Il Mercato Social Kitchen — Restaurant in British Columbia

We had our first date at La Cucina some years ago, and hadn’t been back in a while. Since the new restaurant opened the and the refresh looked very good from the outside, we thought we should head there for a nostalgic date night.

The decour/change looks nice. More modern and it felt warmer/comfortable. I really like the wine wall at the back. The faux brick wall needs a piece of art or something on it. Overall, the ambiance is quite good as are the options for seating. We were seated quickly, and our waitress was very attentive. Told us about the specials and brought us some water.

We ordered a tomato and bocconcini salad to share as an appetizer. It was quite good. Had a little bit of zip to it perhaps some chilli oil. Nice! For dinner we ordered the seafood pasta which was fantastic. I really liked the prawns which were large and sweet, and the clams in the mussels had lots of flavour and the sauce was excellent. The calamari seemed a bit greasy, so perhaps a different way of adding it to the pasta could be recommended. Overall awesome. My girlfriend ate half of my dinner.

She ordered the mushroom risotto. We both agreed that it tasted undercooked. It had a very powerful flavour to it which hid the subtleness of the mushroom flavours. We wouldn’t order that again unless the recipe is modified a bit.

I was happy with the local wine selections, and the price/pour size. Our waitress told us the desserts are fantastic, but we were too full to eat anything else.

Overall quite good, I would just like to see a few more things added to the menu, perhaps a couple more meat and fish options. Something similar to Rauds in Kelowna. We will definitely go back for another dinner probably next year. But as a restauranteurr, you should have us wanting to come back within a few...

EDIT TO ADD- Was contacted by Haley who is refunding our 150.00 meal onto a g/c and apologized profusely over and over. Wasn’t necessary as I just felt they needed a lesson in properly treating their customers but very appreciated. Excited to try again.

Pretty disappointed. Been waiting awhile to justify spending the money to try this place, figured we also wanted to support local in these trying times for the restaurant industry. We ordered through door dash and the restaurant only made half our order, so we called and let them know they said “oh yes I’m looking at that order right now, we will get it right to you!” Almost an hour later we get a call “our delivery girl said she came to your house and you said you didn’t order food.” We said that wasn’t us we have a doorbell cam and no one came at all, the girl was very accusing on the other end and said “well I don’t know what to tell you then” pardon? How is this our problem???? Then the guy comes, seems very agitated with us, we asked which house they went to? He said I don’t know what all the confusion was we gave you tiramisu bye. Our pasta was all congealed and it’s upsetting because the flavour was great and had we gotten it on time and felt like we were appreciated this review would have been completely different. I encourage the owners of this restaurant to teach your employees to speak to their customers a little bit better because overall we feel like our business did not matter enough. The food is really good but your staff...

We had dinner here last night and glad we did! The service was fabulous, and the food went beyond that! We had the calamari fritti to start along with the social bread and the arancini - amazing flavours, textures and presentation. Being Greek I’m a little particular about my calamari and this was right up there.

We went with the recommended Rigatoni carbonara (read double smoked bacon and hand made pasta!) which comes in both an individual serving size (big) and a share size (huge). It was exceptional and made without raw eggs for those of you who worry about such. They also make Italian sodas which were very good and have deals on wine!

Everything is made there by their skilled chefs and cooks and it shows, the meals were amazing and worth the drive from Kelowna (or further).

COVID protocols were very comforting: glassed in booths, vax passport scans and all staff in masks - for those of you who struggle a bit in going out into the world again after all these months, this a thoughtful and safe place.

Would have talked about dessert but had no room after the dinner - that’s what next times are for. The options looked great and we will definitely leave room when we’re back.

Atmosphere is laid back, plenty of room to relax, the staff is extremely attentive and engaged and it it was all around a...