Ristorante da Mario alla Fava — Restaurant in Venice

A lovely night out, sitting in this quiet court a little walk away from a crowded campo San Borrolo, however, overall quite dissatisfactory as a dining experience. Staff is kind and we were given a little courtesy appetiser when we sat down, but I didn't eat well, and were dealt with quite unprofessionally and the dinner was overall too costly for what we had. We ordered a first course that should have had a fish "tartar", but what came to the table was cooked, and the waitress did not explain why. No one else came to explain or check if we were fine. There was no wine of the house and they presented us with a long and complicated list, suggesting we could order a "half bottle", 3.75L, prices starting from 15€. The one they recommended was too sweet for a meal, and I sent it back (we didn't get charged for this, of course). After this accident, I would have expected one they two sommeliers to come and fix the problem, and recommend a wine that could suit our dinner, but they just brought back this thick wine list and I was as embarrassed as before, so we gave up on having wine. Almost every interaction we had was with a different member of staff - there was a crowd of them, but somehow no one looked after us. As seconds, I had a sepie and polenta, and they kindly proposed a different type of baccala to go with it, making an exception, which I appreciated. However, my dish was nothing special: I had fresher polenta in lower-key restaurants and sepie were chewy and a bit dry. My friend took the grilled gourmet for 39€, and it was a much better choice. His was a delicious and enjoyable plate. Portions were however quite small, all through the menu. We had a very nice teacup of zabaione for dessert, and shared it like we did the first course, but felt like we could have eaten more (which doesn't normally happen - we usually struggle to finish everything and skip dessert). Although the quality of my friend's dish was better than mine, we ate quite little, had nothing but water to drink, and ended up spending 55€ each. The bill reached all other tables with a limoncello on the house, but not ours, for some reason. They have a service charge on top of usual "coperto", which is not common in Italy. I would...

Warning! This review is not some ignorant disgruntled American. This is to warn you that if you only want to order a bottle of wine or something to drink and a appetizer, they will kick you out. Yes. Literally take your menus and kick you out.

Wife and I sat down, ordered a 65$(euro) bottle of wine, and were in the process of going through their 9 page menu to find an appetizer or something that looked good. We decided against lunch and to settle on just the app. The waiter came over from the second we sat down and like four more times within a couple minutes to see what we wanted. We initially ordered the wine thinking that would buy us more time. He comes back three times, and we're still looking. Mind you, this is all in about three minutes.

Finally partly because we felt rushed and partly because we thought an appetizer would be sufficient, we said no thank you on the lunch you are so desperately trying to force us to buy, we'll just have the bottle of wine and appetizer.

Next thing we know, he snatches the menus, and says, no, no drink without lunch. Lol.

I don't care what country you're in. If you have five empty tables, and nobody waiting to sit in them, you don't take money back out of your own pocket as a small business.

I read all these reviews about people complaining about bad service. This wasn't a case of a language barrier or anything. Most restaurants servers don't check on you very often in Italy because they want you to sit and wait and enjoy each course. This wasn't that. It was just pure stupidity. Our first bottle of wine plus an app probably would have netted them 75 euros. Instead they have an empty table and a one star review. Get with the times or get left behind. The vast majority of the income for restaurants and shops in Venice is now tourism. Wake up or get...

Horrible experience on all levels. It started off great with a referral from Hotel Colombina from a relative of the owner. We sat outside which was lovely. I tried to order a drink and was told very abruptly and aggressively that it can only be served at the table. The food was extremely disappointing for the price. My family ordered a 42 euro seafood dishes which ended up being shells devoid of any meat. I ordered a 26 euro pasta dish that included 6 tiny empty pasta shells with a few scraps of shrimp on top. Unacceptable! We attempted to pay and somehow the payment did not go through and we left believing the payment went through. The restaurant sent a staff member to our hotel and escorted us back to pay like we were criminals attempting to dine and dash. It felt like the Italian Mafia tracking us down and I felt threatened with the constant look back over the shoulder to make sure we were still following the server back to pay. We had to remind staff to include the discount promised to us. You will very disappointed if you waste...