Petrow's

Thursday, March 14, 2019

Petrow's

5914 Center Street, Omaha, NE

Where we went:

3.14159265359….or Happy Pi Day! Today was March 14th, better known as Pi Day! It is our tradition to go out for some great pie on pi day! There are many great options for pie around Omaha, so it was hard to chose. However, we decided to go to a place we went, and used as a dessert “Bonus” for a previous blog, Petrow's. As its sign implies, Petrow’s is an Omaha tradition. It started as a gas station in 1950 which also served sandwiches. Over the next 60 years it has grown to be a well established and beloved eatery in Omaha. It is so well loved, in fact, that Kyle has actually run into the Oracle of Omaha himself, Warren Buffett while he was having dinner with his friend, Bill Gates!

What we Eat:

We both started off our meals with a house salad, Kyle got the ranch dressing while Eric got the raspberry vinaigrette, both came with a dinner roll. Kyle then ordered the Chicken Parmesan with garlic bread. While Eric was also craving Chicken Parmesan, he acknowledges that he’s had it a LOT lately, so he went for the Pork Tenderloin with mashed potatoes and mixed vegetables instead.

However, the main event of tonight's meal was, of course, the pie! Kyle ordered the cherry pie a la mode, while Eric went all out and ordered both the Banana Cream Pie and the Apple Pie a la mode (he really likes pie!)

The Food:

The salads were fine, really just your standard iceberg lettuce salad that you can get anywhere. Eric’s raspberry vinaigrette was extremely thick, but it tasted pretty good. The dinner rolls at Petrow’s are some of the best dinner rolls we have ever had. Fresh, and hot with crisp, toasted outside and soft, warm insides. The packets of butter we got were, unfortunately, frozen, but luckily the bread was so warm it didn’t take long for them to melt, giving a delicious buttery goodness to our rolls.

Kyle’s Chicken Parmesan was excellent. The spaghetti was perfectly done, and sauce was excellent and the chicken was expertly done with great breading. The garlic bread, however, left something to be desired. There wasn’t anything to it, it was really just buttered toast with garlic powder on top. The second slice he tasted had way too much garlic on it, so he chose not to finish the rest. Eric wanted to try it just out of curiosity, and the slice he tried just tasted like buttered toast, so maybe the garlic powder got skipped on some of the slices.

Eric’s Pork Tenderloin was big. BIG. The first couple bites were very good, the breading was crunchy while the tenderloin was moist and hot. However, about halfway through the first (of two very large) tenderloins, he started to get bored with it. The breading didn’t have as much seasoning, so after a while there wasn’t anything special about it. His mashed potatoes and mixed vegetables were also underwhelming. The potatoes tasted like boxed instant potatoes and the vegetables literally looked like someone went to the Hy-Vee up the street and brought back a bag of mixed vegetable medley that Eric remembers being a staple of family meals growing up. Although it wasn’t bad by any means, he really felt like it was something he could have just as easily made himself at home.

Then there was the pie. First our a la mode pies came out without our ice cream, so they had to go back. Nothing wrong with that, it happens. Kyle’s Cherry pie was warm and delicious, the chocolate drizzle on the edge of the plate gave a classy look to it, and the ice cream was a perfect addition to this warm dessert.

Eric, on the other hand wasn’t as lucky with his pie choices. His banana cream pie, which he usually loves, wasn’t what he expected. His first few bites, he didn’t taste any bananas, so he started picking it apart to see if there were, in fact, bananas (His Petrow’s Banana Split Debacle is a story for another day!). He did find some, but they were very thinly sliced, browning, shriveled bananas (ie not fresh at all) that were just lining the bottom crust of the pie. The pie filling was dry, vaguely banana flavored whipped cream. He was very disappointed in this pie. His apple pie, was also surprisingly underwhelming. It was served so cold that the ice cream on top never melted despite eating this slice after the banana cream. The apples in the pie were surprisingly scarce. They were more prevalent than the bananas in the first pie, but it seemed like most of the pie was like thick apple flavored jam. There was a sort of artificial taste to it that didn’t sit well, and Eric couldn’t bring himself to finish the slice.

The Atmosphere:

The atmosphere at Petrow’s is very unique. Petrow’s still has the air of a classic 1950’s dinner, but very updated to make it more high end. For example, the tables are diner type tables, but are a glossy black, almost marble looking. Each table has a lovely pendant lamp above it, and the dinning room in the back also features a fireplace. That being said, they still have some classic neon signs around and a set back, but still open kitchen. All the soda drinks come in old fashion ice cream sundae glasses. A recent addition also added an outside seating area to the west side of the building that also features a fireplace and a water feature. Due to the rain/snow mix Omaha was experiencing tonight, we dined inside.

The Service:

The services at Petrow’s was good. We were seated right away and our waitress was very nice (though seemed a bit shy) and did everything she could to make our meal enjoyable, including adding some elaborate decorative chocolate drizzle to our pies, which was a really nice extra touch. The food came out surprisingly fast, we hadn’t even finished our salads yet. The only hiccup was the pies initially being served without the ice cream we requested, but they were very apologetic and fixed it right away and even left the extra a la mode charge off our checks at the end of the night.

In the End:

Our experience tonight at Petrow’s was, unfortunately, another mixed bag. Some parts of the meal (Kyle’s part) were excellent while others (Eric’s part) didn’t hold up to the normally high standards we have seen at Petrow’s during past visits. This is a great example of how different visits to an establishment can vary a bit, and a mediocre experience one day can easily be followed up by a spectacular one the next. Of course every restaurant strives for consistency in their quality, but even the best of places can have an off day. We will definitely return to Petrow’s again in the future, but when next year’s Pi Day comes along, we will choose to try a different establishment.