Chains suck - I'd never list a chain even in my top 50 favorite restaurants.
Pizza: Tasta Pizza (Olean)
Lobster: Allegany Grill, (Angelica, NY) (home of the 1 pound lobster tail) Word of the mouth has to be the only way they gain new customers - and the place is always packed when we go there. Driving by, it isn't the type of place you'd think to yourself, "hey, let's go there." And yes, the extended dining room is one of those car port things.
Italian Food - used to be Tarantellas in South New Jersey; I can't remember the town. Apparently they've gone downhill. I haven't replaced it with a new favorite
yet. Favorite meal there: Stuffed prawns.
Steak: Century Manor (Olean, NY) very over-priced for what's provided, but occasionally they have specials that make it worth going to.
Beef on Weck: Beef 'n Barrel (Olean, NY) - one of the best known restaurants in Olean. Excellent decor. And, the food couldn't be any better, for what it is: very thinly sliced, hand carved beef. Not the great cuts of beef from the back, but rather the lesser expensive cuts from the hind quarter. Incredibly over-rated restaurant. Their most famous dishes are closer to hamburgers than to ribeye or filet mignon, but no one fills that niche any better than they do. They do have NY strip steaks & delmonicos, etc., but meh, the quality isn't worth their price.