La Bottega di Cesare — Restaurant in Rome

I came for lunch and I was sat at a bar-like table in front of a wall, which I was okay with, but later it seemed they wanted me out of the restaurant quick. I made a simple request of carbonara and still water, only for the lady at the front of the restaurant to come minutes later to tell me the traditional carbonara with spaghetti would take longer and that if I wanted it with short pasta, instead. She told me it's because they were busy, which in all fairness, they were but not overtly since the place is quite small, but what I didn't think is they would give me such an excuse to change the carbonara recipe. I have never in my life had carbonara with short pasta (rigatoni in this instance) or seen it offered that way, but I was like okay, it should taste the same just with a different type of pasta. I was wrong. The bacon (guanciale) was burned, the mixture of cheese and eggs for the sauce was extremely salty, and they even sprinkled Parmesan cheese on top. They truly thought they were serving a complete stranger to Italian food. Not even speaking Italian, which I am fluent in, but not native-like shielded me from the obvious "This guy doesn't know any better" approach they took. Also, the gentleman supervising the restaurant that seemed like the owner asked everyone at some point how the food was. He didn't acknowledge me once. At the end, a younger woman that was in the kitchen asked me if the pasta was good and I lied and said it was, for the sake of politeness, but I did say I preferred it with spaghetti to which she responded, "it needed more time". I was not in a rush. My advice to the owner and staff, which I am guessing is a family is, offer the same high level of service even if the person is alone or even sitting on the floor, so to speak or just simply say there is no room until a table becomes available and do not change your own menu for whatever reason. In short,...

I actually give this place ZERO stars for the poor service by the waiter that was working there on the day of February 22, 2023 around mid day. We didn’t even get to eat after we were treated so poorly by the waiter. My daughter and I went here with the intention to have lunch because the reviews FOR THE FOOD were decent.. When we arrived the waiter was tending to another group that was already seated. My daughter and I (both black women which I must mention to give what happened some context) then proceeded to wait and while we were waiting then another gentleman (who was white) walked in. When the waiter came over he immediately went to assist the gentleman that came in after us and the gentleman kindly told the waiter that we were there before him. My daughter then said to the waiter that we wanted a table and the waiter just looked at us and arrogantly and impatiently asked again what we needed so we both repeated that we wanted to eat in. He again looked at both of us like we were aliens and then pointed to a table that hadn’t been cleaned yet for us to sit at. His attitude was terrible and didn’t feel right or welcoming. We refused to patronize this restaurant and went somewhere else. Some advice for the staff providing service to customers at this restaurant would be to treat all customers the same way you would want yourself or your family to be treated regardless of your differences. Poor service can have an impact on the success of...

My food was okay, my partner pasta pretty blend. But what we really stood out from this restaurant is how, for no apparent reason, we were treated like absolute rubbish by the owner, who had a very angry demeanor. He rolled his eyes at us when we ordered our drinks, then when the drinks came he basically slide them on the table like we are some sort of animals, same with the pasta dish. And to finish it all, after he collected our plates, he basically slammed the bill on our tables even though we hadn't yet asked for it, and my wife still had some wine left in her glass. My wife asked him ironically if she was still allowed to finish her glass or if we had to go out now, and he snarkingly said he was giving us 10 to 15 minutes...

We are both of a very kind nature, we are both teachers so are used to all sort of behaviors and are usually pretty good at handling other people emotions, but this was just so uncalled for... not sure what was going on in that man's day, if it is a disgust for tourism kinda thing, but I would honestly not recommend anyone to go in there if it is to be treated like that.

I also imagine that once he sees this comment, he is going to respond to it with some sort of lies to delegitimize what we have experienced today, but you will make your own...