- The girls and I took a well needed break from the cold and headed down to FL for some sun and fun. Jill's parent's condo is right off the main drag of Las Olas in Fort Lauderdale so there are tons of great dining options within walking distance. Timpano is literally downstairs and for happy hour they have 1/2 price appetizers and drinks - so it was the perfect way to start the night. The service started out well enough with them being really accommodating by literally carrying tables from across the restaurant so that we could all sit together outside. Our first (yes, first) waitress was super bubbly and excited to help kick off the night with us. We immediately ordered a round of drinks and a bunch of appetizers in order to take advantage of the happy hour specials. We got 2 orders of the black skillet roasted mussels ($6/order for HH), 2 orders of the jumbo lump crabcakes ($8/order for HH), 1 order of the skillet clams ($7 for HH), 2 orders of the meatballs ($4.50/order for HH), 1 order of the calamari ($5 for HH), 2 orders of the shrimp cocktail ($6.50/order for HH) and a Tuscan flatbread ($11). As you can see, we all love to eat and that's the beauty of hanging out with this crew - you will eat and drink well.
The steaming hot mussels and clams came out first and I was super excited because there is nothing I love more than a good shellfish dish. I was extremely impressed by how many mussels and clams they give you - especially during happy hour. The entire skillet was piled high with them. The mussels were served with olive oil and sea salt. They were fairly decent sized and most of them were pretty plumb. My one complaint was that there was too much salt and by the end of the meal I was extremely dehydrated from all the salt I was ingesting. The clams were served with olive oil, sea salt, rosemary and fresh garlic. Again, it was very heavy handed on the salt and rosemary. I would have preferred a cleaner more simple seafood experience but let's be honest, it didn't stop me from gorging on about 20 of them. The crabcakes came with a roasted red peper bearnaise and arugula. As someone from MD, I take my crabcakes pretty seriously and these were ok - a bit heavy on the filler and I didn't really get the lump crabmeat experience but it was a decent happy hour serving. The calamari was your standard bar calamari here too, so no complaints here. The meatballs came with a healthy dose of marinara sauce on it and it was a great 2-bite happy hour appetizer - I could have eaten at least 3 of them on my own. As this point, we were all pretty full and 2 cocktails in, so we didn't even really realize that our shrimp cocktail and flatbread didn't show up even though they did bring us fresh plates.
After waiting for awhile, we just told our 3rd waitress (yes, somehow in the process of ordering, getting our dishes and getting the bill we went through 3 different waitresses) that we didn't mind that they didn't send out the shrimp and flatbread, but it would be great if she could just make sure it was not on our bill. Lo and behold, when our bill came they were on our bill. I mean, come on. We had literally just told them 2 seconds to please check. So we had to track down one of our 3 waitresses to take it off our bill. Then our 1st waitress came and told us that apparently they delivered our food to the next table and instead of them questioning why they got it, they just ate it! Then when we got our bill, we noticed that Jenn's credit card was missing and they had only charged 4 of the 5 cards. The waitress looked at us like we were crazy but then she started looking around and saw that Jenn's credit card was lying on the ground outside the restaurant. WTF?!
All in all, it was a great happy hour place and super fun place to chill out after a long relaxing day at the pool. My only complaint was that the service was all over the place and even though I know it's not New York and things go at a slower pace, the combination of the comical service blunders puts this in the 3.5 fork category. I can't vouch for a non-happy hour experience, but I'd say just try to get there by 7pm and you'll have a great and very affordable night. Total bill: $40/pp with drinks, tip and tax
Photo Credit: Yelp
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