Looking for an experimental Italian eatery, because you have sampled all the others in the area? Go check out “Ristorante Primavera” on Lancaster Avenue in Ardmore. The menu provides a nice variety of uniquely prepared pastas and pizzas aiming to satisfy the customer.

Also accompanying these signature Italian delicacies are lip-smacking salads and a diverse selection of appetizers. This eatery is Italian-based, so I would recommend sticking with a pasta dish. The entrees are fairly priced, ranging from $11-$18 and you can pick up a decent appetizer for $4-$7.

Upon entering, my company and I found ourselves looking for a host to seat us. A friendly server came over and directed us to open seating that had a nice outlook onto the streets of Ardmore; oh, the beauty.

The white-hued interior of the building has tasteful architecture and is well-designed in terms of being a restaurant.

The seating is fairly open and you will find yourself exchanging glances with more than one table when you aren’t focused on the guest in front of you. Smoke meandering its way over to your vicinity will not be a major concern at the restaurant due in part to the high ceiling where you will notice the smoke rising and settling. Unfortunately, the unimportant aspects of this restaurant are where it excelled.

Upon sitting down to eat with my colleagues, I had high expectations for a restaurant that presented itself so soundly. After placing our orders of pasta Capri, fettucine alfredo with shrimp, orecchiette, and an appetizer of bruschetta, we endured a marathon of monitoring our server graciously attending other tables while we awaited some sort of bread to commence our dinner. After what seemed an eternity, our waitress floated over to our table to relieve herself of three ice cold waters and a lukewarm loaf of bread.

We dismissed the bread as quickly as she dropped it off, and again patiently awaited any signs of hope for a decent evening of dining. Sometime thereafter, our waitress introduced us to olive oil, which was apparently supposed to accompany the bread. How gracious a host.

Nonetheless, time passed until our (what seemed to be microwave-heated) bruschetta was escorted to our table by a new server. Since the restaurant was not heavily occupied, locating the deserved customers was not an onerous task.

Our bruschetta was flooded with tomatoes and searching for the bread to taste the dish was more of a task than pleasantry. After discovering the bread, I found it to be well toasted with a hint of garlic; a nice, diverse approach to the traditional dish.

Then, the three main dishes arrived, mine being the pasta Capri, a well-balanced assortment of shrimp, olives, garnish and peppers.

Although the presentation was nice, unfortunately, the chef seemed to have an off night in preparing this dish, for it was nowhere as tasty as it should have and could have been. No zing, no zest, no reason to come back were all features of the dish that lay exanimate before me.

I also had an opportunity to taste the two pasta dishes my colleagues had ordered, and they were both absolutely bland. If a wave crashed down upon these two dishes they would still be dry and tasteless; “flavorless” seemed to be the theme of the night for our friendly chef in the back.

After tolerating his poor performance in the kitchen, I requested to speak with a manager and to remove something from the bill considering the poor quality and service we had received.

After a five minute debate, the waitress was unable to aid us and was very apologetic for our wasted evening.