Bar Vino — Restaurant in Western Australia

This is going to be a mixed review which is not my usual style. We couldn’t make a booking because they don’t take reservations for parties of less than four. So we arrived at 6:00pm on a Saturday evening and the venue was packed. We were asked if we had a booking and reminded the waiter that they don’t accept bookings for less than 4 people. But this wasn’t the waiter’s fault so I didn’t hold it against him for asking. His name was Angelo and he was fantastic all night. Angelo offered us to sit outside in the court yard and order drinks. There were two groups waiting before us. It took quite a while for our drinks order to be taken but when the drinks arrived, once again Angelo delivered it with good service. After an hour we were taken inside to our table. We ordered quickly as we didn’t want to have to wait too long. Unfortunately it was another hour before the food arrived. We had ordered the cheese and pepper flatbread to share for entree. When significant time had passed, we asked another waiter if we could just have all our food brought out at once. For main we’d ordered gnocchi, spaghetti vongole and green salad. Even though we had to wait a long time for food, Angelo and the other waiter were proactive and kept following up with the kitchen. When the food finally arrived, it was so delicious that all was instantly forgiven! Angelo also gave us complimentary limoncello before we left and apologised for the long wait. If the restaurant insists on not accepting bookings for smaller parties then maybe they could consider offering customers bread or light snacks whilst they wait (as a lot of restaurants do in Italy). My takeaway is that next time I will go with a bigger group so we can make a booking because the food...

A gorgeous fit out and interesting wine list with loads of potential for 5-stars, though let down by a hit and miss menu and mixed bag service.

There are some brilliant dishes on the menu, namely the charred broccoli, burrata, and pistachio and orange sorta. Other dishes, less successful: the carpaccio lacks any flavour, the tiramisu is downright unpleasant, and the bistecca is overpriced at $110 for 650g.

Not so much a menu issue, but many of the tables are far too small for the dishes on offer - barely can you fit more than one serving plate on the table if sharing, which is a problem exasperated by the kitchen sending all ordered dishes at once, resulting in a game of plate jenga or serving directly from a dish held by the waiter because there's nowhere for it to go on the table.

The service is likewise very hit and miss, with one waiter being particularity unpleasant to have to deal with; on my most recent visit, his advocacy of the oysters was far too assertive given we had just explained that only one of us at the table ate them, and when he clocked a Rolex at the table, suddenly the wine I requested wasn’t good enough and the ‘’more suitable” option was 2.5x the price. When I chose a third wine of my own accord, there was protest again. A shame, because the three guys that own/run the place are a genuine pleasure...

We really want to like this place, because it is local and looks beautiful, but there’s a few teething troubles before we can fall in love with it. Getting a table is chaotic. Their website states that they encourage walk-ins. But way down their website it says that they accept a ‘limited amount’ of bookings. But it was a Friday night and it was booked. So we walked in, and were told they were full. We pointed to three empty tables but were told they were booked. So we sat outside with maybe a dozen people who had also walked in, and after two drinks were shown to a table. The wine list is great, but the waiters serve at the table from bottles with a gizmo that pours a measure and keeps the wine fresh, but it was tricky to use and no waiter could quite get it right and I’m not confident we got a full measure. The food was disappointing too. My partner’s chicken was under-seasoned. My risotto was the opposite: too much salt. They might benefit from an Italian chef. We’re going to give it a while for Bar Vino to sort out these teething problems before we try it again, and we want...