We've lived in Celebration for years, so when Dom Helio opened, we decided to try it. We weren't…read morespecifically looking for a rodizio-style experience, but at $39, it seemed like a good deal on paper--especially compared with the individual entrée prices. We thought it would be a fun way to sample the Brazilian-Italian menu.
We were seated immediately even though the restaurant was busy. The space is attractive, almost all of the servers were very nice, and the staff were attentive about refilling our sodas.
What followed was so strange and confusing that, despite some frustration, we mostly had to laugh.
Before ordering, we asked how the rodizio worked--whether we should order the appetizers, pastas, gnocchi, risottos, and other dishes or wait for them to come around. We were told to order those items while the pizzas circulated. At least, that was our understanding. It never became clear because most of what we ordered never arrived.
We asked about the missing items at least three times. Near the end, a waiter confirmed that we still wanted one appetizer. We said yes, but another 30 minutes passed and it still did not arrive. Two of our appetizers never came at all.
The pizzas were pretty good, plentiful for most of the evening, and offered a lot of variety. The problem was that they became almost the entire meal. I joked that it felt unexpectedly like an elevated Cici's Pizza--not because the pizza was bad, but because pizza was the only part that operated consistently. Oddly, even the pizzas stopped circulating during the final 30 minutes.
Had we known the rodizio would be primarily pizza, with the other dishes appearing only occasionally or not at all, we probably would have ordered entrées. The $39 price sounds like a good value in theory, but only if you receive the variety that seems to be included.
This was especially problematic for one guest who does not eat meat. Many pizzas contained meat, and there did not seem to be a system for ensuring vegetarian options reached our table. We expected the appetizers, pastas, gnocchi, risottos, and other dishes to provide alternatives, but most never arrived or came around too infrequently to be realistic options.
Some featured dishes appeared only once during the more than two hours we were there, in very small family-style portions for the entire dining room. Often, only one or two people at our table received a spoonful before the dish ran out, and then we never saw it again.
The food seemed to come out on some type of two-hour rotation, with categories released in waves regardless of when tables were seated. If you arrived in the middle or missed a dish, you seemed to be out of luck. We stayed much longer than we wanted while waiting for our orders or hoping the rotation would reach us. It felt less like dinner and more like we had entered the rodizio halfway through an episode and missed the scene where the rules were explained.
After waiting quite a while, we pushed again for the bean soup. Everyone at our table thought it had a slightly chemical taste, so we did not finish it. One waitress then basically scolded us for leaving it unfinished, which was unexpected and uncomfortable.
Later, the same waitress asked whether we wanted an escondidinho, which none of us recognized. When we asked what it was, she started to make a hand gesture as though she would explain it, but then just said, "It's an escondidinho," and walked away in a huff. That left us knowing exactly as much as before we asked. After the soup exchange, we decided it was safer not to accept an unfamiliar dish and risk upsetting her again if we did not like it.
Another waiter brought the escondidinho around in ramekins at the very end. We probably would have tried it earlier, but by then we were full from pizza, had been there more than two hours, and were trying to leave.
Several times, we all looked at one another and laughed because it genuinely felt as though we were being pranked or had wandered into the Twilight Zone. We never knew whether to order something, wait for it, ask again, or accept that we had missed our chance.
There is a lot of potential here. The restaurant is attractive, the pizzas were pretty good and varied, most of the staff were genuinely friendly, and our sodas never stayed empty for long. The main problem was that the rodizio did not seem to have a clear or consistently executed system.
For an absurdist Twilight Zone dining experience, it was memorable in its own way and honestly pretty amusing. As a $39 rodizio, however, it was confusing and did not deliver the variety that made it seem like a good value. We left unsure whether we had received everything included and stayed much longer than intended waiting to find out. Based on our experience, we probably would not return for the rodizio in its current form.