La Griglia — Restaurant in Verona

Superbly bad experience. L’esperienza orribile.

Went here with my cousin while walking around Verona asking if they were serving an aperitivo on a Sunday evening, the hostess was vague in her response and spoke as if possibly we could do a quasi-aperitivo, but instead all she did was seat us at the table and order us a starter plate of mediocre cheese and gave us the wine list (this is not how aperitivo works, for anyone who has visited in Italy, you are supposed to order a drink then have a buffet style assortment of small bites for free).

We decided anyways to order a typical Veronese red wine, Vapolicella. When the bottle arrived it was absolutely completely-cold like it had been just taken out of a refrigerator five seconds before. We couldn’t taste the flavor of the wine at all, maybe it was an amazing wine, maybe not, since it was so frigid it could have been grape juice and tasted the exact same.

When we go to pay for the appetizer and wine (not an aperitivo) I tell the manager who was walking by, very politely, that our wine had been freezing-cold beyond anything reasonable, he replied it was impossible that that red wine could be so cold and looked at me like I was a crazy person. He then strangely invited me to come check the temperatures on the fridges where the wine is kept making me wonder why they’re refrigerating red wine at all. He also suggested that we should have waited (qualche minuto, some minutes) for the wine to reach room temperature before having drunk it, an insane suggestion since even on a warm summer evening that would have taken 2-3 hours.

And throughout this “conversation” I was speaking in moderately-decent Italian (I lived for some time in an Italian speaking region), and the restraunt staff still treated us like ignorant tourists who didn’t know what we were talking about.

In summary, this place is horrible tourist trap that serves freezing-cold red wine and doesn’t do justice to Italian food or wine, do yourself a favor and go...

There are many great restaurants in Verona to have an enjoyable meal in a beautiful setting. La Griglia is NOT one of them.

We arrived around 7:30 in the evening and were promptly seated. I was asked to take a seat that faced a wall. After a bit of discussion (we speak passable Italian), the waiter conceded to move our table six inches to allow me to face my wife (and not the wall) during dinner. While we repeatedly asked the waiter to speak to us in Italian, he did not.

My wife repeatedly told the waiter that she was allergic to milk and all milk products. The waiter would forget, suggesting dishes with cheese. They had a pasta with truffles and he said that would not work as they prepared the truffles in oil and butter. We asked if it could be prepared without butter. He said no. First time for us as other restaurants readily comply with this simple request.

We ordered our meal. For me a fillet of beef. He offered me two options: red or medium. I chose red. And it was red. Not his fault. I found the manager (my waiter was busy) to please cook the steak a bit more. He came out ready to follow through with my request, but then insisted that it was red medium. I said, OK, but that I would still like to have it cooked a bit more. After a minute or so, he agreed. What he forgot in all of this, is that we are the clients. There really should not be a discussion. No matter what you call it, if the client wants the steak cooked a bit more, cook it a bit more. The steak was good, but not exceptional.

Lastly, a suggestion. Increase the lighting in a decorative manner in the outdoor area. It should be festive in character and not utilitarian.

Again for all of you contemplating eating here. DO NOT. There are so many other great...

This place is the definition of a “tourist trap”. So if you are thinking about going there for dinner today, please don’t go! We went to this place for dinner yesterday and I think it was one of the worst experiences in Italy so far. When you enter the restaurant they look you up and down. If you are not wearing designer clothes, they treat you VERY badly and think you will not spend much there. Since we had already eaten a lot during the day, we decided to skip the starters and went straight to the main course and ordered a bottle of wine. Our pasta was ok (by Italian standards, it was probably -10). The “owners” of the restaurant kept passing by us and looking at us with a VERY rude expression. We didn’t want dessert and it seemed like it was the end of the world. When I tried to pay my bill, my account got an error, because it was an international transaction, and the owner said loudly, "Bingo," as if he knew we wouldn't be able to pay. He came back in 2 minutes and I paid, because honey, I can pay. 😉 Just to make it clear that not everyone who has designer clothes has money, my dear. You'll never see my precious money again, and I hope many people don't eat there either. Learn to treat the customer well, differently from what they "seem" to be able to have. You could be surprised about who actually has money or influence....