Fresh Italian Pasta

This place is funny. It sits on the outer edge of the JetBlue terminal 5 and serves food all day. Sadly, my visit happened too early to experience the namesake so I tapped my order into one of the three iPads that make up Fresh’s ordering system so no personal interaction is necessary. It turns out that works to your advantage because hours of working that stove without conversation has rendered the chef incapable of speech. Customers I saw attempting to communicate with him either received a grunt or no response at all. I choose to believe he’s either evolved into a non-​sentient life form or is a sweaty mannequin putting on a show which produced my breakfast sandwich: some fluffy scrambled eggs, melted Swiss cheese and 3 or 4 turkey sausage links stuffed between two slices of wheat bread. It’s very filling and lasted me most of the day which makes the $ 9 price tag more digestible. Not a bad choice if you’re avoiding the long line at DD or the over baked self serve items in the middle of the full to bursting food court.

While it beats the occasional Annie Anne’s or some strange airport convenience store /​bodega, Fresh Italian Pasta still feels mediocre amongst the many options in Terminal 5. The name supposedly says it all, but it’s missing a word in the title: Fresh [Bland] Italian Pasta.
It all starts with a touch screen. No need to shout your order to anyone behind the counter. No confusion. Tap your options and choose the pasta, the sauce, extras like meat, and pay. It may lack a personal touch for many, but this method is so commonplace worldwide. The only difference is they do it better internationally.
For $ 12 – 19, one should expect a decent pasta. The slops of fettucine, penne, and spaghetti have all been fails so far. They may have taken «al dente» a little too seriously, some of it tastes overcooked. From the sauce end, the vodka was disappointing and the parm in parmigiana is sad.
I used to wonder why this place never had a huge line of people. After a number of visits, I can see why. If I have to come back, I may go the sandwich /​breakfast route. I’ve run out of hope with the pasta.

Use their touch screen to build your own pasta-​I had the fettucine with garlic and oil, with some zucchini added in the mix for $ 12.
However, it wasn’t good at all-​so I barely ate it. Their sandwiches looked better, though???