Carolina’s Italian Restaurant Comes to Anaheim – Win a Gift Card Here

A few weeks ago we dined at the new location of Carolina’s Italian Restaurant located in Anaheim, California.  Carolina’s has been a staple for over 35 years in the city of Garden Grove.  It has always been highly recommended to me by my high school students that have grown up in the city!  Also, as a teacher, I must say this restaurant has many fundraising opportunities for schools, pizza deals for school and even free appetizers for teachers and more. Visit the website to see all deals!

The new Anaheim location, located on Harbor Blvd. took over the space where there used to be a Carrow’s and they serve the same Carolina’s favorites that are at the Garden Grove location, which include delicious appetizers, fresh salads, signature homemade pasta dishes, made-to-order pizzas, delectable desserts and an extensive beer and wine list.  All items at Carolina’s our extremely generous portions and I would go as far as saying, next time I visit we will get a few dishes and make it family style….unless we want leftovers for lunch and dinner the next day. They even have catering as well!  🙂 Carolina’s has been voted best pizza in Garden Grove, and proudly maintains the largest beer list in Orange County, with over 400 featured beers. This was definitely awesome!

Managing partner, Tim Ibrahim said, “Carolina’s is proud to celebrate more than 35 years in Orange County and we’re looking forward to serving many new guests at our new location near Disneyland in Anaheim.   As we embark on this new journey with our second location, we’d like to take this time to thank our loyal guests and staff who have supported Carolina’s for so many years. Thank you for helping us to achieve our dream.”

When we went to visit Carolina’s, we started by ordering their famous Italian Cream Soda. I chose the raspberry flavor as it was one of my favorites in high school.  The raspberry cream soda came in an awesome glass with a Carolina’s logo.  This was a large glass that was enough for two to share!  To accompany our Italian cream soda, we had the complimentary cheese bread and Carolina’s Famous Meatballs. The cheese bread was flavorful and full of garlic and herbs.  The homemade meatballs were uniquely prepared from scratch with Carolina’s own original family recipe!  These meatballs were one of our favorite items of the evening and they come as a large enough amount to share. 

Next, we each ordered a glass of the house wine. I got the cabernet sauvignon and my husband got the sauvignon blanc.  The house wine was decent and was the only option if you wanted wine by the glass, so that is why we selected it.  There is a wide selection of bottle choices as well.

For our entrees, my hubby selected the Scallops Pomodoro which was jam packed with a lot of scallops. In most restaurants when you order a dish with scallops, the restaurants seem to go really light on scallops as they can be pricy, but my husband was pleasantly impressed with the amount of seafood and how well they were cooked. This dish was prepared with freshly diced tomatoes, basil, garlic and olive oil and served on a linguini pasta.  He was very happy with his meal and had leftovers to bring home. His dish was accompanied with a choice of soup or salad and he opted for the vegetable soup as can be seen below.

For my selection, I was originally going to go with the cheese manicotti, but our waiter, Alvin insisted I get the tortellini because he thought I would like it better, so I kindly obliged. I really enjoyed this dish and the size was enough to feed me for 2 more lunches and a helping to share with my students at school. There was so much food! This dish was prepared with mushrooms, garlic, and green peas served on a bed of tri-colored tortellini and tossed in a creamy romano sauce and I asked to also have it blended with tomato sauce since a pink sauce is always my personal favorite! I selected to have a salad with my meal when given the choice of soup or salad. 

Lastly, we had a lovely in house made dessert that they make from scratch at the restaurant. This was the tiramisu and it paired very nicely with a cup of coffee. I must add I am not usually a tiramisu fan, but this cake specifically hit the spot and I loved the flavor and consistency! I definitely would order it again! 🙂

Prior to leaving Carolina’s we made our way over to the wall of beer in the dining room closer to the front entrance. Along the wall leading to the back of the restaurant there were several refrigerators filled with a variety of craft beers…over 400 options to be exact. We were greatly impressed and next time we will definitely select some of these beers to accompany our lunch or dinner!

Would you like a chance to visit Carolina’s to try the newest location or the original location in Garden Grove? If so enter my contest to win a $10 gift card here –>

 a Rafflecopter giveaway

I will select two lucky winners to receive a $10 card on June 30^th and they we will be announced on my facebook page. Good luck!

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