Ristorante Enoteca Villa di Sotto — Restaurant in Castelnuovo Berardenga

We have just returned home from a week in Tuscany and stayed in Villa a Sesta, the home of this restaurant. We ate at the Villa di Sotto twice and had an OK meal. The service was good; the food was so so. The pastas and breads were particularly disappointing. If I were to rate the restaurant alone, I would probably give it 3 stars. The basis for one 1 star/Terrible rating is less the food and the restaurant itself but more related to another interaction with the owner/manager of the restaurant.

Villa di Sotto is in a very small medieval town with a resident population of ~ 130 people. We were staying in an Airbnb property in town, about 50 yards from the Villa di Sotto. One morning we woke up to no power. We tried to reach the host by phone but only got a message in Italian, which may or may not have been the host’s voice mail. To ensure that our host got our message, we wanted to leave an email message. (In the past our host had been very responsive to our emails.) We had noticed that the Villa di Sotto had WiFi so I walked down to the restaurant (they were serving breakfast at the time) to use their WiFi to send a single email to our host. I was shocked and extremely disappointed that the owner/manager refused to let me use their WiFi…for one single email. She said “we were not guests of the Villa di Sotto” in spite of the fact that we had eaten there twice and also said that using their WiFi would compromise their security in spite of the fact the I said that the manager could immediately delete the WiFi connection and history after sending the one email. This lack of compassion and hospitality was so inconsistent with our other experiences while in Tuscany. If not for the hospitality of every one else we came in contact with, it would have soured the rest of...

Nice restaurant with a view, but our dinner experience here was disappointing. We sat by the window, and the sun was directly hitting me. My skin burned, so I moved over one seat to avoid it. There was one empty table behind me; if someone sat there, I’d be blocking their view. The staff came to me to tell me to return to my seat when someone comes. I said Okay, I will. A few moments later, another staff member came to me to return to my seat when other customers sat at the table behind me because “It’s not nice.” I didn’t want them to come again at that point, so I just returned to my seat before people sit at that table. When the food came, a random dog came by our table (restaurant’s dog maybe). I love dogs, so I said hi. The staff walked by and told me, “Don’t feed him.” I wasn’t going to. I hope she said something else, like letting me know the dog’s name or something, but that’s what I heard (please clarify if you said something else). I felt like they were controlling and made assumptions that we would misbehave. Constantly getting don’t do this and that from the restaurant staff made us lose our appetite, and we ended up leaving without finishing the meal.

We spent over 160 euros here, the most expensive meal we had in Italy, and the food was somewhat average. The steak was hard to eat—rare (we ordered medium), tough and chewy, lacking flavor. This is how the locals like their steak, and I respect that. It just wasn’t for us. Great drink...

After trying to find somewhere locally to eat and both closest to our accomodation being closed despite advertised as open, a happy accident led us to discover Villa di Sotto. We were able to reserve a table last minute via WhatsApp, and we couldn't have asked for a better meal.

All the staff were so friendly, the wine list is vast, the menu concise and exciting. Went for the boar Tagliatelle, the burrata, the pesto ravioli and the eggplant parm - all delicious, just traditional, rustic, plentiful food. Fresh local cherries and ice cream for dessert, and the view just capped it all off.

We met halfway with our rusty Italian and English and we're able to have a good chat to work out what we wanted - vegetarian and coeliac conscious too for those that need it. Ample parking as well, although a very narrow passage if you're coming off the main road! If you can get a table on the edge, you should do it, but the place is sparse enough to feel lively but not too busy.

I wouldn't hesitate in recommending this place. If we had longer here, we would have...