Olive Branch, Mount Dora

I grabbed a second lunch at this Mediterranean place on 3rd Ave (near the tracks) yesterday. Sometimes you get a feeling about a place and it proves right. I've been bypassing them for other restaurants in town because of the prices and my belief that cooks at "Mediterranean" restaurants aren't very good at their own cuisine let alone that of other cultures. And this place offers little Mediterranean fare. It's Italian with some American. I decided to take my medicine at lunch because that is when the prices are more reasonable. About half off. So, a plus $20 lasagna is now $12. Making it an acceptable risk. I should have tried that. I tried the penne ala vodka. We used to eat that every Sunday night at a fashionable East Side restaurant until we found out how many calories were in it. It has been years since I've tried it again. This was a poor attempt. It was DROWNING in sauce. A sauce that wasn't very good. Four or five times too much volume. It was a soup. Too thick. Too milky. And they used cheap, wide penne. Probably Barilla if not a supermarket generic. And they were overcooked. Soft. There was also supposed to be prosciutto in it. There were four, half finger nail sized pieces of something in there. That's all. I'm not even sure if a true ala Vodka is supposed to have prosciutto in there. And the waitress wanted me to add chicken! It cost $12. Probably double at dinner. A soda was almost $3. They also supplied some bread with oil and vinegar mixed in a bowl. That is another sign of poor Italian in my mind. Oil only please. It's not a salad. Would you consider Ranch? I know the Pizza Hut crowd would love to dunk their bread into that. Preposterous? Now you know how I feel. Service was fine. They have a deck and an interior dining room. They have to double their sophistication or cut prices in half to get into the conversation. I don't mind aspirational ownership, but, be a bit aware of what it takes. Don't be the guy in white leather loafers. If I had to concoct a story about this place, I would say that the owner and/or cook worked at a pizzeria when they were young and thought to him or herself - "I could take this menu to the rich part of town and charge double. All I need are a few table cloths and some cushioned chairs."