Funghi e Tartufo — Restaurant in Melbourne

Disgusting. We are all vegan, and we love our food. To start, the drinks took around 30 minutes to arrive (all at separate times), and they were delicious! However, then came the food. To start, we ordered an antipasto platter for four. The meatballs were decent, the cheese tasted like rubber, the arancini balls were bland and the faux calamari rings were shaped, and tasted, store bought and inedible. Each of us ordered a different main, my baramundi was merely fish shaped tofu (ate one bite, disgusting!), a friend ordered the gnocchi, so thick and salty (base sauce was clearly burnt but still used), ate a third of their meal, second friend ordered the veal, had the texture of a thin biscuit and no flavour. And the fourth friend ordered the pappardelle funghi e tartufo, pasta was decent but the sauce tasted only of cream, ate half their meal. The server was very rude, she would ignore your request for a drink and suggest something much more expensive than what you ordered without mentioning it was more expensive. Friend wanted a $10 beer, she upselled for a $25 beer without mentioning! My other friend wanted a pinot grigio, she upselled for something more expensive that didn't even use the same grapes when he asked specificlly for pinot! (there were two with pinot grapes, but she ignored this and went with the upsell). The most disappointing thing was that the manager came to clear our table, saw all these full meals and didnt even ask what was wrong, or if we were unhappy about anything. Just cleared it away and I suppose threw away all that food. To top everything off, and really ruin the experience, we arranged for our friend to have a surprise platter of desserts at the end of the night. We had her go away, arranged everything with the manager, only to have her return and have that same rude waitress come along and confirm the details of the dessert and costs to THE BIRTHDAY GIRL, she ruined the surprise completely! I've never had a worse dining experience in my life. Disgusting food, borderline inedible, and sneaky/ uncaring service. Will never return, and will actively encourage others to avoid.

Update: wow I can't believe I missed your response, I was seething over the pathetic slop I was served that night. No, the birthday girl did not enjoy her visit she was being polite. She agreed with every word I said. In relation to the upsell, I get how pairing works, I like nice restaurants (this isn't one), your waitress was aggressively upselling. Finally yes the birthday girls mum did organise payment for the desert (me and a friend covered the total cost of all meals and drinks for the whole group) however your waitress STILL came over and confirmed details of the birthday desert in front of the birthday girl and ruined the surprise. I've seen other reviews where you gaslight and try to get people to take it down their one star, and im assuming very accurate low, reviews. I won't be doing that and I certainly won't be taking orders from the worst restaurant in Melbourne.

**update, AGAIN. you're absolutely pathetic! No I did not just update my review out of the blue, it was a response to YOUR response to my review which you've now deleted! The gaslighting continues! Wow, all I can say is wow. I'm really not surprised that your food and service is as terrible as it is, considering the fragile ego owner that can't take constructive criticism. I could imagine your failing restaurant ending up on a Gordon Ramsay show. Where we'd see the short pudgy Italian middle aged manager that's by now gone completely bald, crying at the end because he realises that he is the issue. Will continue to spread bad word...

This dinner was a real disappointment. We were sat at a table next to a busy bar and my view the whole night was of overflowing rubbish bins, staff arguing loudly and a bar top that was completely covered with at any time say 50 to 100 dirty glasses (that’s literally where they keep them all until washing). Food was very average. The cheese platter that was suppose to be a variety was just the same cheese in a couple different places on a wood board with crackers. The “swordfish” and “calamari” are literally just from the vego section of the freezer at Asian grocers served on heaps of rocket - you can make these at home very easily and cheaply. Google the brand Lamyong if you want to buy them yourself. The truffle and mushroom pappardelle was quite good. We ordered the Chef’s Selection without too much thought and only later realised it’s actually slightly more expensive that way than if we’d ordered the same dishes separately. Sucked in. The staff varied between awkward and downright rude. One of them stood at the table every 5 minutes and just said “all good???” before walking off. I noticed at the table next to us a lady was eating slowly and he stood there and said “no good???” and it was so awkward that she asked her date to take her plate so that he wouldn’t come back. At one point there was an argument/fight between staff right next to our table and one seemed to be physically guiding the other one out of the dining room by her arms. A random lady with a very stern demeanour came over and poured our (paid for) sparkling water into my glass to the point that my glass overflowed just because she wanted to empty the bottle then so they could take the recycling out. Long before closing time when we still hadn’t received desert yet they obviously decided to get ahead of things so they could leave as soon as customers left and next thing we know there’s wine bottles being thrown (seriously) into a bin a metre away from us, staff cleaning up the dining room around us, kitchen staff all gathered chatting next to our table, etc. The positive of the evening was that it was soooo bad that it was kinda funny. But given we rarely get to go out lately as we have a kid now it wasn’t funny enough to make up for the wasted evening. It’s a shame because the old restaurant that i understand the owners had before this...

I would not recommend this place, the staff were horrible.

I am a person who does not normally leave reviews after going out to restaurants. I’m usually overly accommodating and only visit this kind of restaurant on special occasions. Unfortunately, yesterday was one of them.

I ordered some entrees, arancini and calamari, which were exceptional.

However, when my lasagne arrived, I noticed the sauce was too salty for my taste. I was with a group of people. I took a bite and three others also took small bites and agreed it was too salty. There was about four fifths left on the plate when I called the waitress to let her know I wanted to send the dish back.

Her response was, “So, what?” I understand there may have been a language barrier but I found this very disrespectful.

The head waiter then came over and was extremely defensive saying that 150 other people had ordered the same dish without any complaints. They offered to replace it but I was upset with the establishment’s attitude.

They came back and I said I would not like anything else. They then said I would need to pay for the dish since I had eaten more than half which was a blatant lie. The waiter continued to be defensive repeating that over 150 others had ordered the dish without complaint.

They failed to realise that people have different tastes and it is not acceptable to treat customers this way. My friend and I tried to explain the situation but the waiter repeatedly cut us off mid sentence and continued to lie. Despite several attempts to end the conversation by saying we would pay he continued to argue.

I would not recommend this place to anyone.

Update: Thank you for your reply. I appreciate you addressing this with your staff. I want to emphasise that my main concern was not simply the taste of the lasagne but the way the situation was handled. Respectful communication is important, regardless of whether a dish is a bestseller. I would hope that this can be a learning moment...