Venetian Well — Restaurant in Municipality of Central Corfu and Diapontia Islands

Disappointment does not really describe our experience. "3 and a half hours for 2 courses, we didn't bother with dessert because they took 3 hours to serve our main after 1.45 waiting for appetizers. 1 hour to get the wine to the table, 30 mins just to take our drinks order. And, no, they did not do anything to make up for that, we should have got up and left after the first hour". I was going to leave this review out but after havieg read several others all remarking on the same, I feel all attending should be well aware of the evening they are abiut to sacrifice.

We quite literally sat at an empty table with nothing but water for the best part of an hour and then a further 45 mins with only drinks that were intended to be had with food. Having spent much of my own time working in fine dinning in London under 2M* chef, I found the service at this place to be amongst the slowest and often completely ignored I've experienced anywhere in the world. I'll detail why but the general tone of the review is one of absolute shambles.

It felt like attending a chefs self indugent menu that clearly couldn't be delivered at a satisfactory time frame, and we were not the only table to complain of the same. To begin with my initial thought was that the staff were clearly trying to leave us alone and create time for the chef to manage a slow service output. However, that changed upon waiting an hour for a bottle of wine and half an hour for the bar tender to take a 2 drink order.

The food was okay but by no means worth the time. Other tables attending later were served before us and received more attention. The set menu was limited in variation and frankly not what I have come to expect from any fine dinning experience. A great deal of prevension behind the menu and polite service, one would think this place going for a *, however that would never be achieved given the long waits and what appeared to be no care for the time taken from guests to achieve an 'over all average fine dinning menu'.

In the end we had to forgo any dessert as it was 12.30am after a 9.15 seating. The very idea of allowing them to keep us waiting a further half hour or more for dessert culminated all opinions of the place to land on utter disappointment.

After realizing the downfall was not only due to the slowest kitchen output I have ever experienced anywhere in the world, I found greater disappointment in that waiters were missing serving all members of the table wine or water, often leaving and not returning for 15 to 20 mins. I began to think their objective was to upsell wine and drinks through long and overly drawn out times without any food, however that also changed because on 3 occasions we caught a waiters attention and upon then coming to the table, they left to do other things and didn't even say a word, ignored us to do whatever was more important and did not return for extended periods. Front of house was a shambles, kitchen output was a shambles and over all a completely disorganized service.

I have put below that we waited 1 hour plus for a table. We arrived at booking time after a drink at a near by location becuase they wouldn't allow us to at the establishment. Upon then returning at our seating time, we sat for a time that a 3 course meal could have been served without a thing.

My summery is it is not worth the time of day, not worth the star* it clearly thinks it's going for and not worth the money. Had we ever given such poor service to any table at fine dinning establishments I had worked, we would not have made them pay foe their meal or at the very least we would have spent our evening making our guests feel comfortable and attended to, to resonate a clear effort toward client satisfaction and upmarket dinning experience. None of this was a priority for them, ultimately as I mentioned before, self indulgent establishment not meeting the standard they clearly believe they are at.

I would not attend again and I would not recommend the restaurant. A Michelin judge would have got up left without paying having been...

There are times (fortunately few and far between), when it is difficult to express in words an experience because it is linked to an emotion which in turn makes objectivity almost impossible; but here goes. The team at Venetian Well catered a very important event for my wife and me, having been recommended by a professional whom we hired to assist us to organise it. We met the husband and wife team, Ioannis and Irini Vlachos, just three weeks before the event in order to discuss the menu and the wines: and we were impressed from the first moment. Irini is responsible for the front of house and Ioannis is the creator who oversees his magic kitchen. We chose a soup, two intermediate courses and a main course, all of which we found on the menu: it was excellent in the restaurant. Well, it was just as good when it was served to 173 of our international, epicurean guests: and the Greek wines were sublime (yes, sublime); and these were chosen by the Chef with the assistance of the restaurant’s knowledgeable and excellent sommelier, Alex. Our guests were delighted; it was better than ever we expected; and it was not at the restaurant: it was in another kitchen, on a beach, in the height of summer. But the team absolutely nailed it. And so to our next meal, this time at the restaurant itself, in a beautiful square in the old town of Corfu, the square which has the well from which the restaurant derives its name. My wife ordered a goat’s cheese salad to start and me, a ceviche of cray fish which was fresh, tangy and a little sweet at the same time, excellent: the goat’s cheese salad was light, served with a mixture of salad leaves and berries, perfect for the 28c temperature. We followed this with chicken and my lamb which had been slow cooked for 48 hours and which was firm on the fork but melted in the mouth, on a bed of tiny pasta which resembles rice, but isn’t....you have to try it. The free range chicken was perfectly cooked and I’m ashamed to say, I ate half of it also. All this was accompanied by a 2005 Cava Lazaridi Cabernet from Drama in the North of Greece: one of the finest wines I have had the pleasure and fortune to drink. The desserts are special, so much so that I won’t spoil the surprise; but you must try them, so leave enough space - although we also had some cheese in between. If you are in Corfu town and if you are able to book a table, this is an absolute must. We are already planning...

I am sad to report that we had an underwhelming experience at this highly anticipated restaurant. It was my husbands birthday and I wanted to surprise him with an unforgettable experience…well we definitely won’t forget it. When I made the reservations I was asked about allergies and food preferences. My husband is allergic to sesame seeds and cannot eat fish. And I was very clear about this in my response. I was also asked if it was a special occasion and reported that it was a birthday dinner. When we were seated we were given the menu and the experience menu. It was basically all fish! The experience menu was all fish and we were told that everyone at the table needed to do the menu or no one can. Then we were also denied the experience wine tasting because it’s only available with the tasting menu. We were not given one of the welcome plates because it has sesame seeds, but I would have been able to eat it. The. The bread was covered in sesame seeds and we had asked if there was anything they could do about one without seeds. They said they would see what could be done, acted as if they were going to accommodate but then took his plate and utensils when it was brought out because there were no accommodations. We ended up ordering a la cart but he was very limited in options and ended up having the risotto. It was very good but also hardly even enough to call it a side and it was a main. I had the fish which was very over seasoned. We did a wine pairing with our app and main but beyond that weren’t offered any more wine or water so the last 45 minutes of our meal we were thirsty. To top it off it was a very hot night and there were no fans or any way to cool the seating area so we were drenched with sweat by the end of the meal. After all of that there was nothing special for his birthday so I don’t even know why they bothered asking if it was a special occasion. We left still hungry after a very expensive dinner. We travel to Corfu frequently and will not be returning to the Venetian well or recommending it to anyone either. I’m sure the experience menu was probably pretty good, but again, it was denied to us. It just would have been nice to have known when booking that we wouldn’t have suitable options available, returned our booking fee so we could have had a better...