Villa Angelo Musco — Restaurant in Belpasso

The most terrible experience I have ever had in my entire life! And trust me I am being nice here! We came here, and there was absolutely no one else in the entire restaurant, we asked if it's open and they said yes, and that they have just opened. They seated us and brought the menu. After 15min we called the waitress for our order since they were all in another area (near kitchen) talking to each other, laughing, yelling, and not caring about us at all. We ordered one pizza, one salad and one steak on grill. Not to mention all the problems here because there were to many to write all, the salad arrives in a bowl and no plates or anything for us to share, so we eated it direcly from a bowl which we put betwen us. After 15min arrives my pizza, and they say sorry but the meat takes a bit more to prepare and we said ok, it's fine. After other 20min the meat arrives. Smelling funny, not at grill at all, one side has the grill lines and the othes is visibly cooked in a pan, full plate of oil, but still my friend tried it, but it had a very unpleasant taste as well. We put it a side and shared a pizza, while waiting for a waiter to let them know that the meat has gone bad. After 15min they come and they ask about the meat, since thay see it is not even touched and we are sharing pizza, we explain the situation and they take it away. We were still eating pizza when the waiter yelled from the other room "hey guys, want some dessert after or coffe?" We said no, and if he could bring the bill, and now things get interesting! The bill is writen by hand and on it is also a meat that went bad! Now comes the waitress who was serving us at the very begining to take a payment. We told her that we think it's unfair that on the bill we have a meat that went bad and we didn't even ate and her reply is "I know, I am sorry but since the boss is not here we cannot remove it from the bill". Yes you read that right! From a hand writen bill! We said I am sorry but this now seems like some kind of a joke and then the waiter pops out from the back and starts yelling "If you pay is good, if you don't want to pay I WILL SEE YOU OUTSIDE!!" Ooh yes, those are his words! He even started yelling some stupidity like, I gave you a place to eat, a chair to sit ecc and you are returning me in this way! Sorry mate but you almost gave me salmonella as well. He started hitting his chest hard and repeating "with me! With me! With me you are having a problem!" We paid our entire bill and left the hell out of there! The waitress was appologising all the way to the door but still, nothing could change our mind after this experience! Definitely a place I am not coming back...

Just north of the town of Nicolosi on the winding road SP92 making it's way through the Etna Park to the Mt Etna base camp at Rifugio Giovanni Sapienza and the Silvestri craters is found the Villa Angelo Musco restaurant.

The decor is rustic and cosy with lots of old time memorabilia adorning the walls and shelves. There are three main dining areas and a centrally located bar/cafe/souvenir shop.

There is an al a carte menu and fixed cost buffet dining options during certain days of the week.

On Sundays they currently offer a €22 lunch (menu in attached photos) composed of very generous portions of a variety of seasonal antipasti, 3 types of meats, 3 types of pasta, desert, house red wine, mineral water and coffee.

Quite unconventional for non Italians, they expect you to take your coffee standing up at the bar at the completion of your meal during which they strip the table clean for their next customers.

Looking at the menu there is a variety of dining options of pizza, pastas and meat dishes at fairly reasonable prices.

Friday night seems to offer live music as well.

Obviously set up for the tourists, near the bar there is a souvenir shop where you can buy all forms of My Etna and Sicilian souvenirs.

Even though the restaurant caters for the tourist, it is frequented by many locals coming all the way from Catania and surrounding areas.

Our waiter was very friendly and chatty.

The restaurant is non smoking but on the downside the smoking area is located in the first room at the entrance of the restaurant so the first and last thing you breath entering and leaving the restaurant is a lung full of second hand smoke.

The parking area is small and can be very full during peak times. Roadside parking is not an option as it is situated on curves and bends of a narrow road.

Surprisingly, for a restaurant catering for the tourist, very little English is spoken and the menus are only in Italian. So do have your Google translate at a ready (or even better an Italian relative!).

Free social Wi-Fi is advertised but you can only log in with a Facebook, Instagram or Google account. Accepting the connection means you agree that your username, profile picture and email address will be recorded and made available to the third party providing the internet connection. This obviously has privacy issues and opens you up to unsolicited emails or worse. I declined the "free" Wi-Fi.

Overall it was universally agreed by those in our dining party (consisting mainly of local relatives) that it was good value for money and good quality food. They said they would return again so that indicates a definite...

Beautiful setting, extremely friendly staff, the food was simple (we had pasta with pistacchio sauce) yet tasty, and beer was ice cold. The dessert was ok and the coffee was on the house (also delicious, as usual in Italy). Definitely land here if you're around Mount Etna and are hungry for a local, unpretentious yet...