This has been an exciting weekend for our family. On Friday, we found our new furry family member, Lola, but we got there a bit late in the day so we had to wait until Saturday to bring her home. That was fine because we needed to get a few things for our new girl. We opted to celebrate by heading to a new restaurant in Cedar Park, Damiano's. It's located right by Redhorn Brewery and Coffee and the parking lot was quite full at 630 on a Friday evening. We were able to get seated pretty quickly and we were excited to see that this was authentic Italian food made by authentic Italians! We took a few minutes to browse the menu before making our choices. We started with Mozzerella Cheese Sticks. They were nice and warm and the cheese was delicious. The marinara sauce was chunky and well seasoned. The breading reminded us a little bit of a South County favorite, Garvey's.

Next, they brought us some bread. The rolls looked a little bit like bagels, but had the consistency of a yeast roll. They were lightly brushed with butter, parmesan cheese, and Italian seasoning. They also tasted great dipped in the marinara sauce.

Finally, our food arrived. I selected the baked ravioli with Italian sausage. It was different than any ravioli I've ever had because the meat was not in the pasta, but served on top. The Italian sausage had a little kick to it, but tasted great and was plentiful for my dish. There was a layer of melted cheese on top of marinara sauce which covered the ravioli. There were only about 3 cheese ravioli, but they were giant sized. I was very happy with my choice.

Mike ordered the Stromboli. It was huge and stuffed full of meats and cheese. Several men around us ordered them too, and they all joked that they probably could have split one. Mike was able to conquer about 1/2 of it, which still gave him plenty for leftovers. Overall, this was a great choice and we must have arrived at the perfect time because as we left, there was a line practically out the door waiting to be seated. We have finally found some excellent Italian food in Texas, we just had to wait for some Italians to move here! We will definitely head back, as the entire menu looked delicious and we could probably swing by Redhorn, too.

The New Austonian