Tabla Bar & Grill is a terrific Indian restaurant in a really lousy location and space. The dining room has the feel of having once been the sort of diner you usually find attached to a motel. And, in fact, it seems to be attached to something similar, perhaps a timeshare facility. To get to the restaurant you have to pass a booth touting tickets to local attractions as well as a convenience store of sorts.But the important things, the food and the service, are first-rate. The cuisine is authentic, and the staff is welcoming and friendly and they go out of their way to do a little extra. My favorite among the entrees was the alu bukhara gosht, hunks of lamb in a sauce seasoned with plum and ginger, which gave a sweet note to counter the spiciness. I also enjoyed the murgh dhansak, chicken in a sauce flavored with pumpkin and fenugreek with lentils. It was ordered medium-spicy, which was just hot enough to perk up the taste buds without singeing them.
Lamb rogan josh was a more recognizeable dish of lamb with tomatoes and almonds. There is a long list of vegetarian dishes. I had the cauliflower mussallam, which had florets in a creamy sauce tinged with tomatoes.

Amid the myriad chains and franchises that are populating the area around the Orlando Eye attraction, an independent restaurant is a welcome find. And that it offers very good food and a fun dining experience makes it all the better.

Tapa Toro comes to us from Vassilis and Katerina Coumbaros, who also own Taverna Opa at nearby Pointe Orlando, one of my favorite Tourist World recommendations. Opa, of course, is the Greek restaurant where every evening is a raucous party of napkins tossed in the air to buoyant balalaika music and belly dancing atop the tables.

At Tapa Toro the theme is Spanish and the music flamenco, and here the napkins stay in the lap and the clacking heels of the dancers punish only the floor.

This is not a place for a nice, quiet, romantic dinner, unless you consider a sound level louder than Hard Rock Café and dancing on top of a table with a scantily clad belly dancer to be romantic.However, the noise level heightens only after 7 pm when the entertainment begins.

But it’s not all ambience here. The food is surprisingly good. There are the usual items: domades, moussaka, pastitsio and the like. But you’ll also find more unusual things, such as lamb ribs, Greek country sausages, taramosalata, and a house-made yogurt that is crazy good. Don’t come here if you’re in a bad mood. On second thought, do, it’ll cheer you up, and you’ll have good food besides.

Churrascaria means meat. Well, not literally. Churrascaria (tchoo-huh-scah-REE-uh) actually means house of barbecue, but to fans of this type of Brazilian steakhouse, it means meat, meat and more meat. Texas de Brazil is a small chain out of, no surprise here, Texas that is riding the wave of low-carb popularity with a new location on International Drive.
Here’s the way it works: you first visit the salad bar, which is more than just lettuce and condiments. You’ll find all manner of salad fixings plus such items as hearts of palm, tabbouleh, artichoke hearts, Brussels sprouts, roasted red peppers and, for some inexplicable reason, sushi.
When you’ve had enough of the salad bar — and my advice is to go easy there — the waiters, called gauchos and dressed accordingly — will start bringing large skewers of meats, sausages, chicken and seafood to your table. And they’ll keep bringing them until you tell them to stop. (You do that by turning a small disc on your table over so the red side is showing.)
The thing that keeps this from being just another glutfest is the quality of the meats, which is first-rate. Plus, the overall atmosphere is upscale and attractive.

In the odd location of the Prime Outlets mall on International Drive, Vinito is serving authentic Italian dishes, classically prepared by Naples native Raffaele Marsilio. Have the spagetti Geraldina, named for Marsilio’s mother, who taught him to cook. Or have the veal Marsala, one of the best renditions in town.
The calamari was quite good, too. The squid was tender and the breading was light and fried just so, then sprinkled with a little salt. Perfect.For my entree I chose the green pepper filet mignon, a wonderfully tender steak cooked to a perfect medium-rare and served with a tangy peppercorn sauce tinged with rosemary. A truly delicious sauce.
Desserts are worth lingering over.
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Vito’s Chop House is a first-rate operation, a highend steakhouse with a touch of Tuscany. The atmosphere is masculine but comfortable, the service is practiced and sure, and the steaks are of the finest quality and an omigod size that will have you requesting a takeout container before they’re even placed in front of you.

Beer it the forte here, with 140 tap handles, all connected via tubes to an overhead refrigerated keg room. Beyond that, there isn’t a whole lot more to get excited about. The food menu is also quite large, and although it initially reads like any other bar menu in America, it also has pan-Asian notes that go completely unexplained. There is an extensive list of burgers and your usual bar appetizers, such as calamari (fried or kung pao’d) and spinach cheese dip, interspersed with moo shu egg rolls and chicken garlic noodles.