Olea Mediterranean Cuisine

It appears they are out of business. Made the online reservation. When we arrived the doors were locked.
Newspapers on the floor outside
It would have been nice if someone had taken the time to call us about the closure.
Good thing there were lots of other choices nearby.

First time and last time!
Wasted time, money, calories, taste-​buds.
1. Service took forever
2. Quality of food = poorly made, no taste. Had the Dep (minced lamb, side salad and fist full of rice) again not flavor
3. Small portion (in this case ok cus it had no taste)

I swore I would never come here again but on a Sunday it was the only place without a line out the door. In fact there was only one other table here. I ordered the chicken kabob. I swear it was supposed to be an entrée but it looked like an appetizer. Exactly 4 pieces of chicken, some rice and a tiny salad. I the chicken was quite good but only four bites. I ended up ordering some hummus too.

My husband and I came here on a Friday night. There was one server for about five tables, otherwise the restaurant seemed dead. Our food was good though. I unfortunately don’t remember what we ordered. I had some sort of paella and my husband had some sort of stuff squash. We shared a plate of appetizers with hummus and other Mediterranean cuisine.
I’m not really sure why people are so hard on this place. I found people watching here to be fascinated. I watched a drunk couple come in and the woman all but spilt her water all over herself before even beginning to order. I also watched a group of two women gossip over food while one of these ladies was absolutely rude to the waitress every time she came over. And I also spotted an out of towner going over her schedule and hotel handouts. Definitely wins the award for most interesting clientell in Burlingame.

Good food. Quiet restaurant. Nice location.
We started with the warm olives, which were quite nice. I had the Olea Grill Combo — lamb, chicken, and ground lamb/​beef served over bulgar wheat with veggies — it was very nice, especially the chicken, and the lamb was very tender and flavorful. My husband had the Ricotta ravioli with sausage served with a creamy tomato sauce. Also very nice. My son had the Pomegranate New York Steak, which fell a little flat of expectations. The pomegranate sauce was not quite right for the beef.
All in all, this was a lovely dinner for the three of us.

The food here is fantastic! Caprese, calamari, and lamb kebabs were some of the best I’ve eaten. Wine was reasonably priced, and the staff are friendly.
The place is usually nearly empty… don’t be deterred! My favorite Mediterranean restaurant on the peninsula

It’s an interesting place! One could easily be turned off by the lack of welcome and attention from the wait staff. We had lunch on a Sunday afternoon– there was one waitress managing all the tables, inside and on the outside patio area. But I saw a few people come right to her with their credit cards as she was not bringing them their bill. So lack of attention seems the norm. There was a very strong parmesan cheese gone-​bad smell the day we were there! It was strange. The table next to us even asked but she said she didn’t smell anything!
The upside is that the food was actually quite good! Freshly cooked and quite tasty. We ordered off their brunch menu. The crab cakes w/​egg Benedict was great. Butternut squash ravioli really good. So if you can stomach the poor customer service them you may be pleasantly surprised with the quality of the meal!

The portobello appetizer was great. The meat combo was amazing and the dumplings were superb.
Great restaurant. Must check it out

Nice place for a quiet date night dinner.
I’m not sure why the place is so un-​crowded because I thought the food was good (the combo kebab platter and the manti plate were delicious), the price was reasonable, the restaurant was nice enough to take a date or family, and the décor was interesting (nice collection of clocks you have on the wall, but would be great if they actually showed the real time, lol). My boyfriend and I came here after being punished by a long wait at a burmese place a couple doors down, and after long days at work and surviving traffic both of us wanted a quiet dinner where we wouldn’t be hovered over to finish eating faster. Overall, I think it’s good but a couple things could use improvement — 1) service was kind of slow for a place that had so few people in it at the moment, 2) hella cold in there but one of the front windows by a table with guests was wide open (I don’t know if the guests maybe wanted it that way).

Pros: decent prices, decent food
Cons: mostly pasta dishes and not as many other Mediterranean dishes. Service is just so so. Waitress was not knowledgeable about the food.
Overall, place was fine.

I eat here once a week with my business networking group. We usually have 25 – 30 people eating a full lunch. The staff does an exceptional job. The food is always amazing and a great variety. They are so accommodating and friendly.

Favorite place on the Peninsula! Always fresh and delicious! We love to come here as a family because we know we will get a wonderful meal in a casually elegant setting. The menu has something for everyone, and they will make special items for the kids. The ingredients are all top quality and fresh. Excellent service at this family owned eatery too. There is also a full bar for the grownups.
Not to miss:
Mediterranean appetizer plate — has various spreads, salad, dolmas. I could just eat this as a meal, its so delicious and healthy.
Borani — wonderful original dish with housemade falafel, swiss chard, yogurt. I would never think to order this, but love it here.
All the pastas, especially the ravioli, are also delicious.
We can’t get enough of the housemade soft bread with hummus.
Happy that there is still a delicious family owned restaurant on the Avenue, when most places there are now chains.

Excellent location and nice atmosphere
Food fresh and well prepared
Med plate was nice assortment
Good choice for anytime

My friend first took me there and the overall experience was maybe a 3.5 star, though not spectacular. The food was really delicious and that was the main reason I went back again with another friend for a second time. The food was still consistently good and delicious, but service was really mediocre. Seriously, their service MUST step up if they wanted to earn more decent reviews.
Our server took our orders and brought the wine we ordered. Ten minutes later, she came back and said she forgot to notify the kitchen/​enter our orders into the system and forgot which entrée we picked, ehhhh, OK… @.@ During dinner, our server did not come over once to ask about the food or if we needed anything else. I like the food, but with this type of service, not convinced I’d go back again. :(

Everyone wrote about the Keledosh, which is supposedly THE dish to get here. But… no love for the non-​lamb eaters or the vegetarians? Fear not! I recently dined at this cute establishment and found THE dish for veggie eaters — Borani.
Made with swiss chard, bulghar wheat, a flavorful tomato sauce, a yogurt sauce, and topped with 3 falafel balls, this dish was unlike anything I’ve tasted and super delicious! The presentation was wonderful (and only slightly less spectacular than the beautiful Keledosh dish presented in a full squash).
We were also served a soft onion bread as a starter. The bread was good, but the olive oil and balsamic? Not so much. Finely ground black pepper doesn’t work very well as a good bread dipping vinaigrette either.
A very good restaurant if you’re craving Mediterranean food in Burlingame. I’ll be back to try some of the grilled items and pasta dishes!
Note to management: Turn up the heat! It’s freezing in there!

I finally found a go-​to restaurant in Burlingame. Downtown Burlingame is cute and walkable. It’s a great place to go when you want to go out to dinner without having a pre-​determined plan – and when you want relatively easy parking. I’ve tried many restaurants there and while most places were fine, I never really found a place I wanted to keep coming back to.
If Olea remains as good as it was my first visit, however, I will return again and again. i love Mediterranean food. Olives, goat cheese, yogurt, lamb – what’s not to like? The bread was delicious. You can tell it was made fresh in house. I had the keledosh, a sort of lamb and lentil casserole served in a whole kabocha squash with a cool yogurt sauce. It was an amazing sight – you really do get an entire pumpkin-​shaped squash. And the kabocha isn’t just a serving dish; it’s roasted to tender perfection. The dish is enormous. In fact, I just ate my first of possibly three nights of leftovers. My boyfriend had the manti, lamb-​filled dumplings. They were also very good.
Even more surprising than the whole kabocha squash were the prices. Olea is extremely reasonable. And the restaurant itself is more nice than casual, so you really do get a 4 (or maybe 4.5?) star experience for the price of a Crepevine meal.

Great little restaurant in central Burlingame. The staff here are super friendly and the food is really tasty. Aside from a regular Lunch and Dinner menu they also have a Brunch menu of Benedict’s, Omelettes and Pancakes!
Hubby and I came here last weekend for an early dinner and really enjoyed our meal. Being around 5:30 it wasn’t very busy and the staff were in the process of changing over the table settings from and Lunch and getting ready for Dinner service but still managed to provide us with excellent service.
Before our meal came we were also bought some fresh complimentary Onion Bread (
) with some Oil and Vinegar. It was warm and soft but a little doughy (hubby said it was slightly under cooked) but it was still enjoyable nonetheless, I liked it anyway.
We both ordered the ”Olea Grill Combo” (
) which is a mixture of Lamb, Chicken and Halep with Ulgur Wheat and fresh Vegetables of the day. The meat was all very tender and seasoned perfectly The Chicken came with a light Citrus sauce drizzled over it too which normally neither my husband or I are a fan of but flavors blended very well together and both thoroughly enjoyed it.
The Vegetables were also cooked nicely and the only very small let down was the Ulgur Wheat. I quite enjoyed it but Hubby unfortunately didn’t so maybe next time we’ll see if we can get Rice instead.
We also ordered a Baklava (
) to share. We don’t normally have Dessert’s in restaurant’s but after hearing that everything is made fresh in house how could we not give it a try? I’m glad we did as it was delicious. Sweet, flaky pastry and made with Pistachio nuts. Too many places cheap out and use mixed nuts or Walnuts so bonus points to Olea for clearly taking pride and serving up quality item’s.
Our server who I think may have been the Owner or Manager was very attentive and friendly. For some reason he felt the need to apologize for the speed in which it took for our food to come out which although very sweet of him I didn’t feel at all necessary as it came out in a very timely manor. I can understand why though as the US is known for being in a hurry to do things where the Mediterranean is quite the opposite. He also bought us some complimentary Tea after our meal (
).
Olea is still fairly new and finding their feet in an area that is filled with Mediteranean food but with their super friendly service and delicious food I can see them being a big success.

The experience here was outstanding from start to finish. Our party of three was seated with a warm greeting and smiles. The place itself is that of modern eclectic rustic interiors with dark walnut colored floors– great aesthetics for a Mediterranean restaurant. The service was solicitous– even by the guy who kept our water glasses full and bussed our dishes.
As the food started coming out, the fun level went up! The lightly floured fried calamari was exactly that– not greasy at all. The spicy marinara sauce had a nuance of fresh flavors and was great for dipping bread in too. The seafood paella with risotto was lighter than most paellas. The ingredients were fresh but the flavors more simple– still a great choice if you like paella but would like it on the lighter side (see photo). The Keledosh consisted of lamb, garbanzo beans, lentil, barley, spicy sauce, mint and prunes tossed in homemade marinara sauce and served in a freshly baked kabocha squash (kind of like a butternut squash — see photo). It comes with a yummy, fresh yogurt sauce too. It was every bit flavorful as the variety of ingredients noted and eating it out of a squash was definitely a unique, delectable touch. The Dizek has lamb, bell peppers, onions, parsley, sumac, garlic, and homemade marinara with bulgur rice which is a softer palatable form of brown rice. Given the great satisfaction of the spicy marinara sauce with the calamari, I enjoyed the sauce for this dish even more with all the hearty goodness, spices and the succulent morsels of lamb. I think there was even some eggplant in there too! If you don’t finish, this tastes even better the next day!
I’m glad our initial dining spot caused us to walk out. This place is a gem full of amazing Mediterranean flavors! There’s several other enticing unique menu items I look forward to trying in the future! –love this place!

Really enjoyed this restaurant! Loved the linguine with clams! I’ll be back for sure! :)

My mom and I wanted a place to enjoy the beautiful day, grab lunch and people watch. We took a seat outside so they immediately served us bread and water for the adults as well as for my 14 month old son.
Service was great! They were very attentive and continued to keep our glasses filled with water.
We ordered the Goat Cheese, calamari and chicken kebabs to share.
We definitely enjoyed having lunch here and will return. The chicken was cooked perfectly. My son loved the kiwi that came with the goat cheese.
We also enjoyed the homemade biscottis and my son gobbled them up.