Pasta Shelf & Sipps Coffee and Dessert Bar

Pasta Shelf is a family owned restaurant that has been based on Bath Road in the west end of Kingston for a number of years, and they have now branched out to own another location in the heart of downtown Kingston - on Ontario Street.  This is where our adventure brought us this week, and - for reasons I will explain later - we broke tradition this week and also continued on to Sipps Coffee and Dessert Bar.  We were also joined by our friend, Leslie, this week, which was great... She was a very good participant in our adventure - especially given that she had no idea that there was anything other than going out for dinner involved until we were on our way downtown :)

With one quick glance at either the website or the menu for Pasta Shelf, it is very clear that family is very important to the owners.  The restaurant boasts an offering of family rooted, home made, authentic Italian recipes that are hand made on site and available at affordable prices.  Both restaurant sites offer a dine-in experience as well as a take home and bake option - perfect for the "in a rush on my way home and too tired to cook" kind of night.  Check out more details for the restaurant here.

I should report that I have had Pasta Shelf before.  When studying to become a teacher, my peers and I met at the west end location two or three times over the course of the school year for a quick dinner between afternoon and night classes; and as a teacher, I have been to conferences and professional development opportunities that have been catered by Pasta Shelf.  On each of these occasions, I wouldn't say that I have been blown away, but I was certainly stuffed and satisfied.  As we ventured to the downtown location this week, I wondered if I would have a similar experience.  In fact, I expected I would. Generally speaking, though, things were different this time around - and whether this is a result of being a different location with different staff, a result of how much time has passed since I have last had a Pasta Shelf experience, or a result of something different entirely... I can't say for sure. 

The atmosphere in the restaurant is relaxing and comfortable.  Exposed limestone walls, rich wood floors, beams and furniture, as well as beautiful pendant lights with deep red shades made of glass all add to a very classy feel that is also welcoming and doesn't make you feel like you have to dress to the nines in order to go there.  It is the kind of place where you could be dressed up with your date for dinner before a show, or be dressed in jeans and a t-shirt (my personal favourite wardrobe items!) with your buddies and not feel out of place.  I absolutely appreciate a restaurant that can serve double-duty in that respect, and in all reality - it is probably very smart from a business perspective, as your doors are open to a much broader clientele (which of course, means more money!).

During our visit, the restaurant wasn't particularly busy, meaning that it was fairly easy for our waitress to be attentive to our needs (she even looked on the sound system for me to see what song was playing when one peaked my interest... for anyone interested, it was a guitar acoustic version of Crash into Me covered by Stevie Nicks.  Totally worth a download). I'd be curious to see how a weekend compares to a night in the middle of the week, though - because as a group of people who dine out fairly regularly, we find that we rarely crave Italian food, and seeing a number of empty tables left me wondering why attendance was poor.  Not a favourite spot?  Too competitive a market in downtown Kingston? More people are taking food home than dining in?  There's no way for me to know for sure, but based on our experience, my future decisions of whether or not to visit again rather than go somewhere else in an area where a plethora of restaurants are available will be based on opinions of the food... which sadly, weren't all that positive in this visit.

This particular dining week, a couple of us ordered drinks - a glass of white and a glass of red were delivered - and I had a "Mediterranean Sunrise", which was delicious and probably consumed much too quickly. I wasn't on the ball in this instance and didn't write down what was in the drink, sadly... But if you know me, you can bet the drink was at least a little fruity (you can take that as you'd like). Beyond the drinks, the ordering run-down went as follows:

Shared at the table - bruschetta; toasted baguette topped with fresh pesto, bruschetta and melted asiago and romano cheeses.

Carrie - Caesar salad to start, and Linguine Chicken Matriciana; a pasta dish with a tomato cream sauce, chicken and bacon topped with mozarella cheese.

Tonia - Soup of the day to start - tomato and spinach, and Rigatoni Parmigiana; rigatoni in a meat sauce topped with melted mozarella and parmesan cheese as well as Italian meatballs.

Todd - Caesar salad to start, and a hot and spicy pizza - topped with tomato arrabiatta sauce, hot Italian sausage, green peppers, red onions and mozarella cheese.

Samer - Garden salad to start, and Seafood Linguine; linguine in marinara sauce (you can choose alfredo if you'd prefer) with scallops, shrimp and mussels.

Leslie - Caesar salad to start, and Rigatoni with Sausage and Peppers; rigatoni in a spicy arrabiatta sauce topped with hot Italian sausage, red and green peppers and smoked white cheddar and mozzarella cheeses.

To begin, let me say that the presentation of each dish was wonderful.  Clean, white dishes, colourful meals.  Without any bells and whistles, they looked absolutely delicious... The unfortunate aspect is that they looked better than they tasted.  It's not that anything was inedible or disgusting or terrible, even... But things were bland.  Looking at the plates, you expected a great deal of flavour, but you were left feeling disappointed as things were "flat".  I've never been to Italy, but I've heard that the food there is pretty darn good to say the least, so this didn't seem like a "true Italian experience" in the end. Even the bacon flavour in my pasta was barely noticeable, which was hard for me, because I am a believer that bacon makes everything taste better (that is, except bacon itself... although bacon-wrapped-bacon wouldn't be such a horrible thing!  For the record - bacon is the sole reason I could never be vegetarian.)  We, of course, polished our plates clean as per usual... but by the end of it all, we were left feeling in need of a more satisfying taste experience (the restaurant's slogan "pasta made perfect" didn't hold true for us), so we opted to have a look at the dessert menu, only to find that the things we were interested in having weren't available because the restaurant was all out. 

This is where the decision to visit Sipps Coffee and Dessert Bar on Brock Street (facing Market Square) came in. I have been quite obsessed with cheesecake as of late (as a kid, I hated it, and in the last couple of years, I have rediscovered it... unluckily for me, it has discovered my lovehandles...), so what better way to end the evening than with a piece of delectable deliciousness.  Since Sipps was close by, we decided to give it a go.  Before I describe that experience, here are the scores for Pasta Shelf, using the ever-trustworty and reliable FORK RATING SYSTEM:

Carrie: 2 forks. The bartender saved this one - the drink was great, but the pasta was bland.  Caesar salad was okay - but pretty ordinary.

Tonia: 3 forks. Good bruschetta, AWESOME soup, good wine (thanks to the winery). Pasta... meh.  It was salty and only had 3 meatballs.  Not the taste she was looking for.

Todd: 2.5 forks. The salad was "ho-hum", and the pizza was comparable to frozen.  In fact, Dr. Oetker does it better. And, then the bill arrived. To quote Todd, "It annoys me when people charge $2.29 for soda water"...

Samer: 3.5 forks. The garden salad was really good.  The pasta was okay, but the seafood was very bland. "I could have made something similar at home... I actually just made something just like it yesterday, but with more flavour".

Leslie: 3.5 forks. Typical caesar salad.  The pasta was good - it had a little zing to it. (I think Leslie's spicy pasta was the only pasta that wasn't bland!). According to Leslie "for someone who likes spice, that's a low-level spice"... but for those of us with no flavour, it might have been just right!

OVERALL SCORE: 2.9 FORKS.
Not a "never go again" restaurant... but certainly not on the top of my list, given that out of 5 meals, the score was saved by appetizers and one somewhat spicy pasta...

And so... on we went to satisfy our tastebuds at Sipps Coffee and Dessert Bar.

I'm not really sure about the particulars regarding Sipps... how long they've been open, who acts as the brains behind the operation, where inspiration comes from... I just know that I am darn happy that they were open, and even happier that they had cheesecake available.  Have I mentioned my obsession with cheesecake lately?  Yes?... Oh, well, it is an obsession after all.

Sipps is a cosy spot. You can either sit at a table by the window, on a comfortable couch or arm chair in the back, or at a pub-height table on a comfy leather chair.  Sipps is for anyone and everyone.  Those who like a warm beverage (coffee, espresso, hot chocolate, tea...) or a cold drink. Those who like tarts, cakes, pies, cookies... Those who need a place to study, or want a place to quietly socialize. I have never walked by Sipps and seen it empty - perhaps partly due to the high-traffic area at which it sits (Market Square is certainly a good place of real-estate!); but also probably due to all of the goodies it has to offer.  I know that sweets aren't for everyone, but I really believe that almost anyone can find something they'd love here. 

Life is short.  Let's get to the point and tell you about the goodies.  We decided to continue with our fork ratings for the evening and give Sipps a score, too.

Samer chose a chocolate chunk brownie.  While he said he has had it before, and it wasn't as fresh as usual (it was 8:00pm by this point, after all), he still gave it a score of 3.5 forks.

Tonia nibbled on 2 chocolate chip cookies.  She said they aren't as tasty as the ones that you can always depend on from Farmer's Market, but still very delicious. (Arguably, it would be hard to compete with Tonia's own homemade cookies, so she has a right to be picky). Her score: 4 forks.

Todd enjoyed a large slice of red velvet cake with cream cheese icing. It was the last piece of the night, so it wasn't as moist as it could be, but it was still tasty enough to deserve a score of 3.5 forks.

Leslie got on the cheesecake train with me (she's a smart girl). She took pleasure in putting her fork through a caramel apple cheesecake.  While it was a little too sweet for her tastes, she especially enjoyed the chunks of real apple and gave the dessert a score of 4 forks.

And me? I devoured a slice of chocolate caramel swirl cheesecake. Yes - I said it correctly.  Chocolate. Caramel. Swirl. It put me into a total cheesecake coma and it was completely worth it. Absolutely worth a score of 5 forks and the complete discomfort I felt from gorging myself until I was filled to the gills.  As Tonia said, "this feeling is uncomfortable, but tomorrow, it's going to be gone."


That gave Sipps an overall score of 4 forks. Not too shabby for few sweets.

Two restaurants in one night?! I can't wait to see what the rest of this adventure has in store for us!

"Wilson" of the Restaurant World