Romano Cucina

By far the best Italian restaurant I’ve ever ate at, nice waiters and flavorful food. Most Italian dishes I get from elsewhere really lack in perfecting their sauce, but Romano Cucina is the exception. Would definitely return here/​recommend it to a friend.

Great little spot but gets really busy between 5−7pm. Definitely worth the wait! Nice little bar inside to have a drink while you wait for your table, and the staff are extremely friendly and attentive.
The food? Fantastic! Delicious, large portions and fairly priced. No wonder they have a line as soon as they open.
Try it

This place is awesome. Simple as that. It is our family’s favorite restaurant. Great food, great service and excellent atmosphere. Chances are, you will have to wait when you come here, but it is so worth it. We have been here 4 times now and it has been fantastic each time. Highly recommended!

One of the best restaurants I have ever dined in!
The staff here was very good at making sure we had everything we needed whether it was water, butter, menus, or answers to our questions. Our server was amazing; he suggested things to try with the things we had ordered. My friend and I ordered delicious pasta dishes — the server suggested we substitute the sauce for their house sauce. We took him up on that offer and didn’t look back. Everything was delicious.
If you come here, follow their advice and tip generously. Great service. Great food. Great memories that you’ll take with you.

They open at 5:00 and you had better get there by 5:30 or you will have to wait… that includes bar seats! Why? The food and the specials. Every weeknight they have specials. Our fave? $ 5 cocktail night on Thursdays! The food is prepared well and the portions are good. The bread is warm and crusty outside, soft inside.
Ambience? Sure, it’s kitschy for sure. Lots of vintage photos, and in the Men’s room, all gangster photos. Good fellas to John Gotti. Fun stuff.
The servers are good, the hostesses could use some work, but I’m not dropping the rating for and 18 year old kid at the podium.
It’s good, you should go.

5 Star Service .
We did arrive during dinner hrs and had to wait for about 25 min. Definitely worth rhe wait.
Customer service 5 star
Food was amazing 5 star.

This place is absolutely amazing. Not only is the décor and atmosphere cozy and clean but the staff is top notch. Everyone was working as a team and did any job they saw that needed to be done.
And of course, the food, it’s absolutely what you’d hope for from a small Italian establishment. I’ve had wonderful experiences here both dine and take out. I’d suggest them to anyone!

Excellent food and a lovely atmosphere with quick and attentive service. At a loss for what we should have for dinner, my boyfriend and I opted for Italian and found out this place was just a short drive away. We were seated within 5 minutes of arriving and were almost immediately greeted by our server. We ordered the calamari, primavera aglio olio with chicken, and the penne rosa with chicken milanese. All of the food came out prepared fantatically and was ready exceptionally quickly. The calamari was deliciously crunchy and well seasoned without being too chewy, and the pastas were both great. My primavera was very flavourful and the vegetables were cooked perfectly. I’ll definitely be coming back to try out some of the other dishes on the menu!

My favorite thing of all time here and I CRAVE for it all the time: TIRAMISU. It’s rich, thick sponge cake soaked in espresso & Kahlua, layered with sweet, real mascarpone cheese and drizzled with chocolate. YYYUUUUMMMMMMMMM!
I cannot find it like this anywhere else! Just trust me, eat your dinner BUT leave room for their tiramisu!

It actually rained in SoCal today!
Called ahead around 5pm to see if the wait would be long for two people on a rainy, Wednesday night.
Hostess mentioned they don’t take reservations as seating is first come first serve.
Seating:
We roll up at 5:30, the inside is already packed. Inside waiting is about 30 min — 45 min. Bar and outdoor seating is immediate though. Turns out though it’s a rainy day, Wednesday’s are ½ off wine bottles with no corkage fee. Nice for winos!
We picked bar. All menu items can be ordered at the bar!
Food:
Took a little time to get our orders since I modified my order due to lobster allergy. The day’s special consisted of shrimp ravioli (minus the langostino lobster) in white wine cream sauce with tomatoes.
Yummy ravioli and lightly salted cream sauce. Added additional Parmesan and red pepper flakes.
Would come back on a Wednesday with friends for ½ off wine.

This place is AMAZING!!! The service is great, and they are so quick! The food is really great! The portions are large and could be shared by two people! I had the Fettucine Alfredo with lobster and the flavor was exploding in my mouth! My sister had pasta Gianni and she loved it. She said the mushrooms flavor was really flavorful. Also had the calamari for the appetizer and it was so tender. This is now my new favorite Italian place and would certainly come back! I am so glad I tried this place out!

Yummy food. 2^nd time going. Although the hostess indicated the bigger tables were to seat «6» people. And my group of 4 got seated at a 4 person cramped table. And then she sat a party of two at the 6 person table. And a party of 4 at another «6» person table. But we sucked it up and enjoyed our food anyway. Still great good.

My wife and I ate here today and it was of the more pleasant dining experiences that we have had in quite some time. Great atmosphere, great service and really good Italian food. Being from the east coast originally, it is hard to find really good Italian restaurants here in OC. This place fits the bill perfectly. So glad that we discovered it. We both had the Chicken Parm, which comes with a salad. Really fantastic. We also ordered a calzone to go for my daughter, who said it was great. The restaurant is small, so you may wait for a bit, but it is worth it. A real find!

They are a 4.5 star venue or better…
See my previous reviews for their cuisine.
Here is a review on the cannolo pastry:
For me, it is «The Best Cannolo in the South OC» (and beyond). The portion size is large with dense, smooth ricotta cream filling the crunchy shell. The cream protrudes from each end and contains miniature chocolate chips. There isn’t any flavor of amaretto or liqueur but that is okay because of how outstanding the filling is. The cheese is likely ricotta but the slight tangy sourness makes me wonder whether it is either sheep’s milk ricotta or some bit of secondary cheese was added (i.e. mascarpone, cream cheese etc.).
There is a light dusting of powdered sugar on the exterior which I would likely veto next time. The moderate sweetness warrants this being unnecessary. Purists may find it a bit too sweet overall but it is so damn delicious I can’t say that about it.
I truly love what they’ve done here in regards to this pastry. I am a big, big fan…

I actually am not sure how to rate this. It was between 2 – 3 stars overall.
The husband picked this place based on his co-worker’s suggestion. Since we don’t normally go out to eat Italian food, I thought we mine as well give it a shot. There was a 45 min wait on a Friday night, so that had to be a good thing, right? Hmm…
I think we maybe went on an off night and am blaming it on the fact that they were super duper busy. We sat on the side next to the bar so there were a lot of bodies standing around. It made it a tad bit uncomfortable because more bodies = more body heat. Being pregnant, I get hot easily so that wasn’t fun!
Once we sat down, our server acknowledged us quickly and came back to take our drink order. To make it easy on her, I took the initiative to place our drink and food order together. After that was done, I received my water fairly quickly, but it took a very long time to get my husband’s wine to our table. Our food also took longer than I would have liked, but it at least came out piping hot.
The food:
–Complimentary bread– Excellent, but then again. We were hungry
–Spaghetti w/​meatballs– Since people were raving about this dish, I decided to give it a whirl. It was okay. The sauce was lacking salt and our table was missing the salt and pepper shakers. DOH! The meatball, sorry. I wasn’t a fan. I took more than half of my meal home and added seasoning before reheating. It tasted better, but the meatball still was not a winner. I chalk it up to the texture. It seemed overly mushy and not very meaty.
–Garlic Shrimp w/​fettuccinie– My husband ordered this and it was way better than my dish. The noodles were a perfect al dente, the sauce was missing salt, but not as bad as my dish. There were ample amounts of shrimp.
–Spumoni Ice Cream– Really delish and probably the highlight of the meal for me.
For the wait and amount of money spent, I probably will not be going back.

Great little hole in the wall! I went for wine wednesday a few weeks ago. They don’t take reservations which is the only bummer. The place is small and gets pretty packed.
Bruschetta and sausage appetizers were delicious. Caprese salad was good too, a little on the salty side though.
Christian was our server. He was quick, polite, and awesome. The manager Ryan was really cool too and came over to ask how our meal was and took a salad off the bill that my friend didn’t like.
This place is great I will definitely be back!

I have been to this restaurant twice now, and had a completely different experience both times. Someone in my group was celebrating a birthday each time I have dined here.
The first time, we came on a Tuesday, around 5pm. There was no wait for a table, and we were seated right away. I ordered a glass of the house Cabernet, and Chicken Parmesan. The entrée was served with a dinner salad which was really fresh and good. The wine was good, and had a nice flavor. I am a bit picky with Italian food, and the Chicken Parmesan was delicious. Our waiter was very attentive, and we did not have to wait long for anything during our meal. The waiter brought out some Spumoni ice cream with a candle for the birthday we were celebrating.
The second time, we came on a Sunday, around 5:20pm. There was a wait of 30 — 45 minutes, and our buzzer went off around 6pm. The hostess came out, letting us know it would still be another minute. When the buzzer went off the second time, we went inside and were seated. I think it was just a completely off night all around in the restaurant… not sure if they were short staffed, or what happened, but Ive always heard amazing things about this restaurant which makes me believe it was just one of those nights. It happens. I ordered a glass of the house Cabernet again, and when my wine came, it was Chardonnay. The waiter who dropped it off, said he would have it corrected. About 15 minutes later, we asked about the wine again, I still had not received it. We ordered, and when the meals came, one was supposed to be Eggplant Parmesan, with Spaghetti. It was Penne with Sausage and I am not sure what else. It was taken back, and it was about another 20 minutes until the correct dish came out, and we asked to just have it boxed up to go at that point. There was no birthday ice cream served, even though we had let them know there was a birthday. Kind of a bummer!
I will say it is VERY noisy in this restaurant. Its always busy, and it is very loud and really hard to carry on a conversation because of it sometimes.
I am leaving my review at 4 stars, because the food is amazing. I have really liked everything I have had, and tasted here. They were very apologetic on the second visit with everything that went wrong, and the meal that was incorrect was taken off of our bill, which was very nice.

I went back here for the second time a few days ago and it did not disappoint. The food here is simply delicious. I had the ala checca with shrimp. It was so fresh. The portions here are huge, including the side salad that comes with the entrees.
Atmosphere and service are spot on also. Just an overall great local place to have a wonderful dinner. Try and come early, it fills up fast!

Nice little local’s spot. Service was friendly. All entrees come with choice of soup or salad. Bread comes out hot and they have oil and vinegar on the table.
Had the spaghetti tombrello. Menu claims spicy but it was not. Really liked this pasta. Only thing I’d change is that I’d wish they’d add more sauce. Many bites felt a little dry, however that might be the design.
Thought my wife’s sausage and peppers pasta was a little plain, but she loved it. In-law’s loved their eggplant parmesan and lasagna bolognese.
Reasonably priced.

After a long wait outside with a Martini, we were finally seated after 45 minutes. Our waiter, David was friendly and attentive. The bread they brought in the basket was warm and tasty.
Ordered…
Spaghetti with meatballs, Lasagna (2), Pasta Primavera and Tiramisu. Came with salad/​soup.
Everyone loved the food and shared the Tiramisu in the end. Overall, it’s a good restaurant. The food is good but I wouldn’t say it’s so good that I want to come and wait nearly an hour for it.
I’ll most likely order for a pick up when I have a craving.