Mangia Monday.... Hard Rock Edition!

Yay Structure! Mangia Mondays... Where to and not to eat in South Florida!

For those who are not familiar with my lingo Italiano, Mangia is to eat!

This past weekend we celebrated my husband Andy's birthday at the Hard Rock Hotel and Casino in Hollywood, FL. A staple in the South FL night life scene, we have been coming here for a good time for years. Years I tell ya!

Happy Bday Andy - At Center Bar

Soooooo to break tradition from our usual Tatu birthday celebrations, this time we decided to try the semi-newly opened Cafe Martorano.  This is another location and more of a cafe than the original Martoranos that's in Fort Lauderdale. Can you say YUM!? Apparently this Martoranos has two separate seating areas, inside or out. While we would normally automatically opt for the under AC choice, we were greeted with the option of a 2 and a half hour wait for indoors or immediate seating outdoors. Break out the pony tail, lets sit outside!

I wish I would have taken a picture of the food, but I was too busy shoveling it all in my face. That's right... face! Thanks Louis CK! We ordered 4 menu choices which we all shared family style. We split a meatball. That's right, one meatball - 4 people. At $18 for a meatball, I think it was well worth it to feed 4. Then moved on to linguini with white clam sauce, a cheesesteak AND a pizza. At Martoranos you can also order the house Martorano wine, which is delish! A bottle of Pinot Grigio and a bottle of Chianti please! I'm so ready to go back again.... Would even wait 2 and a half hours if I had to - Delish! You can see the awesome menu for Martoranos here.

Now comes the irritating part.... Bongos. While we had all previously been huge fans of the upstairs bar (including me wanting to have my 30th birthday celebration there) that all went downhill. We wanted a bottle of champagne and a seat. They were out of champagne... Now, it's Saturday night at 8:00pm and you are out of champagne?? Isn't there Happy Pappy's across the street? Couldn't you send someone to Publix? We were so confused! SO CONFUSED!!! Now we can see why Bongo's is all over Groupon and Travelzoo. It's terrible!!! They can't give away their food and drinks! Also, I should mention that Andy said the bathrooms were worse than a NYC subway. After that lovely tidbit, we didn't even attempt to brave the women's ones.

Bongos upstairs... Super cool. If only they could get it together!

Though Bongos was terrible, I do have to thank them for being SO stupid that we ended back at our favorite hangout - Tatu! Tatu - a well prepared, delicious, gourmet Japanese fusion style restaurant, was NOT out of champagne. Smart! I knew I loved them for a reason....

Finally!

You can check out my Yelp's on Tatu, Martoranos and Bongos by clicking the links!

What's your favorite Hard Rock restaurant?