Shelly
Water
71% of the earth is covered with water. Good tasting drinking water should be all around us. We are out to drink it, taste it, and rate it in Goodmans.
“The perfect water is simple: Cold with no aftertaste.” Shelly Goodman
We aren’t looking for artisan wells, fancy names, cool bottles, or pedigrees in the water we drink. We are looking for perfection in the notability of how little the water tastes.
Somebody had to create the delightful dishes that we love to eat. At times those that created have not evolved and therefore are no longer making the best dishes. Most people like fettuccine alfredo, what’s not to like.
The Giants growing up in Arizona have watched guacamole made at the table when dining at many different restaurants. What Giants have never seen is fettuccine mixed with alfredo sauce table side. They still haven’t seen this since sauce was never part of the process at the restaurant by the creator of fettuccine alfredo. Alfredo used butter and cheese.
So how was the signature dish?
And
The smallest Giant started off his tasting by sharing concern that his allotment was not enough. He ended it by saying that the restaurant should use the sauce out of the bottle like at home.
Giants rating for the fettuccine alfredo:
Back to the beginning of the visit. For the Giants it started 2.5 months earlier when they booked a hard to get reservation for July 12, 2018. Good thing they did. The Giants walked in after a nice family of three that was flatly turned away since they had no reservation. In clear English, “Sir the tables you see open are for guests that booked them months ago.” One can imagine the momentary fear the Giants had when the reservation book didn’t include the Goodman name. Confirmation was produced by the Father of Giants and the group was sat for dinner.
Service was friendly enough (a little stuffy for kids and their parents). It seemed until the bill came that the great tasting chilled water was complementary. The water rating:
The Giants should have asked prior to many refills whether the water came at a per container cost – it does. A modest €2.50 each which is far less than some places that go as high as €8 per bottle. The first bottle was offered and no price could be found on the menu. The following bottles were ordered and no warnings were given that college funds would be depleted if Giants continued to hydrate. Lesson learned.
The Mother of Giants loves fried zucchini.
“I have never had better fried zucchini than this.” – Mother of Giants
“It’s like they are French-fried zucchini.” – Daughter of Giants
Fried zucchini rating:
Desserts and other dishes:
That’s right, nothing special and some items disappointing including the three desserts tried.
What about the family turned away? Well there was plenty of room that they could have dined in the time the Giants were there. Alfredo has to protect his good name by not letting the unreserved masses in whatever the cost.
This action gives Alfredo a Friendliness to Tourists rating of:
Overall rating of IL VERO ALFREDO:
Teatro del Sale in Florence, Italy only allows members to dine. Nightly the dinner includes entertainment. For the Goodman Giants even knowing about an exclusive members only club feels like a major honor. Months prior to the the visit in July of 2018 the Giants reached out to the club to apply for membership and book a table for six. Upon arrival each family member filled out an application for membership, including the young eleven year old Giant. The initial application only covered the Father of Giants and made it so the reservation could be made. Each Forgein Non-Resident (youth or otherwise) becomes a member for 7 Euros a piece.
Littlest Giant copying off of the membership form that his brother just completed
Members queued for entrance, drinking included wine and water
The all-you-can-eat* dinner club provided a wide variety of dishes that the Giants would not have chosen for 30 Euros per adult. The family style format is not quite all-you-can-eat (that’s why the * was included) in that it really is all you can get before the other members do. Think if your 70 person Italian family were to sit down for dinner all at the same time and each dish were brought out one at a time. At times items were left for multiple servings, and at times items were consumed by humans faster than if each member were a wolf.
Abundant and refilled side dishes while main dishes were served one at at time – No Giants tried these baby fish
Two Giants tried these
Dish after dish was announced by the wait staff and the Giants kept hoping for the chicken that looked so delish to be presented.
Nothing like chicken roasting by open flames to keep Giants trying foods they likely will only sample
Bigger mollusks! Not as good as the first ones in the estimation of the two brave samplers
Sadly the family of travel bloggers are not able to capture all the emotion experienced by the Giants and others when the hard working staff member with Down Syndrome was able to announce a dish. The other staff member did excellent work and set boisterous examples for him. The emotion was palpable when with enthusiasm and pride this tall spirit in a short frame proclaimed his dish to those dining.
The oldest of the Boy Giants looks like he is getting away with theft because of his excitement for the fact that the water was good, self serve, and not charged for by the carafe. He calculated that as a family 10 waters were drank, and since normally the charge is 6 Euros per bottle, the Giants were able to get a value of 60 Euros in water alone.
Giants take on the water:
Good, endless, and self serve! Water heaven!
Top off the night with dessert and a show!
Thirds please!
Giants rating of the food:
Loved the trying of so many choices
In true family style the member moved the tables out of the way to arrange seats to enjoy the performance
The Giants rating of the night:
With dinner starting at near 8:00, arrival time is 7:30, the Giants chose to skate and not see the show when it got late. Could be that the show would have moved a 6 Goodmans night to 7?! The prepping, cooking, presenting, and eating of the food was enough entertainment for the Giants!
“Organic Birch Water,” isn’t all water organic? And if it isn’t then what is it?
Clearly the Giants need to understand France more to know why one would want birch sap water since they don’t like this sample.
“Tastes like wet wipes” according to the Mother of Giants.
Giants rating:
On Monday, 6/18/18 we left Zizzi after 15 mins of no service at the start of our late meal. We were pleased at the extremely prompt table service at Pizza Express.
We were seated, fed, watered, and checked out in less than 40 minutes. Food included appetizers of dough balls. The pizzas we had ranged from plane cheese to one with items like caramelized onions and goat cheese.
Giants food rating is:
Our Food expert said after the meal, “It’s not fair since I was so hungry,” referring to how he felt about this dinner at 10:00pm. Our expert alludes to the idea that at 5:00pm we would likely rate the place lower.
The server was fast, friendly, and aware of how parched we were. He gave us good tasting water, refilled it, left a pitcher, and refilled the pitcher. Us Arizonans loved the water love.
Gotta love the view of St. Pauls from the Pizza Express behind the Mother of Giants with her picture of water.
Giants Water rating:
Friendliness to Tourist rating:
Tesco is a grocery store chain, so this is generic water. And Shelly loved the flavor. Excited that there must be other great still water options when the 1st try that was not even a name brand was good. Only 3 Giants rated this UK flavored water so no official rating given.
