La Cantinetta — Restaurant in Wiesbaden

Great food, served at the speed of continental drift.

La Cantinetta. The name is misleading, because every “Cantinetta” should at least remind you of a cheerful Italian canteen. Here, the service moved at the speed of geological erosion. Saturday afternoon, Wiesbaden, my wife, my daughter and I wanted a quick Italian lunch. Quick, ha. That was the first joke of the day.

A waiter intercepted us like a sidewalk salesman and parked us at a table outside. The menu was already a warning: faded print, partially unreadable, the culinary equivalent of a 1990s photocopy. The table wobbled like a seesaw. Did we leave? Of course not. We stayed, like idiots with optimism.

Drinks first: my daughter orders sparkling water, my wife and I order Coke. Simple, right? Wrong. The water comes back still as a corpse. We reorder. Then reorder again. At some point I thought they might be running a little chemistry lab in the basement, trying to reinvent carbonation from scratch. Eventually, sparkling water appeared, but by then we’d already moved inside to escape the table that thought it was auditioning for Cirque du Soleil.

Food: I ordered chanterelle crème soup and linguine al mare. My wife went classic—pizza tonno. My daughter chose lasagna. The soup took so long I honestly imagined they were still in the forest looking for mushrooms, negotiating with elves. When it arrived? Delicious. Fresh bread, too. The tragedy of this place is that the food is actually very good. But good food with apocalyptic waiting times is like giving someone a beautiful bouquet of flowers wrapped in used toilet paper—no one leaves smiling.

The main courses followed the same rhythm: wait, wait, wait, maybe they were building a brand-new wood oven brick by brick. The lasagna? Good. The pizza? Good. My pasta? Good. But after the fourteenth geological epoch between courses, the goodwill had already evaporated.

Then the bill. We asked. We asked again. We asked again. When it finally arrived, I said I’d pay by card. The waiter asked if I had cash. Cash? I haven’t carried cash since the Clinton administration. Another fifteen lifetimes until the card terminal materialized.

By the time we left, I was convinced the next Ice Age had begun. One star, only because the kitchen itself knows what it’s doing. The service, however, could turn a Roman banquet into a...

The atmosphere is nice. The food was good. It was not as special as expected but still very good. Two things made our experience very inconvenient. First, our impression was that all waiter's recommendations were upselling attempts. I get that better plates might be more pricey, but in most restaurants in Germany, they make sure that not all recommendations are on the pricey side of the menu. The second thing , which was very annoying and unprofessional was the waiter's behavior. In the begining he was very nice and asked us where we are from and even asked some personal questions, which made us feel very inconvenient especially when we ordered alcohol he said that he knows that Egyptians (Arabs/Muslims) do not drink alcohol but we do drink? And when we asked him where he is from he said he is half Italian half Turkish. After we paid the check, he talked to us in Arabic and said that he is Arabic and talks Arabic. In our opinion, this is very sneaky and unprofessional. First, he is the one who initiated the discussion and asked us where we are from and then when we asked where he is from he lied, probably to make us feel free and say whatever we want in Arabic so he can understand everything and then in the end tell us he understood. We didn't say anything bad anyways, but the idea itself is very annoying and especially asking us "so do you drink alcohol although you are Egyptians" after we ordered the drink, we didn't get whether this was a question because we already ordered, so logically the answer is yes, or whether this was a rhetorical judgemental question. Also, the check included taxes and tips, which is uncommon in Germany! We wanted to leave tips anyway, but we shouldn't be forced. Overall, a very annoying experience that we won't...

Disappointing Service – Rushed Out Despite Reservation

We had a very disappointing experience at La Cantinette. Despite making a reservation, we were rushed out of the restaurant in an extremely unprofessional manner. There was no mention of a time limit when booking, yet after finishing our meal, we were asked if we wanted to order drinks. We ordered a second round, but just one minute after they were served, a waiter abruptly told us we had to leave because they needed the table for another reservation. We explained that we had just received our drinks and hadn’t even started drinking, but they insisted. To make matters worse, they started making noise around us by moving chairs and tables, creating an uncomfortable atmosphere. A second waiter came over and repeated the same request, even though other guests who had arrived before us were still sitting undisturbed. When we questioned why only we were being asked to leave despite having a reservation, we received no clear response. We refused to leave until we finished what we had ordered, as it was completely unreasonable to be forced out immediately after being served. We saw a supervisor, raised our complaint, he mentioned that we were right but our evening was already ruined. This kind of service is completely unacceptable and does not align with customer satisfaction. If there is a time limit, it should be clearly communicated during the reservation process. Treating customers this way—especially when other tables were not asked to leave—raises serious concerns about fairness and professionalism. Unfortunately, this experience has left a very negative impression, and we will not...