Hi Stephen,
I followed your path from homepage -> Restaurants -> Italian and found it to be very easy and user-friendly. I think part of your problem with users not following the whole path, may exist with them receiving all the information they need once they hit the "Italian" page. Offered on each one of your restaurant panels are the phone number, address and a link to the restaurant's website. After seeing this information, I'd assume most interested users would visit the website directly or call the place. At first, I did not realize you could click the restaurant's name in order to receive more information, which I assume may be why you're not receiving those extra clicks. I'd try implementing a call-to-action button on each one of your panels such as a "more info" button. I believe that will help direct users to your individual restaurant pages. It may not be groundbreaking, but I think it might be worth testing. Anyway, that's what I got for ya. Best of luck!