Rafael’s Italian Restaurant

These guys need to raise their prices. $ 3.75 pitchers Monday through Wednesday, the three of us had a big lunch for under 30 bucks. Totally tasty. We’re leaving with two pizzas for ten bucks.

I do try to give circumstantial credit to restaurants when it makes sense. I expect that Manchester’s main drag is probably not going to offer the same culinary delights as New York or Chicago (or Chattanooga, for that matter). However, bad food has some universal properties, several of which Rafael’s proudly featured. One of these was lousy ingredients: I ordered the special calzone, and I think the main protein was ⁷⁰⁄₃₀ hamburger meat. The vegetables and accompanying tomato sauce were also pretty lousy. Nevertheless, with these things alone I might have had a chance of finishing my calzone. It was the hearty helping of undercooked (raw?) onions that really did me in, though. Every bite was almost painful with the unwarranted bite that completely swallowed up any other part of the flavor profile.
If you’re not into pizza, no worries. My friend got a veggie sandwich with a side of fries, so there are any number of unpleasant food experiences to choose from. The lack of quality is especially baffling when you consider that Rafael’s had about a half-​dozen employees working at 2 PM on a Sunday with a nearly empty restaurant. The only way I could see Rafael’s making a profit is if the city of Manchester is actually paying them to stay there… possibly as a bribe to keep them from trying to cater city council events.

Reasons why I won’t be back:
1. The tables and floor were very sticky.
2. At one time, there were 5 teenaged boys (workers) all behind the front counter. 2 were playing on their phones and the others were just goofing around with each other.
3. The sweet tea container was empty. Not a huge deal for me, but the kid who finally made some kept rubbing his eyes with his bare hands while preparing it.
The food was pretty good, but unfortunately the staff is not making Rafael’s look too good.

I had special calzone and my co-​workers had asked for particular ingredients… like chicken. Huge portion and great taste! Cheap too! Wish they had one in Houston!