Olive Garden’s Never-Ending Pasta Bowl is back; is it worth it?
At Olive Garden, most dinner entrées start north of $20. But in this summer when customers are looking for values, the Florida-based chain has brought back one of its most well-known promotions, the Never-Ending Pasta Bowl.
As described on its website, the limited-time promotion includes unlimited pasta, salad and breadsticks starting at $13.99.
We set out to find out if it’s worth it, but the answer may depend on whether or not you’re carbo-loading.
But as usual, prices and participation vary by restaurant. At our restaurant, the Never-Ending Pasta Bowl costs $15.99.
It comes with a choice of pasta from fettuccine, spaghetti, angel hair and rigatoni and choice of sauce from Alfredo, marinara, five-cheese marinara, creamy mushroom and meat sauce.
The Never-Ending Pasta Bowl comes with Never-Ending Soup or Salad with Breadsticks, which is on the permanent menu at $13.49. Soups include minestrone and pasta e fagioli.
The offer is dine-in only, so expect to enjoy Dean Martin-type songs in the background.
You can add on proteins such as meatballs or Italian sausage, but there’s an extra charge. In our case, it was $4.99 extra, which would be getting us close to the usual price of an entrée, but the toppings are also never-ending.
We ordered the Never-Ending Pasta Bowl with water. The total came to $17.39 with tax but not including tip.
We started with a plate of fettuccine with Alfredo sauce and were offered a refill without asking. We opted for angel hair with creamy mushroom sauce. it came in a smaller bowl.
There may be ways to get roughly the same meal for roughly the same price. For instance, there’s Create Your Own Pasta for $14.99 at our restaurant. It also includes the choice of four sauces, but the choice of pasta doesn’t include fettuccine. You get spaghetti, angel hair, rigatoni or gluten-free rigatoni. Topping add-ons are in the $4-$5 range and include broccoli and grilled chicken.
Then there are the weekday lunch favorites, which are available 11 a.m.-3 p.m. Monday through Friday. They start at $11.49 for the Never-Ending Soup, Salad and Breadsticks and go up to $13.49 for shrimp scampi.
Finally diners can get a heat-and-serve entrée to take home for $6. Choices include fettuccine alfredo, spaghetti with meat sauce and five cheese ziti al forno.
Olive Garden fans may remember the Never-Ending Pasta Pass, which was offered in years past and included nine weeks of dine-in pasta for $100. There was also a Lifetime Pasta Pass. Neither are currently available, according to the Olive Garden website.
Information: olivegarden.com