Donald T.
Yelp
A preface: I went to Carmello's to hear a pitch for retirement planning--one of those "Spend an hour listening to our pitch and we'll give you a free dinner." Unfortunately, due to very heavy traffic, I arrived late and wasn't permitted to hear the pitch. However, the dinner's sponsors did provide the dinner in a separate (the main) dining room. So, on the one hand, I received a free meal at Carmello's. On the other hand, the free menu was limited and I suspect the serving sizes were much smaller than Carmello's regular dinners. Nevertheless, I did have an opportunity to judge the restaurant.
Location
Carmello's is in Old Town Manassas. It's convenient to 66 and 28, though I was delayed about 20 minutes taking 28--it was raining during rush hour. Yes, I should have known better. However, despite the summary of the place's features above, it offers no parking. There's no valet service, no parking garage, and very limited on-street parking. There is parking a few blocks away--several free lots and reportedly a few garages. So you may have to walk a few blocks.
Ambiance
Nice but not great. Brick walls, wood floors, padded chairs and booths. The place was nearly empty--there were three other groups of two or three people. Even then, the hard surfaces caused sound to carry. It wasn't bad nearly empty, but it probably could get pretty noisy if the place gets busy. Some music--maybe Sinatra--was playing quietly in the background. Lighting was okay. Temperature was okay.
Food
This may be the weakest part of my review since--as I mentioned--I had intended to attend a private dinner with a limited menu. The choices were steak, salmon, and chicken. I had the salmon, which came with broccoli and roasted potatoes. It was preceded by a salad and a warm dinner roll. All of that was pretty good. The bread was warm and tasty, with some sort of special butter. The salad was definitely fresh, and was okay. The salmon, too, was fresh and properly cooked. Very small portion, though--which probably was due to the limited menu selection. And ice water. There was no opportunity (even though I knew I'd have to pay for it myself) for coffee, tea, drinks, or dessert. And that brings us to . . .
Service
Service was poor. The other three tables were served by a chipper, friendly, helpful, attentive female server. Nice personality and from what I saw she interacted well with the other diners. I got a dour male server. (I mention their sexes just to distinguish the two.) He wasn't impolite or nasty, just cold, inattentive, and noncommunicative. I asked him--as I often do--what menu item he'd recommend. As mentioned above, the three choices were steak, salmon, and chicken. I asked specifically about the steak and salmon. All he could offer was: "They're both popular." O...kay. He came around just once to fill my water glass and to provide a clean knife. As I mentioned above, I would have ordered and paid for tea or coffee and a dessert but--maybe because it wasn't on the limited menu--it wasn't even offered to me. At the end of the meal he just vanished. Maybe because he figured I was only there for a free meal, he didn't see a need to be attentive. I really don't know. I did leave him a tip, though--about 25% on what I figured the sponsors had paid for the meal. After about 10 minutes, I just stood up and left into the nighttime drizzle for a three-block walk back to my car.