Chianti — Restaurant in Greater Strathcona

I'm being a little generous with the rating. I came here with friends for my birthday. Low energy guy with tattoos was our first encounter, was supposed to take us to the patio but just wandered off instead. Food was decent. The prices were quite reasonable, the portions were fairly big. Lots of fresh made stuff from the piping hot bread rolls to the pasta sauce to the salad dressing. The menu could use some work. For example there's no option to have your pasta baked with cheese. They did it for me on request but seriously, is this some outrageous ask when you have mussels and blue cheese as add on options? I had wanted the whole wheat pasta (2 dollars extra) but the waitress was constantly in a huge rush so I forgot to ask. She came maybe 5 times to ask us if we were ready to order but somehow couldn't keep up with bringing buns or drinks we requested. Missed items due to not writing things down, long delays (20 minutes for our desserts for example). Really it's not her fault but no matter how busy you are you have to listen carefully, get the orders right and let people have the luxury of getting the order exactly how they want it. That's why those options are on the menu and that's why we come here. Speaking of the menu there's no dessert menu available online. Also no full drink menu online. The best part of the meal was the unusual dessert of strawberries, black pepper and Sambuca over vanilla ice cream but danged if I know what it's called because there's no way to find out without calling them or going in person. It was an ok experience but the rushed order, the long delays, the missed drinks (they also were out of the type of beer we wanted) and the lack of a complete menu online were enough that we decided not to come back for our friends birthday next month. We'll try another place where we can feel comfortable that our order will be at our convenience and we'll get the correct items we asked for in a...

Our trip to our long standing goto Whyte Ave Italian eatery Chiantis left alot to be desired. We were a 6 top for my wife's birthday, just family. We ordered 3 appetizers, Calamari which was more "fishy tasting" than it shouldve been. Deep fried mozzarella triangles, these we okay but nothing you can't get at the grocery store. The 3rd appetizer was Bruschetta that was very amateurish, id never serve it to guests in my home. It looked like some tomato and basil tossed on Texas toast. No finesse, no oiI anything to bring it together, nothing. So needless to say the appetizers had whole table not pleased, but hey you go here for the pasta not the appetizers!

5 of the 6 of us had pasta of various shapes. I had the Penne Mediterraneo and all the toppings and sauce were tasting good. But the Penne pasta was over boiled, closer to mushy soft then al dente. After the poor appetizers, I was left disappointed with my main dish. A 1st time I've being disappointed at Chiantis. The 6th person in our group had no pasta, but instead a chicken w potatoes and zucchini dish. The potatoes were barely boiled enough to call edible.

The other 4 whom had pasta enjoyed thier dishes, carbonarra, and spaghetti, ravioli were all good, my wife said hers was excellent!

So overall, 0 us 6 liked any of the appetizers. 4 of 6 liked thier main dishes.

It was classy that when the restaurant learned of my wife's birthday, they brought her a piece of cake.

Overall a muddling experience. I will come back, but likely never order appetizers again. And will ask to make sure pasta is al dente and not over cooked.

Service was slow likely due to it was pasta Tuesday a big promotion night. Still tipped 18 %, waiters were kind, although we had asked for more bread rolls, none were delivered the rest of the evening. Hope for...

Update: Another visit to Edmonton, another visit to Chianti Café. This favorite gets invoked at least once during "pasta frenzy" time, a sort-of happy hour for the glutens :-)

On this visit we went with the lasagne (still tasty, though smaller than I remember), the gnocchi in a curry sauce (interesting), and the chocolate mousse (great texture, should always come with a side of salt, and I still wish that it's dark choclate).

Chianti is a comfort zone for generations of Edmontonians, and just for that it's worth a visit. The food is comfort food, not Italian haute cuisine, and that's okay too.

This was a good visit and I'm sure another one will follow the next purchase of a plane ticket north...

Every town has a homegrown favorite place that transcends the generations, and Edmonton can be crazy-proud of Chianti Restaurant.

Reminding me of childhood dinners in New York's Little Italy neighborhood, Chianti offers a solid selection of all the antipasti, pasta, salad, and dessert that I expected. (Whole wheat or gluten-free pasta are available.)

Everything we've tried, and we've worked our way through much of the menu, is solid working-class central Italian fare. The staff are attentive and the kitchen has been flexible with our strange requests, including non-traditional pasta/sauce pairings, and stranger :-)

The hunnybunny goes gaga over the chocolate raspberry ganache cake; the mousse is quite wonderful too.

Add to that several specials -- including the wonderfully-named Pasta Frenzy, which has Caesar salad, chocolate mousse, and wine at special prices -- and Chianti is a great option for those nights when only a mass of Italian...