Joia Cucina — Restaurant in Melbourne

As most of you already know, yours truly is currently stationed in a beautiful suburb of Ivanhoe, retreating and recouping. Soooo, given that I have never been to Ivanhoe before, legit, I was curious to find a place for a #valentines dinner.

I went off the first recommendation on internet search and took a leap of faith, and reluctantly booked at @joia_cucina - I had never heard of them before.

What followed blew my mind away, this beautiful and I do not use this word lightly, restaurant is located on a bustling street of quaint Ivanhoe suburb and it's beautiful inside out.

Making a reservation helped because even at 5:30 pm, this was nearly at capacity. It shows how popular this place is among locals.

We ordered our appetizers, brocollini, and caprese salad.

For mains, we kept it simple, Pizza 🍕 eggplant parmigiana.

And for desserts we ordered Nutella pizza. BUT what fo we have here, Nutella pizza alright, butheart-shapedd pizza bread pockets filled with Nutella, strawberries and pistachios! How can one not fall in love with this.

All foods were fresh, flavourful delicious - I am not exaggerating when I say,loved the pizza bread, so fresh, so light, so delicious.

Staff was amazing, friendly, and caring. They offered suggestions when sought, fabulous service. Cannot fault.

I gotta come back here even if it means an hour long train ride....

Great food but disappointing service. The quality of the food itself was very high, and we were delighted with the flavour and size of servings. The service, however, felt rushed and focussed on efficiency rather than our dining experience. This was our first time dining at Joia; we had out-sourced the kids for the night; and we had hoped for, and anticipated a more personalised and intimate dining experience. The ordering felt rushed and impersonal; the mains were served before the entree plates and cutlery were cleared; cutlery was not then replaced between meals (and the attention of wait staff could not be gained to receive new cutlery, so we took them off the adjacent table); and I was advised that I had to pay the bill before receiving a detailed bill to review (despite me requesting a copy of the bill before paying, as is the norm). As it turned out, the bill was in fact incorrect, and we were overcharged. It was a very odd experience, and I commented on this at the time. It was an unfortunate and unnecessary conclusion to the evening, and felt indicative of the rushed focus on efficiency, over customer experience. Sadly, I would...

Dined a week ago. Very nice place. Drink list was very average, dissapointed with cocktail selection, I have a sweet tooth, my only option was to get a moscato wine. Starters were absolutely delicious. We had muscles, they were fresh and flavoursome, to die for an absolute must have. We even scraped every bit of sauce with extra bread the waitress brought over. One of the Best muscles dishes we have ever had, would order again every time. Shared a patata pizza. Pastry delicious, light and fluffy, Had the olives with bread. Very nice.

Mains - a couple of us had the Duck Ravaioli. Flavour was delicious, it needed more juice/ sauce as it was dry, (too thick) and edges of ravioli were tough or undercooked. Another dish was the Sparchcock, second time ordered as it was very delicious, my brother in law loves it and has ordered it two weeks in a row. Mu husband ordered a steak. It was very tender and juicy. Too full for desert or coffee. Staff lovely, however we did have to wait a while for service as it was a full house. Overall,...