When your Italian mother is more excited about going out to eat instead of cooking herself—you know that the place has to be good. I agreed to try Rivoli’s as long as we didn’t go for an early bird special.

Hit the Lights

When you walk through the front doors of Rivoli’s you will instantly get a warm and casual feeling. There are huge, plush couches to sit on while you are waiting to be seated and the staff is extremely friendly. However, if you happen to have a spare spelunker’s helmet in your car you might want to bring it in with you because I’ve been in caves that have more light.

It’s a shame, because their web site showcases pictures of all the intricate paintings that adorn the walls but you aren’t going to see them because it is about as bright as a lunar eclipse inside Rivoli’s. That explains the abundance of plastic plants all over the restaurant because there isn’t any photosynthesizing happening in this joint!

Two Go This Way and Two Go That Way

The host called my name and we were on our way to probably the worst seat in the house. He said to my group, “Two go this way (pointing to the left) and two go that way (pointing to the right)”. We all looked at this guy like he was crazy because we didn’t see a table. He repeated his instructions and this time we followed his directions. Low and behold, there was a table for four hiding behind this massive pillar. Between the lack of light and less-than-desirable table, this night couldn’t get much worse—then it started snowing.

Start Me Up

While we were deciding on what to eat, our waitress Nicole brought over some bread with butter and oil. The bread was decent, but could have been a little warmer. My kid didn’t seem to mind as she was double-dipping the bread—into the butter and then the oil. That’s my girl!

After the bread we were treated to a house salad. I’m not really into salad, but I have to tell you that this dressing was amazing. It was really light and full of flavor. The dressing had a bit of a sweet taste that enhanced the lettuce instead of smothering it.

Sample This

We decided to try the appetizer sampler which consisted of calamari, bruschetta, mozzarella sticks, fried ravoli and mozzarella en carozza (Italian bread stuffed with mozzarella, breaded and then fried). The appetizer came out fairly quick and I couldn’t wait to dig into this Italian fried feast.

The calamari was crispy, just the way I like it and they included the tentacles! It wasn’t chewy or soggy and it had a nice flavor to it. I then moved on to the fried ravioli which was fried just right and stuffed with a creamy cheese filling. Usually fried raviolis are extremely dry and taste like a bag of parsley and sawdust. Next up was the mozzarella en carozza. This was also fried perfectly and surprisingly not greasy. Lucky for me my dinner companions didn’t want any of this and I ate the whole thing myself.

After that I tried the bruschetta, which I have to admit that I am not a big a fan of. Hopefully my pisons won’t take away my green, white and red card for confessing my dislike of this iconic Italian appetizer, but the bruschetta at Rivoli’s was pretty damn good. The last item on the massive sampler was the mozzarella sticks. These sticks were just a tad smaller than a Twinkie and the creamy insides were replaced with fresh mozzarella. You could tell these were homemade and not some “cheesy” mozzarella sticks that you would find in your grocer’s freezer. Rivoli’s might want to consider renaming these mozzarella logs.

Are You Kidding Me?

We ordered the “kid’s” portion of spaghetti and meatballs for my daughter. Normally a kid’s portion is no match for my child, but this time she had to raise her white napkin up in defeat. Seriously, there had to be close to a pound of pasta on her plate and the meatball was about the size of my fist. If this was just the kid’s size, what the heck was the adult-size meal going to be like?

Lotsa Pasta!

Since it was my first time there I decided to get a dish that had an array of pasta. I got the “Taste of Italy” which consisted of fettuccine alfredo, chicken parm on top of fettuccine and cheese lasagna. My dinner came on a plate that was the size of a platter. To say the portions at Rivoli’s are large is an understatement. Finishing my dinner was going to be a difficult project, but I was up for the challenge. Part of me was just hoping that my mommy would still let me get dessert if I didn’t finish my dinner.

My fettuccine alfredo was cooked perfectly—it was not too soft and not too hard—it was just right. The alfredo sauce was pleasantly light, but a little bland. Usually alfredo sauce goes down like lead in most restaurants, but this sauce was as smooth as a cold beer on a hot summer day. I added a good amount of parmesan cheese and that helped reduce the blandness.

The cheese lasagna was very thick and very cheesy—which is a good thing! Growing up I never had meat in my lasagna, so I was happy to get some lasagna like mom used to make. However, mom never used as much cheese as Rivoli’s. I’m convinced that they must be hiding a small cheese factory in the back of the restaurant because all of their cheese is fresh and they aren’t afraid to use it.

Last but not least was the chicken parm on top of even more fettuccine. I’ve been to restaurants where the chicken parm is about as thin as a credit card and this is definitely not the case at Rivioli’s. The chicken parm was almost as thick as the lasagna! My biggest fear of chicken that thick is that it will be undercooked. That chicken was cooked through and through—another dish perfectly cooked. Every component (breading, chicken, sauce (gravy) and cheese) was in complete harmony as it hit my taste buds. After eating all that I could—I started wishing that my last name was Rivoli instead of Ranu.

Save Room for Dessert!

Dessert is a given, so there was just a little bit of room left in the tank of Frank. My mom warned me that the desserts were pretty big, but who still listens to their mom when they’re an adult? As usual—mom was right! Our waitress must have some diesel arms from carrying around the dessert tray all night. After looking at this tray of decadent desserts, my first thought was, “Yes, please.” However, I knew there was only room for one dessert so I had to choose wisely.

I’m a sucker for peanut butter, so it was a pretty easy decision when I saw the peanut butter cake. I was told that the desserts were made fresh daily, so I was really looking forward to this huge piece of cake. However, when I took my first bite I knew this cake was not fresh nor made daily. It tasted like plastic and the cake was rock hard. Man was I bummed—until my mommy told the waitress that I wasn’t happy with my dessert and that I was reviewing the place. DOH!

Momma Ranu broke rule #1—“Never tell the restaurant you are writing a review!” I want to experience a place “as is” and do not want anyone to act any differently when I’m there. Our waitress Nicole said she helped make the cakes today, knew they were fresh and went to the back for another piece.

She came back in record time with a new piece of cake. I took one whiff of the cake and my rule #1 went out the window. This cake was frigging awesome. Not just awesome—frigging awesome! The chocolate cake was light, moist and fresh—completely opposite of the chocolate hockey puck that I first received. And the peanut butter was smooth and creamy. Not to mention that there were half pieces of Reese’s peanut butter cups in the peanut buttery center. If my wife, mother and child were not there—me and this piece of cake were going to look for a hotel room on Fischer Boulevard. It was that good.

So happy that I look extra crazy in this picture.

My wife got the cannoli and I was eager to try this mammoth piece of pastry. I tried some of the super creamy filling, but it didn’t taste like your average cannoli filling. Don’t get me wrong, it was tasty, but different. It took some time, but I knew I had this taste in my mouth before—it was cream cheese. There was definitely cream cheese in the filling and I’ll give Rivoli’s props for trying to differentiate themselves from a classic Italian dessert. Some Italian purists might beg to differ, but this Italian appreciated the deviation from the norm and enjoyed the Rivioli cannoli.

The End Result

For the first time in a real long while I had to take a doggy bag home because I simply could not finish it all. And I wasn’t alone—every person walking out of there was taking something home with them. There was a line out the door in the middle of a snow storm—so that tells you that this place is worth risking life and limb for Italian food.

You definitely get a lot of food at a pretty reasonable price. It wasn’t the best Italian food I ever had, but it was definitely worth another trip. Even if I wasn’t visiting my mom in South Jersey—it would still be worth taking the trip down the Parkway from Northern New Jersey.

For more information, visit Rivoli's web site.

Rivoli's Italian and Seafood Restaurant

781 Fischer Boulevard

Tom's River, NJ 08753

732-270-3634