagree on ingredients.

sushigami
8001 S Orange Blossom Trl
Orlando, FL 32809
(407) 850-9091
https://www.yelp.com/biz/sushigami-orlando

Fat One’s Hot Dogs & Italian Ice

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NY Dog

Exterior

Interior

*** (3 stars)

This was a perfectly fine hot dog, but I guess I was expecting something more, having been to many gourmet hot dog places in other cities. The dogs and buns are split in two for grilled. I tried the New York dog, which had mustard and sauerkraut, but was somewhat overwhelmed by the cloying red onion sauce. I was glad I didn’t get the foot-long version, as the small size was plenty, although at $5 I didn’t feel it was worth it.

Fat One’s Hot Dogs & Italian Ice
8001 S Orange Blossom Trl
FC16
Orlando, FL 32809
(407) 634-0205
http://www.yelp.com/biz/fat-ones-hot-dogs-and-italian-ice-orlando-2

On The Border Mexican Grill & Cantina

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Grilled Shrimp Tacos

Chile relleno

Exterior

Interior

*** (3 stars)

This is a pretty good Tex Mex chain. The menu is quite extensive, and there should be something to please almost everyone, as long as you’re not looking for authentic Mexican food.

The trick is to order items done on the mesquite grill, as they are very nicely flavored. I had the shrimp tacos (I ordered the fish tacos, but that’s another story). My companion had the chile relleno, and didn’t care for the clumsy breading and flavorless stuffing. But the accompanying brisket enchilada was pretty good.

Our favorite item was actually the queso cheese dip. It’s not something I would normally order, but it was a Yelp freebie, and it was excellent, a large serving, filled with lightly spiced peppers. It went well with the complimentary chips and salsa.

Also included in each meal are unlimited black beans and yellow rice. The rice is nicely seasoned and was much better than typical chain restaurant Mexican rice.

Our server was well trained but not a good listener.

The interior build-out is quite nice. It’s hard to imagine that this space the plaza was once occupied by card stores and sunglasses shops.

On The Border Mexican Grill & Cantina
12517 State Rd 535
Orlando, FL 32836
(321) 329-3188
https://www.yelp.com/biz/on-the-border-mexican-grill-and-cantina-orlando-4

Gallettos Wine Bar & Grill

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Exterior

Lunch Salad bar

Lunch buffet

*** (3 stars)

Gallettos offers a well-tended buffet at lunch time. While the food on the menu is Spanish and Portuguese, there was little evidence of this on the buffet. I’m pretty sure neither stroganoff or Chicken Milanese are from either of those countries!

The salad bar is somewhat limited by has very fresh ingredients for making a Caesar salad or a simple green salad. There are several soups available, too.

The main course buffet offerings are more extensive, wth two types of rice, two types of beans and several types of chicken. There were also ribs.

There were also a couple of dessert offerings.

The price of lunch was a very reasonable $9.95.

Everyone working there was friendly and attentive, but there were more employees than diners on the day we went. I would have liked to try the Portuguese specialties from the menu, but many were over $23, which was too much for lunch time. Perhaps I’ll go back for dinner.

Gallettos Wine Bar & Grill
3875 S Kirkman Rd
Orlando, FL 32811
(407) 295-3146
https://www.yelp.com/biz/gallettos-wine-bar-and-grill-orlando

Nine Spices Hot Pot

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Interior

Veggies

Table

Sauces

Conveyor

**** (4 stars)

This is a fun and healthy place for dinner, or for lunch if your budget will handle it. The idea is to use a pot of boiling broth to cook your own vegetables and meats at your table. At lunch you can select vegetarian, which is reasonably priced, or one meat, which is rather pricey, or all you can eat, which is definitely dinner pricing.

The fun thing about the all you can eat option is that you then select your ingredients as they pass by on a conveyor belt that makes its way around the whole restaurant. This seemed to be what most customers were doing. Note that there is an advantage to being “upstream” on the conveyor, as you have first choice of ingredients.

I went with the vegetarian lunch and the “original” broth. This was a good choice, because the “spicy” broth was pretty spicy, and there is a condiment bar where you can add your own desired degree of spiciness and other flavors.

My favorite ingredients were the corn on the cob and the rather spicy “pickles” on the condiment bar. I also used lots of fresh cilantro.

I won’t say it was my favorite lunch of all time, but it was a fun experience, and I’ll probably go back someday.

Nine Spices Hot Pot
5320 S Kirkman Rd
Orlando, FL 32819
(321) 270-0830
https://www.yelp.com/biz/nine-spices-hot-pot-orlando

Bulla Gastrobar

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Exterior

Interior

Gazpacho

Ceviche

Flatbread

Salmon rillettes

Burger

**** (4 stars)

I love the interior design of this place, which has cool lighting and excellent acoustics. It is a Spanish tapas restaurant, but at least at brunch I found the selections to be more modern American that authentic Spanish tapas.

My companion had the gazpacho, which was excellent, although unusual in that it seemed to include cream. She also had the ceviche, which included a very generous portion of cooked shrimp, but wasn’t really what she was looking for in an authentic Spanish ceviche.

I had the brunch, which allows you to choose three plates for $27. While that might sound steep, they are very large servings and quite shareable.

I had the flatbread with Mahón cheese, sunny side up quail eggs, caramelized onions, oyster mushrooms and bacon. It was one of the best flatbreads I’ve had, with a thin, crisp crust, charred around the edges, and the eggs and bacon perfectly cooked. The sweetness of the caramelized onions went perfectly with the savoriness of the other ingredients.

My second plate was supposed to be the salmon crostini, slices of salmon on crostini. Due to confusion in the kitchen (or a mistake our waiter was unwilling to admit to) they actually brought me the Salmon Rillettes, which was a spread. It’s actually not a selection on the brunch tasting menu, but I liked it fine, despite my confusion.

My third plate was the least successful. The Bulla Burger was a generous serviing of 45 day dry-aged beef, topped by cheese, sauteed onions and a single pepper. The meat was, in fact far too generous, more of a baseball than a patty. As a result the “medium” I ordered ended up charred on the outside but completely raw throughout the middle. I also felt the burger needed some condiments, as the ingredients didn’t really have that much flavor. However at this point I’d had so much food it didn’t really matter that this course went largely uneaten. I will say the accompanying “truffle fries” (which were actually rosemary flavored diced potatoes) were well cooked and tasty.

I’m not a big brunch fan, so I appreciated the wide varieties of non-brunchy offerings at Bulla. Service was friendly, and I’d definitely go back.

Bulla Gastrobar
110 S Orlando Ave
Ste 7
Winter Park, FL 32789
(321) 594-4175
http://www.yelp.com/biz/bulla-gastrobar-winter-park-2