Trattoria Burnaby (Old Listing) — Restaurant in Burnaby

As you can see in my reviews, I don't like to leave negative reviews, but unfortunately my experience at Trattoria was notably very bad. Considering the vast options that diners have when it comes to pizza/pasta, and considering how many businesses work hard to ensure happy customers, I feel it is justified to give a fair review for this restaurant.

I attended a birthday dinner with my friends last night at Trattoria in Burnaby. I've been here many years before, but it has been a while, and normally I think the Global group provides a decent experience for this kind of dining. I entered the restaurant with positive expectations, which were quickly not met upon seating. I had purchased a cake from a bakery for two of my friends who were celebrating a birthday that day. I did not intend to open the package there, but I did want to inquire with the manager how much the cake cutting fee was as one of the guests lived nearby and we were going to go there after for dessert, but I thought it would not hurt to ask. Before I could even ask, the manager saw me. I was happy, thinking how easy it was to find the manager (dressed in a suit by the kitchen). His smile appeared to turn to a glare as he saw the box in my hand, and before I could even ask, he said "no outside food". His response then became confusing as he informed me that there was a cake cutting fee of $2.00 per person, and then the proceeded to say Health Canada prohibited outside food, and I should understand. I told him I did not intend to take the cake out of the box, and that we would not be eating it there, and ended our conversation there. (I did note going through previous reviews, another diner celebrated a birthday with what appeared to be an outside cake). Regardless for future diners--you may want to call the restaurant to confirm what the actual reality is or face the manager's wrath.

The second issue was the food. We ordered several pasta dishes, a pizza, and calimari. All were extremely salty, and I was thirsty for hours after. I could barely sleep despite drinking a ton of water and electrolytes after. The food did not wow me at all.

The third issue: we only saw our server three times the entire time, and our table was cleaned by a nice gentleman. When the bill came, she hovered so close to me I could fee her breath as her head peered over me. I did not find this to be professional at all, especially when I when to change the tip from the automatic 18% to 25% on the screen. Yes I did tip over 10% to be polite, but I truly wanted to leave NOTHING. Gratuity should be for service, to which we barely received any. I have no problem tipping, and thanking the hardworking staff for their work, but my friends and I truly were not happy with our experience. I also spend a lot of time researching restaurants, and I note the reviews on here are very automatic and slightly dismissive. They definitely do not acknowledge the concerns raised by customers, and this does not make me confident that my next experience would be a good one. We will not be returning, nor would we recommend this restaurant to anyone.

EDIT to add: they never acknowledged the occasion at all. It is not required, obviously, but always a nice gesture. It makes the difference between an average restaurant and an exceptional one to acknowledge special celebrations and occasions. We barely had any interaction with the staff, except when we paid, and my brief conversation with...

I had an awful experience at Trattoria in Burnaby on Friday night. I arrived at 7pm for our party’s reservation. I am 9 months pregnant and was not offered any drinks what so ever (no mocktails, or juice, or even water). My friend found me a water cup. We had an 11 person reservation. Everyone came except my husband who became ill that same day and couldn’t make it. When I arrived I explained what had happened and my server went to discuss it with someone else (not sure who). She came back and informed that they wouldn’t charge me for his spot. I thought that was very kind and I was appreciative of that. After dinner the floor manager came over and told me “the chef wants to charge you for the extra spot now”. This felt strange to me that they had changed their mind but anyways that was their decision I didn’t argue with it. I will say the food was good, the timing of the food was also good. I enjoyed the meal. When they served the 4th course I requested my bill that was at 9pm. Two hours after I arrived. For the entire meal, I was never offered any drinks, not even tea or coffee with dessert. At 9:30pm, still no bill. I asked again and explained at 9 months pregnant it’s extremely difficult for me to sit for that long. I get very uncomfortable. So at this point I’m already late to relieve my babysitter at home. They say they are having trouble with the bills and need a bit more time. The manager brings Prosecco for the table, which was kind, but again fails to offer the pregnant woman any sort of beverage. During this wait time another server walked by with a large wooden tray and hits me with the corner of the tray right on the back of the head. I am writing this the next day and still have a headache from it. It’s now 10pm and still they haven’t sorted out the bills. I haven’t had anything to eat or drink in the past hour and I’m late for my babysitter. Then, it starts to poor down rain. There was a leak in their enclosed patio roof and I got soaked. We moved around to avoid it, but my clothes were already wet. By 10:30 pm (one and a half hour wait for the bills) they still could not figure out the bills so we told them to please bill us as one and we would sort it out ourselves. The entire experience left me feeling awful, and I would have preferred not to go to that restaurant. I am not the type to complain, but my experience was...

Trattoria Burnaby used to be one of our favorite pasta restaurants, especially on Tuesday when they offered pasta dishes at $16, now $17 with new menu.

It was New Years Eve, we decided to go out for Tuesday pasta special at Trattoria. When we arrived, it was 70% full, we were seated right away on the patio in a nice booth. The heaters were turned up way too high to enjoy, our foreheads were beading with sweat. We told our server that the heater by our table was too high, very hard to enjoy our meal in this heat, but he didn't bother to do anything.

They had a set New Years Eve menu for $130 for two, steak, lobster, salmon, etc. we would have ordered it but we had prime rib the night before.

We order the tomato basil flat bread appetizer and a Caesar salad to share. The tomato basil flat bread tasted good but soggy, kind of turned us off.

I usually order the Linguini Gamberi from the old menu. The new menu was disappointing, not much to choose from. The spaghetti and meatballs was the only old item on it.

The manager suggested the Nodi Marini Fra Diavolo, it has baby scallops and shrimp in a tomato sauce, it was plentiful. It tasted alright, then I had a baby scallop, it was so fishy I wanted to spit it out, it was so bad.

Hubby ordered the short rib ravioli, it looked like a kid's meal when it arrived, tons of gravy with maybe 3 slivers of pork rib in the gravy. Needless to say, we had to hit a McDs on the way home for him. It looked disappointing when it arrived, and it was. I tried one square, zero taste of a mush pocket...yuk.

Our server asked how our meal was after a few bites, before we had a chance to answer, he was off to another table. He didn't take the time to listen or cared about what we had to say, I was going to mention the bad scallops to save them from serving it to other patrons, but he didnt really care what we had to say.

We were not told that the Tuesday pasta special was not in effect that we later noticed on our bill. The pasta was not worth $27.

Very disappointing service, food and atmosphere for the first time. We been coming to Trattoria Burnaby when Tuesday pasta was at $14, that shows you how long we've support you, we have enjoyed every meal there until tonight. We've recommended to a our pasta lover friends this place.

We will not be returning until a new menu has...