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The large centre image is great, it gives one a feel of having visited the restaurant, and helps to make you comfortable with the environment. The way that light is shining in, makes it look just a little bit smoky though. You've mentioned that the image will rotate through a series, so that shouldn't be a problem.
The link to the Menus is good, being in the top navigation area, but I actually missed it in my first viewing of the site. My eyes were drawn down to the three boxes - Dining & Catering, Special Functions, News & Events. I missed reading the top menu, because the text is fairly small.
The colour palette seems appropriate in the circumstances, and looks easy on the eye.
The three charcoal tabs down the bottom of your middle image confuse me a little. the wooden panel is open already, but the tabs seem to indicate that more is hidden?
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I completely agree that the specific image used in this homepage does need some help. For the time being this was one of the only images I had to use as a sample FPO image. The client will be providing me with professional high-quality images for the actual site.
The reason I chose to have the three categories at the bottom of the home page is b/c they are not as important (from a hierarchy standpoint) as the main navigation items. I didn't make the main nav items as large or solid white b/c I wanted a softer tone to them. If I had made them 100% white then they would be too harsh in my opinion. Also to note - the hover and active state of the main nav is 100% white.
Regarding the charcoal tabs at the bottom of the interior page, these act as a navigation element once the wooden panel has been activated (raised from the bottom). Without these elements the user would have to close the wood panel and then move forward to their next page of choice. From ease of usability I added these tabs.
I hope this explanation helps out some.