La Base Ristorante — Restaurant in Rome

Me and my friend have been travelling Italy for 12 days and decided to come to this establishment for our last meal of the trip.

We ordered 2 starters, a pasta dish and a calzone. For drinks we ordered a sex on the beach and a gin ‘fizz’.

The gin ‘fizz’ was stated on the menu to have gin, lemon and sours, and soda water. When the gin ‘fizz’ arrived it was completely flat and had NO syrups or flavours.

We called the waiter over and explained this to which he took it away to the bartender to make a new one for us.

He brought over the new one and it was completely the same, no syrups or flavouring, and COMPLETELY flat. We called him back over and asked again why it was flat, he stated it was ‘supposed to be’ and ‘it is what it is’.

We then asked him ‘so is this just gin & water?’ to which he replied ‘yes’. It tasted absolutely disgusting, so we asked for a pina colada instead as there was absolutely no way it could be drank.

At this point the barman actually requested we go up to the bar, where he made a new gin ‘fizz’ in front of us in the most patronising manner as if we were children, when he was making this he did so with soda water from a bottle that was probably sat there all day (hence why it was flat) my friend even offered to drink the “cocktail” if they added more soda to make it more fizzy, to which they basically refused.

No matter how much we explained he carried on belittling us and would not make us a different drink. At this point we had already had our starters, I went up to the server and asked if we could just pay for what we had already eaten because we wanted to leave, we physically could not sit there and eat in that restaurant with that awful service.

(I do want to say that the female waitress on shift tonight was lovely and this is not a representation of her service at all).

They refused to let us leave without paying for our main dishes which were ‘ready’. So we agreed to have this for takeaway as of course we aren’t going to pay for food we haven’t eaten. Our food was not ready, and instead whilst we waited the manager of the restaurant (an older man with glasses) carried on belittling us whilst we explained that a gin fizz should not be advertised as such because it was not fizzy.

He told us that this was an international thing and that a gin fizz is never fizzy, to which we agreed to disagree and stated we would have settled for the gin fizz with more soda which is what we were asking for at the bar but the bartender was refusing.

Our last evening in Italy has been completely ruined by this experience.

And the main dishes which we had to eat sitting on a bench in the street were average at best.

So basically if you want to be spoken to like a 12 year old and order things which aren’t actually the same as stated on the menu then come eat here. But honestly I’d say...

After a long day walking the streets of Rome I looked for a bar to have a drink before going home.

Waiter showed me to the bar asked for a beer, bar tender WAS NOT INTERESTED. I waited 15 minutes for the lady bar tender to serve me the beer, I understand she had other orders so I decided to go to the bathroom to make time go by, returned to the bar 5 minutes later, STILL NO BEER even though I was right in front of her and the draft pipes. I sarcastically asked, does it take long? Waiter said a little bit, tried to pressure the lady bar tender.

I asked if in the meantime they could help me charge the phone, all of th suden no one has a cable for charging a smart phone, NONE she replied with some attitude. No problem, can I have the beer ? Nope she has 4 other drinks to make before pouring me the draft. I eventually get my beer, try to enjoy the restaurant, it has a nice setting and interesting posters. As I'm about to finish the beer, I ask bar tender for another one, she agrees, then checks her phone, then has a drink, then checks her phone, then she zips more of her drink, starts cleaning glasses, and tidying bar clothes, and just like that, all of the suden I'm invisible. I finish my beer, and raise my hand so she understands I'm ready for the second draft, this time she has no drink orders, but decides to clean the bar glasses and the coffee machine, argues with the waiter about how to properly cleansen the machine. After 10 minutes waiting for the next draft I decided to leave, OH SORRY she says, I'm no longer invisible, and she I surprised I'm leaving. As I walk to the cashier to pay, I see all sorts of charging cables on the paying stand, my final thought. None of this people were interested in helping or serving any one, they work because Rome has tones of tourist, that keep the place running. It was a...

Avoid if you’re a person of color/American. Or if you like to eat in privacy, or appreciate a staff who won’t make a scene at your expense. Came here with my friend and felt absolutely vilified and preyed upon. -100,000/5 stars.

They started taking videos of us eating for “their website” but this simple process lasted about ten GRUELING minutes where the server spoke down to us, paraded our wine in front of us, kept doing retakes, and got mad at us…..

It was the most awkward, cringe, uncomfortable and grotesque experience ever. The whole restaurant stared at us while we were being filmed. We received no instruction on how to act in their video and I asked something simple about the wine we were being poured in the middle of all of this… and THE WAITER BECAME IRATE WITH ME??? AS IF US EATING THERE was a burden beyond his comprehension.

We communicated to the original hostess who seated us, that this made us super uncomfortable, I was quickly and violently ushered (pushed by my lower back) to my table. In ABSOLUTELY PERFECT Italian, I asked if they spoke Spanish (I’m fluent in English, spainish, French, but my Italian is so-so) but at this point, we decided that was it-

we would be paying for what we had been served but we would be leaving at once and then about 15 workers came to our table to speak rudely upon us, to question us and degrade us.

Poignantly afterwords, then all of a sudden the original server comes out and CUSSES ME OUT?? They pretend to have terrible English but suddenly know every curse word in the dictionary once you ask why they’re discriminating against you.

Please starve instead of consuming food at this location. I’d rather eat from the trash than consume food here and be treated so poorly.

What’s even worse is the food was kind of okay. So sad. So...