Jackson Heights Life

I had a similar experience.  I ordered the chicken parm and asked if I could substitute a vegetable for the pasta. They told me that the entree doesn't come with anything.  Just the chicken on a plate.  I don't think I have ever ordered chicken parm at an Italian restaurant where it didn't come with some type of side.

Still, I like the place and hope they do well.

I agree with Lilybell.   With no side dish especially pasta which goes with chicken parmigiana + negative reviews on Jackson Heights Life + negative reviews on Yelp = great news for Armondo's and Uncle Peter's.  At both these restaurants entrees include a side dish. 

I really like the place! I find the portions in Uncle Peter’s a bit big, the food at Romero’s tasty, interesting and I left full.

No side is wierd, but what got me is that we explicitly asked about a side before choosing the dish, was told it came with pasta and to choose the type of pasta we wanted and then when the dish arrived without the pasta, and we asked where it was, was told it didn't come with a side. It felt a little bit like a bait and switch.

Chicken parm doesn't come with pasta though. It's a secondi

that's a bummer, really. we've been looking forward to trying the place, and still may, but this would leave a sour taste (no pun intended). not so much the a la carte pricing, but the seemingly brusque way the diners were handled.

Yeah that's kind of a bummer, isn't it? Romeo's is extremely convenient for me, but paying that much for plain old chicken parmigiana plus one side--that's a lot. We order chicken parm from Mama Rosa's. Granted, it's not a white tablecloth experience, merely takeout, but I'd wager the chicken parm is just as good. And yes, it comes with pasta (though that is not clear on Seamless--they should fix that issue).

I gather the Romeo's owners and staff come from an upscale Manhattan restaurant, and maybe they think that they can operate the same way in JH. I guess we'll see. There are a couple of pretty upscale Italian restaurants in Corona that probably have similar prices and seem to do well--I've been to each of those once, and don't recall whether everything was a la carte, but they were pricey. So maybe Romeo's can follow suit--but I bet they won't get as much business from people who make it a frequent stop and become regulars. It will be more of a special occasion place.

Okay so we went again tonight. The waiter who took our order said that the dishes do come with a side--pasta or vegetable. I ordered a special, chicken marsala, and he said it would come with spinach. Then another waiter came by and said that we had been misinformed about the side dish coming with the main dish, but he would give me the spinach anyway!

Hmm....don't know why they can't get their story straight. He did give me the spinach, and the food was good (we had linguine with clams as well) and overall we had a nice time--and the place was quite crowded with a wide variety of people, all ethnicities, by the way--reflective of the neighborhood and not just a certain segment of the population.

So they seem to be doing well regardless of the confusion or the a la carte menu. They just seem to be kind of disorganized still. We saw waiters giving other diners the little wedge of parmesan they give as an appetizer, but they never brought it to our table. However, they did bring the zucchini appetizer (free) that we got one of the two prior times we dined there.  My daughter asked for a candle in the dessert we ordered (it was my birthday) and several waiters came and sang Happy Birthday. It was nice, the service was quite friendly--though I will say that getting served was a bit on the slow side. All in all--I'll go back, though the thing about no sides with the main dish does annoy me.