Ai Balestrari Campo de Fiori — Restaurant in Rome

‼️Beware: rude staff and awful service ‼️

I still can’t believe the service in Italy is that low or it simply doesn’t exist.

I ordered the food, the waiter brought it, and when I kindly asked him to take the dirty tissues away that I used to clean my hands, he said… “No. Why would I do that??? Maybe you cleaned your nose or ears with that. I am not going to touch it.”

I was obviously surprised with this response because the main job of the waiter is to make a customer happy: communication, advising dishes, serving the food, making the experience enjoyable and reacting to requests of a visitor.

He rejected my innocent and very simple request angrily and well, I was surprised but accepted being left with dirty tissues right near my food.

Just for the background scene: the bathroom where you can potentially wash your hands is dirty and smells like a disgusting toilet. So choosing to wash hands there or just clean it wet wipes, I opted for the second one never imagining it can be such a big problem in this restaurant.

So I started eating without any problems and after some time the same waiter came back with the attitude to have an argument. He started shouting (!) at me in front of other guests who instantly became witnesses of this show. He was literally yelling at me saying that I’m “impolite”. Excuse me, what…?

I’m a guest of a restaurant who came to enjoy the experience and to pay you. How is it possible in the 21 century to talk to guests like this? For no reason.

If you do something differently in your restaurant and even let’s imagine in general in Italy, but knowing that you serve foreigners/tourists right in the city center, a basic thing is proper, polite and respectful communication.

Here is what you could say: “Madam, sorry, we are not able to take away your tissues from the table because we do it only after a guest finishes eating. I’m very sorry. // I’m sorry, madam, as a waiter I’m not responsible for that but we have a cleaner. Please wait a second // I’m sorry, madam. I can imagine that it’s different in your county but it Italy we do it like this. That’s how you can enjoy the culture difference and know more.”

Simple things, right? But you didn’t say anything even close but instead chose to shout (!) at me in front of the guests for such a small thing that doesn’t deserve a scandal which you made even close.

The story finished with that the waiter angrily and demonstratively took my food away that I didn’t even finish eating and didn’t let me finish it.

I’m shocked and speechless…

Maybe it Italy you have so many tourists, thus, so much money that you don’t care about basic communication. Maybe you don’t respect people but only care about your ego. But working in the field of hospitality is a good rule of thumb to learn how to treat your guests properly. At least because you represent the country and create reputation of the culture. Which turned out to be awful.

This place is...

It's a Pizzaria and we didn't order the pizza - maybe that's where we went wrong. Instead we ordered a starter I forget the name of and couldn't identify if I wanted to. It was deep fried and greasy whatever it was. I had the Osso Bucho for main which turned out to be veal swimming in grease and butter rather than the classic dish one imagines. It was served with green beans which looked nice but they were mistakenly delivered and were quickly whisked away to be replaced with over cooked runner bean something-or-another in a greasy sauce. My good lady wife ordered the (over-cooked and soggy) Gnocchi which was so salty it was inedible. In addition the staff forgot to lay the table and didn't give us cutlery until prompted.

I have given the restaurant 2 stars instead of 1 as being British we didn't make a fuss or complain at the time, we just slunk off into the night agreeing there was always tomorrow night and we would find some good food somewhere...

The restaurant seemed very busy with families happily eating Pizza. Maybe their pizza really is the best in the world, but if they can't cook their other dishes, well they should take them...

Our first meal in Italy. They sat us in the basement. Very dusty down there. My arm caught a cobweb as I sat down. Ordered wine but no wine glass. I used the water glass to drink my wine. But first, I had to clean the glass as it was dusty and nasty. Checked the other tables and realized it's all dirty. I guess I just had to do as the romans do and use it. Their cacio e pepe was the saltiest thing I ever ate. I could only eat half, my tongue was going numb. We ordered a fried artichoke, I dont understand why this is a dish? It's not edible. It only tastes like burnt crisp. There is no artichoke flavor at all. We paid 6euros for a good laugh over this sad, sacrificed artichoke. Also ordered a pizza. At least that was edible, not the best pizza tho. Anyways, as we sat in the dusty quiet basement, I started to worry if this was the quality of...