In short: Beautiful setting but inconsistent service and underwhelming food portions. 🌄🍽️
Ristorante Gemma is nicely located with great views of Lake Garda and the surrounding mountains. 🌄 The table setup feels a bit fancy, which initially gave the impression of a more refined experience. 🍽 Service, however, was very mixed — some waiters carried themselves with a classic, upright posture and cloth over the arm, while others seemed a bit slow and disinterested. A middle ground might better suit the atmosphere. 🤷♂️
Oddly enough, for the first 30–45 minutes of our visit, Arabic music was playing over the speakers. It didn’t really match the setting and had us wondering whether we were actually in an Italian restaurant. 🎶❓️
Upon sitting down, we ordered some water which the waiter poured for us — a nice touch. We were also given bread, but no plates, which made it tricky to do a proper olive oil, salt, and pepper bread dip. 🍶
We ordered one starter — the burrata — and asked for it to arrive with the main dishes so we could share it as a kind of side. Despite this, it was brought out far in advance of the mains. Not a big deal, but a bit disappointing since we’d made a specific request. 🤷♂️
The main dishes arrived about an hour after ordering. The wait was a little long, but we noticed many other tables had it worse — some had food quite quickly, others seemed to wait even longer. ⏳️
Overall, the food was decent, but the portions were very small. The ravioli dish had just six small pieces with a bit of sauce — it felt more like a starter than a main. The spicy pasta was green in color but otherwise not memorable. The pasta with burrata had only a miniature amount of burrata and was mostly tomato sauce, which came off bland. 🍝
The lasagna was the highlight — flavorful, satisfying, and finally a portion big enough to feel like a main meal. Definitely where the kitchen shines. ☀️
I had the “typical steak of beef” expecting something in the range of a 200–300g veal or beef steak. 🥩 What I received was three thinly sliced pieces of well-done meat, a bit bland on their own. I ended up adding a good amount of pepper and made myself a kind of pepper-meat slip. The fries served with it didn’t look great and were poorly plated, but they were crispy. With olive oil, salt, pepper, and some parmesan, they ended up doing the job. 🍟🧂🫒
I would strongly recommend going with lasagna or just some starters for a snack, while enjoying...
Read moreCame here on a recommendation, but it was not a great experience. We booked a table and it wasn't ready so waited outside will deciding the menu and having some drinks. We ordered from different sections of the menu but asked that they come together,l at the same time - they didn't which wasn't a major issue but the food quality was very bad - we ordered clams and mussel soup - very over seasoned, turbot - very small portion for €22, a fish platter for 2 for €57, again very small portion and fish was over seasoned and over cooked, the worst was the salad - it looked like it was the end of the salad bag and the carrots where shaved the day before and 3 tomatoes for €8.50 and the grilled vegetable where burnt, we tried to get the many waiters attention at different times but they never came near us - it was a horrible experience and we would not recommend this restaurant, it is a tourist trap and has a nice view but so does so many restaurants in Limone. We enjoy good food and don't mind paying for it so the price is not the issue the quality of food and...
Read moreThis is the best spot to eat in Limone. It is next to the main square, really close to the picturesque small port. Here you will eat with an incredible Lago di Garda view. The food was excellent, we got a tagliere of affettati and cheese... The quality was great, and it was accompanied by a citrus fruits jam. Than we got the carne salada (typical of this area) with an ice cream of mustard and the third plate was a salad, with homemade mayonnaise, with Limone-oil and burrata on the top. As a dessert, my husband went for something more traditional like the chocolate pie, I dared their dessert: ice cream of oil with marenga, bottarga eggs and pumpkin vinegar. I almost forgot, we got 2 glasses of Lugana wine, it is local, fruity white wine... Delicious. 5 stars for the place, food and in general...
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