Gente Urban Italian Eatery — Restaurant in Centre Wellington

I don't understand the rave reviews. We really wanted to love it here and felt giddy when we arrived. Small, family-run restaurants in old houses are generally the best and tend to be our very favourite. But from the moment we walked in, it was a bit of a disaster (boxes and deitrius piled to the left of the front door, a mop leaning against the wall to the right, table for two next to where we eventually dined with a laptop, various papers, and other office supplies strewn all over it; it felt very disorganized). Despite having a reservation, we stood and waited over 10 minutes for a table. No big deal! We were happy and smiling. These things happen.

The one server complained to us that they were overbooked and he snapped at the only other server to help him clear tables. It's awkward for customers when staff is bickering in front of them and they're made to feel like a burden. The older gentleman server seemed very flustered and unhappy. We were seated in the corner of the room and given tepid water in a glass bottle and were left for 40 minutes - no menu, no drinks taken, no bread served, no apology or "be with you in a moment", not even any eye contact. After about 25 mins, I tried in vain to get their attention with a friendly hand wave and an "excuse me", but it was as if we didn't exist. It was so strange!

We talked about leaving, but had been looking forward to trying this place while on our staycation babymoon (we live in town). We were going it could become our new go-to dinner date spot as it's within walking distance to our home. So we really wanted to give it a chance and were willing to overlook the slow service. We're reasonable people and get that everyone has off nights and makes mistakes. We were finally able to flag down the server and to kindly tell her we'd yet to see a menu. To her credit, she apologized and explained that she thought we'd already ordered.

After ordering, the appetizer did come fairly quickly (bruschetta was tasty, but I was surprised to see dehydrated parsley on the tomatoes and on the rim of the plate. This was true of the store bought complementary bun that was fancied up with oil and dried oregano, too. Even as just an enthusiastic home cook, I always use fresh herbs, especially for finishing touches). The server forgot the wine, but remembered after our entrees were served. Again, she was friendly and apologetic, which helps when service is lacking. We had the veal scallopine and tagliatelle rustica. The veal scallopine was tender and the vegetables were nicely cooked. The fresh tagliatelle was enjoyed, but the veal was tough and the sauce was bland. We both agreed both dishes could have benefited from some more seasoning (freshly ground pepper is offered in addition to powdered parmesan, which we accepted, but there isn't any salt on the table). We're not sure if we both just ordered poorly or what? Maybe we chose the two least popular dishes on the menu? It did seem the other diners were drinking quite a bit, so maybe that accounts for the good reviews about the food?

Or maybe it was just an off night for both kitchen and serving staff? They did have an outdoor private event and another large table indoors. We're not sure we'll try it again as we spent over $90 for one starter, one glass of wine, and two mains and didn't have an enjoyable meal. After reading many good reviews, we were really disappointed.

Usually, when service is poor or slow, something is done to make it right; perhaps a complimentary glass of wine or dessert. That sort of thing makes such a difference to the diners' overall feeling about their experience. But this wasn't done.

The evening was somewhat saved by the musician playing the accordion and belting out Italian tunes. It was incredibly charming! This really added to the atmosphere and was the only part of the meal that was memorable in a good way. If you go, Saturday night is the night to go as that's when they have live music, which was a...

Let's call this review, "No, he won't." Because he won't. He, being the chef. What won’t he do? Anything that would make a guest happy. My husband and I dropped in for a second meal nearly two years after our first. We had moderately acceptable, but just vague enough memories of our first dining experience here to take a gamble on a return visit. $168 dollars and many regrets later, here we are, composing a Google review. It took quite some time to place our order, and about the same amount of time to find the wine we ordered. We took the opportunity to stare into each other’s eyes while thinking about the good old days of Prohibition. The wine – a $49 Pino Grigio, was nice. But it wasn’t nice enough, nor did it pack enough punch, to prepare us for the travesty that was about to follow. I should have got sloshed. Like a pair of love-struck fools, which we are, we order the most expensive appetizers – the deep-fried calamari, and the crab cakes. For mains, hubby orders the seafood pasta in a marinara sauce, and I order the lamb. Things rapidly spiral downhill from there. Bread was ‘meh’ and it came with a roasted red pepper spread. I hate roasted red pepper. So I did not eat it. Usually, Italian restaurants provide olive oil. But not here. I’m not sure if cardboard is a species of calamari, but whatever specimen took a long journey from the deep sea to end up on my husband’s plate, it lost all of its flavour and texture along the way. It must have been exhausted. The inclusion of cornmeal in the bland, unseasoned batter made for a gritty AND tasteless experience. The calamari desperately needed salt and seasoning. Two crab cakes, paper thin and the diameter of hockey pucks, were browned to the edge of blackness. The tasteless patties barely held together. Both the calamari AND the crab cakes were served with some kind of a red-pepper mayo. Did I tell you I don’t like red pepper in things? I certainly told our server. I asked, very nicely I might add, for some mayonnaise, you know, the kind a person who doesn’t like red pepper – I know you’re out there too – would ask for. We are legion. But this isn’t a restaurant for ‘that kind of person’ or any other kind of person with a request. My server responded, “No, he won’t.” She had clearly heard these kinds of requests – the kind that real people make – before. I was out of luck if I wanted to eat something that satisfied my palette. Too bad for me - and apparently anybody with a food allergy! Hubby’s pasta was OKish. Verdict on the sauce, “Not bad.” Keep in mind my husband is a chef with 20 years’ experience in fine restaurants and hotels. OK is OK. Verdict on the crab cakes and calamari – “Oh my god! No flavour whatsoever and whatever flavour there was was bad!” Did I tell you we agree about most things? My lamb tasted like lamb, which is not a bad thing, for me. Some people would have found it 'too lamby.' I ate it all. However, the mess of vegetable it was served with, potatoes, a few tiny bits of broccoli stem, and LOTs of – you guessed it – red peppers, tasted entirely of red pepper. I could not eat it. Alas, we did not stay for dessert, having already been served the just version of our own. No, they won’t. No, they don’t. And no, we won’t –...

This was the worst dining experience I have ever had, and we go out to eat 3-4x a week. We came here for dinner on a Sunday evening and as you’ll see in the photo, there was only one other table with guests (+2 tables on the patio). When we arrived, we were seated, however from there it went downhill. Our waiter kept promising that he would come over to take our orders, and once 40 minutes had passed, we finally got to place drink orders. Realizing he had taken a long time to do even this, he offered to put an order in for our kids to get them fed, which we appreciated (at first). The problem then was that he didn’t take mine or my husbands orders until the kids food arrived. We placed the orders and my husband heard the cook tell our waiter that it would be 20 mins to cook our meals and for us to pick something else off the menu. The waiter came by and didn’t mention this at first, but about 15 mins later decided to finally tell us that it was going to be awhile. At this point our kids were done eating, so we asked if he knew what we could expect for timing for our meals (politely). He went back to the kitchen to ask and we heard the chef tell him that if we didn’t like the timing then we could go across the road to eat. I couldn’t believe what I heard, as we had been very patient and understanding and there was absolutely no justification for this kind of comment. I told the waiter that we heard what was said and at that point were just going to pay the bill. So $55 later, our kids shared one meal, and we had some beverages. As a business owner I’m still in disbelief at the service, especially when there was literally no one there. I can’t imagine what it would be like here if they actually had...