Sandro's Trattoria-Metairie

[BTG]

I made my first visit to Sandros with the wife yesterday for lunch and it was a very nice experience. Honestly I was not expecting much based on the location and the look of the inside of the place, but they really delivered on the food and service side of things.
I ordered fried calamari while waiting for my wife to arrive and it came just in time and it arrive piping hot and tasted perfect.

We had tomato basil and minestroni for soups and lasagne and grilled chicken with fetuccini for entrees.
My minestroni tasted like they had just finished cutting up the vegetables that morning. The fetuccini was rich and outstanding. Not 100% sure if it was house made, but it blew away the stuff that Andrea's and Impastato's are always bragging about. The chicken was moist, tender, and seasoned very well.
It is interesting in that you pick your pasta from among six or so choices and then if you want to add stuff to it, there is another section of the menu with many choices.

As for service, the waiter was very good. He actually had come out with a salad for my wife, but realized when he set it down that she had a soup not a salad, so he apologized and asked her to please keep the salad on the house.
The poor guy did his best with a group of old ladies sitting near us who all were "shocked" when the bill came and they realized that the chicken/veal/pork that they ordered in addition to their pasta came with an extra price. Once he got them all straight, another one was still questioning her price and he had to point out to her that the extra $1.50 was for the wheat pasta that she ordered. All of this was clearly spelled out on the menu. Service people really don't get enough respect for the kind of stuff they have to deal with on a daily basis.

[EatinAintCheatin]

Thanks for the update. I'm glad they are still doing thing well. It's been a while since I've been there and have been wanting to go again. It's on my rotation list.

Here's a thread with several people's reviews from TOB...myself incuded.

http://forums.neworleans.com/showthread ... ght=sandro

[Yvette]

Long been one of my favs since Jerry mentioned it about a year ago. Food quality is top notch, and omg that bread dipped in olive oil is heavenly.

I have ALWAYS found the service to be slow, but not offensive.

[sore_bluto]

I've been to this restaurant a couple of times. The food was good/very good by dish and the service was a little slow, but responsive. I got a chipped water glass and asked the server to pitch it and she took it straight to the trash.

The biggest thing keeping me from going back is that the dining room is a little uncomfortable. There aren't that many tables inside and they are too close together. There's no BGM so everyone is part of each other's conversations when the place is busy and it was busy both times I went for dinner. Eating outside is a better option if the weather is suitable, but that isn't very often, and then you are eating in a busy parking lot. I know moving can kill a business, but this is one that would benefit to a move to a nicer facility.