Bella Gelateria — Restaurant in Burnaby

I have been a LONG time fan of Bella Gelateria. My favourite location was Yaletown where they had the chocolate fondue before they closed. I also frequented the Downtown location so to my surprise, I was super excited to have one near Burnaby.

I have frequented this specific location maybe 5 times in the last season prior to today, where I felt like having their Banana Bread gelato. I was told this was a seasonal flavour and the staff let me try new flavours before I settled on my usual. The Wickedly Burnt Caramel and just to treat myself, I also got the Early Grey both on a cone for $11.

I noticed when the staff was scooping, compared to other locations the spread of the ice cream was not equal for the two flavours. I was also a bit concerned to see how liquidy the Wickedly Burnt Caramel sat on the Earl Grey.

I started eating the ice cream right away in fear of the gelato falling off. I noticed an uncanny grittiness in the Burnt Caramel gelato. Swallowing it felt like sand paper and the little grits stuck to the back of my throat. Throughout the ice cream there were tiny ice crystals and a few big chunks that crunched in my mouth. I have had my fair share of ice cream and I recognized right away what this reminded me of - Freezer Burnt Ice Cream.Sometimes when you leave ice cream in your freezer too long, the water separates from the fat content and you get this grainy, sandy ice cream.

I contemplated sucking it up but then I crunched on a pretty big piece of ice and decided I had to let the staff know there was something wrong with that batch of gelato. I do not think Bella Gelateria would serve freezer burnt ice cream, so I assume a different process went wrong in making gelato. Making creamy gelato is very finicky, that is why people buy it from places like Bella Gelateria.

I brought my concern up to the lady who was working and she tried the ice cream and told me maybe the texture of my gelato was weird because it was scooped from the top, she said it tasted fine. I explained that there were ice particles throughout the ice cream and she said maybe it was from scooping from the edge of the ice cream.

Then the gentleman who was working came over and without much confidence said the ice cream should be fine because it was fresh and just delivered. He did not bother to try. I originally wanted to give this review a 1 but to be fair the Earl Grey gelato was good and also, I appreciated the Lady's attempt to be helpful. So I only gave this review 2 stars because I appreciated the lady's honesty. She tried the gelato again and she remarked that indeed there were ice crystals inside the ice cream.

At this point, I did not expect them to refund me or give me a new ice cream but I was expecting an apology and maybe to swap the poor quality gelato for a different flavour. After all, it was NOT just me who noticed the ice shards in the ice cream.

The gentleman who was working said he would let the supplier know and said thanks for understanding, sometimes the gelato will not be the same consistency depending where it is scooped and basically gave some excuses why my gelato was not up to standard.

It was closing, and I did not want to escalate the issue so I just said, I will still eat my ice cream (I mean... I paid for it, not going to throw $11 away) and went back to my seat and bitterly finished my ice cream. Sure the Earl Grey tasted good, but from that poor interaction with no apology and recognition of my problem. No attempt to rectify my experience... The more I thought about how I wasted my hard earned money on ridiculously expensive ice cream to get gelato that tasted freezer burnt... I just could not believe myself. I am probably not coming back to this location until staff is trained to deal with quality control and customer service.

If you do plan on getting ice cream here, I HIGHLY suggest you insist on trying the flavour you are getting, so you can notice any quality issues before purchasing.

I made a mistake. I thought my usual would taste fine and then this happened. Super...

They do not care about customer satisfaction at all. The person that took my mother and I’s order seemed new and there was a bit of a language barrier but we understand and were patient and nice towards her regardless. She was a sweet woman and even confirmed our order with us a couple of times.

I ordered the iced matcha latte and my mother ordered the regular caramel macchiato. The new hire got it mixed up and thought I’d ordered the regular (hot) matcha latte and my mother the cold macchiato. I work in customer service and feel for employees, therefore I politely told them that I ordered the iced latte and patiently waited. This other blond girl that was working, quickly made the right order and handed it to us. Though, I’m not exactly sure what happened but I think the blond girl might’ve scolded the new employee because after we told her it was the wrong order, they conversed and the new employee started crying.

My mother’s macchiato was good. My drink on the other hand was not pleasant at all. At first I thought it was just because it was unsweetened so I asked for a sugar packet and I mixed it in. It was still horrible. It was extremely grainy and I’ve had matcha numerous times before and it was never like this. I even poured the matcha in the sink and there was an insane amount of leftover powder. Matcha, if made right, is not supposed to be grainy at all.

After tasting the matcha the second time I went back. I did not think to go back, I was willing to let it be, but my mother insisted because after all, we did spend our money on it. I politely let the blond girl know that the matcha was extremely grainy and that I could not continue to drink it as it was bothering my throat. I even apologized for coming back because I didn’t want to make their day any harder, and it would’ve been fine had the blond girl not been passive aggressive and rude about it. She claimed that that was the “right way to make matcha” (it’s not) and said that she won’t do anything about the order because she did nothing wrong she only “made it the right way”. I did not expect to get a refund or even a remake but simple accountability and apology would’ve sufficed.

Keep in mind, I was making sure that I was not being rude, even with my tone or my wording. Her reaction was completely unprofessional and disrespectful. That was horrible...

My husband loves the ice cream so for his birthday yesterday I purchased him a 800g to-go box. It was priced at $60. I asked the staff if it was a single flavor because I couldn't remember which one he liked. I thought about getting 2 of smaller 300g options for one flavor each. However, I was advised that they do 3 flavors in the 800g and 2 flavors in the 300g. The containers on display did not depict the interior, so I would assume with this statement that it has dividers. Nope! They just put all ice cream in together haphazardly.

The girl who put my ice cream in was the literal definition of a Gen Z and their terrible service. She took 15 minutes to get my ice cream scooped. No smile, just disgust and annoyance that she had to do this. At the end, she took a giant spoon and smoothed all the flavors together. She put the lid on while ice cream leaked out the sides and put tape on it. Put it in a bag and handed it to me. The handle had ice cream on it! The inside of the bag had ice cream. As I was walking to my car, I heard creaking because I kid you not, the container which was styrofoam was pushing open against the tape. She had overfilled it and not taped it well. It took a 5-minute drive home, I told my husband I got ice cream and I told him the flavors. We opened the container and it was so hard to see where one flavor started and one ended.

I couldn't believe I spent $60 on that mess. The ice cream was great but this staff just did not care and ruined it.

The thing that drove me wild, is it asked for a tip before the service was provided which I opted to give!!! And I got this crappy service for a product that could have been amazing. It's just the staff opted to not care and ruined the product in the container. Hire or train better. This...