Sale & Pepe Ristorante Italiano — Restaurant in Riga

Part of my family lives in Italy. I travel back and forth quite often. I absolutely love Italian cuisine and I can say I've tasted many pizzas in different places throughout Italy and Latvia. This place has the MOST authentic Italian pizzas in Riga. This is the closest you can get to those served in Italy. Both taste-wise, look, and feel-wise. Besides, often pizzas that you get in Italy are actually worse than these served in Sale&Pepe. I can say for sure I haven't found a better pizza in a single tourist area in Italy (Lago di Garda, Venezia, Milano, Cinque Terre, etc).

Speaking about Riga. There are many places where you can taste a really good pizza but they all lack this notion of real Italian taste. That must be something with the dough or the oil that Sale&Pepe chefs do that creates the taste that takes me back to Italy. No other place in Riga can do that. IMHO. And it's not pizzas only, other dishes are amazing too: lasagna, eggplant, pasta, etc. Just for the food alone, I am giving this place an all-star rating.

Sale&Pepe is a well-hidden place. We found it by accident and were lucky we decided to try it out. This is one of our favorite go-to restaurants ever since. I haven't ever seen them doing any marketing. To my mind - this place is underrated. They often have just a few tables occupied and this makes me think that more people should learn about this gem. Sometimes they make great promotions, ie. free prosecco or Aperol spritz for a ridiculously low 1.90 eur. By the way, one more thing I love is that they serve house wine in 0.15 or 0.5l carafes. I would add 1l carafes as well.

On the flip side, there is a noticeable problem with their service. We've been there many times, but almost every time there is a new waiter and every time there is an issue with him/her. There was only once (April or May 2020) when the lady waitress (don't know her name) that did great, all the rest seem to have very strange and sometimes even rude behavior. First of all, no one smiles. Ever. Second, the waiter doesn't know how to speak with customers. There is always a feeling that the waiter doesn't want to serve you in the first place and he looks quite irritated that you came. I'm not speaking about some basic rules for how to place utensils on the table and so on. Last time we were there we thought a waiter would fall asleep while talking to us.

I hope that Rita & Raffaele will see this review and will consider to implement at least some suggestions that I believe will make this restaurant an absolute winner. Select staff more carefully. They should be able to smile and know the basics of how to serve. Don't hire too young people - they do spoil your image very much. Do more FB, IG marketing - that's just a friendly advice Keep up with awesome free prosecco or spritz promos Expand the menu a bit, I'd love to see more starters. For example, the prosciutto (crudo, cotto), pancetta, salami, olives, cheese plates (including fried chese. I have a nice picture taken at an Italian restaurant in suburbs of Reggio Emilia. You can use that idea.). Add lambrusco to the menu, it goes very well with the starters. Start offering aperitivo just like in Italy: e.g. 10 eur from the person - snacks & a glass of wine included. Start offering bread, olive oil/balsamico on the table like it is in every restaurant in Italy. (that is important)

I hope that with this review I managed to help people seeking for a really nice Italian restaurant. And I hope I managed to give some good advice...

We were so looking forward to having dinner here. Sadly we were very disappointed. We came here a year ago and the pizzas were amazing, they still are, but the rest of the food that we had was very different. My teenager son was so looking forward to lasagne, his favourite dish. When it came out it looked awful, reheated, dry and over cooked and had no resemblance to the pictures on the website. Unfortunately our young person didn’t want to make a fuss, so he wouldn’t let us say anything, but he gave it a 3 out of 10. My husband ordered carbonara and it was was a very small portion and didn’t look that great, topped with a few pieces of crispy bacon which he had to stir through. There were items on the menu which weren’t available, including wine etc. This is understandable, but it’s quite a small menu, so we were surprised. Our puddings we’re ok and looked nice, but I don’t think my Tiramisu was authentic, it tasted of lightly whipped cream and was very sweet and loose, not tasting of mascarpone which I’d have expected. The Panna Cotta was good, but let down by the burnt caramel, which was very bitter. The service was ok, but our server was very meek, understandable if newly employed and inexperienced, but then someone experienced should have been supporting. We had to ask for black pepper (it’s the restaurant’s name) and Parmesan (served in a bowl, old clumpy lumps,which I would have expected freshly grated) all should have been offered in an authentic Italian restaurant. It just didn’t fill us with confidence and the wobbly table we were sat at outside (same one we sat at a year ago) still hadn’t been fixed and really caused a problem when trying to cut anything. This is easily fixed and we couldn’t believe it hadn’t been done. The table leg falls down a drain! The best part of the meal was my pizza and it really was gorgeous, really authentic, wonderful flavour and the base fantastic. I really enjoyed it, but felt so guilty for the others in my party having such a mediocre meal. I hasten to say we will not be returning. Keep it as a...

Incredibly disappointed.

Tagliatelle Ragu was clearly re-heated in a microwave as the meat was bland, dry, and chewy.

The waiter brought out half of the mains with the starters and then didn’t bring out the other main dishes for 30+ minutes. Half of our group had finished their pizzas before the other half had arrived.

The waiter was inattentive and rude. We had to ask him for our main dishes multiple times and never received anything but a blunt response.

When we (politely) asked if we could remove the ragu from the bill (as it was inedible and we did not eat it), he implied we had clearly never eaten ragu before and began to openly argue with us - despite our polite responses to his accusations.

When we went to pay the bill we (again politely) asked to remove the service charge as we were shocked with the behaviour of the waiter. He demanded to know why and began to berate us for “not knowing how starters work”.

I have never received such awful service.

Bad food is forgivable and not something that I would blame a waiter for. But the treatment from him was absolutely...