Olive Garden vs Bertucci’s

The Olive Garden vs. Bertucci’s comparison is apt because both offer Italian-American dishes featuring pastas, olive oil, and tomato sauce, among other staples.  While the dishes cannot be considered as authentic Italian, these are as Italian as you can get while still retaining the characteristics that make them American, so to speak.

Let’s first have an introduction of what makes Olive Garden and Bertucci’s unique from each other. Olive Garden is a chain of casual dining restaurants with more than 800 locations in the United States and abroad. As a subsidiary of Darden Restaurants, Inc., it maintains its headquarters in Orlando, Florida.

Bertucci’s is a chain of sit-down restaurants offering a wide range of Italian-American foods with its specialty being brick oven-baked pizza. Aside from its sit-down restaurant service, it also offers delivery, takeout, and private dining services. It’s a privately-owned company with headquarters in Northborough, Massachusetts.

Italian-American Cuisine at Heart

Olive Garden takes pride in its breadsticks and, in fact, offers its lunch menu with the breadsticks at the core of it. The Italian-American menu consists of a wide range of pasta dishes, salads, and steaks as well as soups, which the company asserts are made fresh onsite every day (i.e., fresh, hot and satisfying).

But herein lies one of Olive Garden’s weakness. While a wide range of choices can be a boon for many customers, it can also be the bane for people who want a simpler menu so making the choices becomes easier.  Take a look at a typical Olive Garden menu card – it’s confusing because of the cluttered layout and complicated combinations of meals, and the addition of deals.

Even just looking at the menu will take five minutes or so of perusal unless you already have your favorites. You may have to wait for a waitress or manager to explain the menu combinations and deals, especially when you’re ordering for a catered event.  Fortunately, once the waitress explains these matters, it becomes easier to make your choice.

The breadsticks are rightfully the heart of the meal – served warm, these are delicious aside from pairing well with many of the dishes. Overall, the dishes have a fresh, filling and flavorful quality to them, especially the Lasagna Fritta, spaghetti with meat sauce, and salad.  But there may lapses in a few types of food, such as there not being enough salt or grated cheese in the spaghetti.

Bertucci’s prides itself on its wood-fired pizzas for good reason. The crust is both crisp and chewy while the sauce is flavorful and the toppings are obviously of fresh and premium quality. The BBQ Chicken Pizza, for example, has a sweet ketchup with a tangy edge to it combined with the sweetness of the caramelized onions and meatiness of the chicken breast.

The pizzas are available in two forms: First, created by customers with choices from more than 25 toppings; and second, curated by the chefs like the Sporkie.  Other items on the menu are equally delicious, such as ravioli, chicken parma, filet mignon, and spaghetti with meatballs.

Casual Dining Taken to a Better Level

Both Olive Garden and Bertucci’s are casual dining restaurants but with a difference – at times, both chains take casual dining to a better level with highly satisfactory customer service.  The waiters are typically friendly, helpful, and efficient to all customers, especially for parents who brought their children along for the experience.

If you’re looking for excellent catering services from a casual dining restaurant, both chains are good choices, too. Bertucci’s, for example, have private dining packages and full catering services with the dining packages suitable for both small and large groups.

So who wins in the Olive Garden vs. Bertucci’s comparison? We have to say that Bertucci’s has a slight edge because of its private dining areas and full in-house catering services, as well as its great food and drinks.