Osteria da Pampo — Restaurant in Venice

I had dinner with a friend since we were lucky enough to find a table for 2 inside without having a reservation. The restaurant is in a quiet area of Venice, far from the attacking pigeons of St Marco, which is really nice. For starters we had some typical Italian dish (bread, pomodoro and burata) which was good and some marinated eggplant with sardines, invaded by marinated onions, which we found very basic (for 13-14 euros the starter). For the main course I was hesitating between spaghetti alla bursara and spaghetti with raw shrimps, but at the waiter’s suggestion I went for the second option. The dish was so fresh that the shrimps were alive and ran out from the plate, otherwise I couldn’t understand why I had maximum 10g of shrimps on a mountain of pasta. No salt at all and a lot of oil, but apparently olive oil is good at making tourists feel better in any situation, so I wouldn’t complain about that. I won’t evaluate the plate of my friend, who had spaghetti alla bursara, but judging by the look on his face, he’s immune to olive oil. The strawberry tiramisu I had for dessert was not bad at all and made me forget a little about my 21 euros spaghetti with abstract shrimps. Honestly I’ve ate way better in Venice for the same money, but if you want to spend a quiet and decent moment, I guess you could...

I chose this place for a solo dinner as it looked quiet and pleasant. I wanted to give myself a full and rich experience of Venetian dining at a less touristic neighborhood. But the waiters were quite unkind from the beginning. There were seats available but they designated a table with one-hour restriction for me. I accepted and placed orders of a bottle of Veneto wine upon recommendation, a meat stuffed pepper, and a grilled squid dish. Quite good amount for a single diner. After an hour, many tables were still empty and they didn’t ask me to leave. I stayed a little over an hour in total. Since this kind of unpleasant reception was quite rare to me, I felt pretty bad. I still have no idea why they were rude and unkind. Perhaps because I was alone who would occupy a table for two? The following morning, I got stomach pain, and diarrhea began. The squid was probably not fresh enough. The dish was not tasty anyway. This is also a rare occasion at so many trips. For following days, I suffered from diarrhea. I’ll probably build an avoidance on squid for a while. And if I get an unpleasant greetings at the beginning anywhere, I better leave the place immediately. A...

Such a tragedy. Food was good. Staff unwelcoming, slow, and rude in the end. While we were trying to order desert with one waiter, the other waiter curtly told us that our time slot had expired and she needed the table. A rather unpleasant discussion evolved. There was no other party actually waiting for a table.

You can’t have a laidback service, ignore your own time restraint and planning, and then blame the client and rush people out.

Unnecessary. Much ado about nothing.

(We went to Nevodi for desert and it was amazing.).

Edited after reply by owner: we were a party of three and we left three honest and fair reviews after an unpleasant experience. I stress again that the food was good; don’t make the guests responsible for things not going the way that you needed them to go. Your planning, your service, your responsibility. Pity that we couldn’t have a constructive...