Benjamin B.
Google
I've lived in Monroeville my whole life and have known about the Wooden Nickle the entire time. I went there once in my early 20s and recall having a decent meal there, but I've never been back because of the prices.
Flash forward 20 years and my wife and I needed to find a restaurant open earlier than usual for one of our ritzy nights on the town. We usually go to the likes of Meat and Potatoes, Gi Jin, or other places downtown, but decided to finally give the Wooden Nickle a try.
We arrived to the staff huddled and chatting at the door. The snow was particularly bad and the restaurant was fairly empty. The wait staff were super cheerful and bright and were by far the best part of our experience. Unfortunately, from there it goes downhill.
The ambiance is dated. It has the feel of "we used to be a big thing" but it now reads "we're trying to hold onto what we once were". If you don't mind that kind of ambiance, that's fine, but it's tired and cliche.
We were pressed for time so we didn't order an appetizer. My wife ordered the Seared Scallops with Parmesan risotto and I order the Veal Parmesan. The menu had some nice sounding options, but you can't find to many places still doing a veal parm. Locally the options are Esta Esta and Olives and Peppers. Only the latter is worth mentioning and it's still only par at best.
The veal parm itself was decent. A little overcooked, but overall not bad. The sauce and pasta, though, were sub par. Clearly dried pasta, which, for the price, you'd expected something fresh made. I've had better pasta and sauce at the Eat n' Park next door.
As disappointing as my meal was, my wife's was so much worse. The scallops were salted beyond reason and cooked well past what a scallop should be. They actually reached that texture where the protein is just breaking into flakes as you chew. The worst scallops I've ever eaten. That includes my first attempts at learning how to cook them myself and failing miserably. There's no excuses for a restaurant charging these prices to serve for like that.
The risotto was so much worse. If you've had real risotto, you know these is a texture to the rice that is essential to being a true risotto. That's in addition to the type of rice it needs to be.
At the absolute best, this was overcooked cheesy rice with the texture of mashed potatoes.
We didn't stay for dessert. I'm glad we skipped the appetizer. And I won't be going back. You can get dramatically better versions of these meals almost anywhere else, but most especially at a real top tier restaurant. You're better off eating anywhere else in Monroeville and saving your money. No self respecting restaurant charging prices like this should serve food this bad.
The staff though deserves a second shout out. They were cheerful, polite, and timely. Everything else was a miss.
