Bellavia Ristorante Italiano — Restaurant in Saint Julian's

Our experience was literally made up of two extremes. We were welcomed and accommodated by the hostess and shown to our seats. We were given the menu and had ample time to ask questions and decide on our dishes for the evening. Nothing was too much trouble for our waitress. I ordered a calzone replacing salami for chicken and my husband ordered a pizza pie, again without any fuss. Once we ordered there seemed to be a switch in serving staff. We had a different lady, who was rather short in patience and I would guess was having a bad day. The food arrived, huge portions but unfortunately overcooked. We decided to leave without making any complaint as we had eaten enough of the fillings, but when the bill came there had been a charge for the change in ingredients in the calzone. Had this been noted at the time of order I would have made a decision accordingly, but instead it showed up on the bill and it came across dishonest, as most people do not fully check the bill. The original waitress returned to explain the extra cost and went on to say she would remove the cost. Annoyingly had we had an outstanding experience we would have paid and tipped more than the extra charge but instead we left feeling bitter about the whole situation. Overall, the food was burnt but they were big portions and reasonably priced, the beers were on the more expensive side in comparison to other places in the area, service by the hostess was friendly and patient, but the table server was rude and impatient and our evening was just very average...

This Restaurant is located in a small street but next to plenty of other Restaurants, Bars and Hotels. We have made a reservation for Dinner and spoke with EVELINA, the female boss ( her husband/partner is from Italy and he is the cook). The reservation was done in a very friendly way and is recommended because the Restaurant is highly frequented. We were sitting inside. Soon we got the menu and wine list. The choice of wines is quite big. Fast Evelina took our orders and was able to offer a special Pizza done to my special advice prepared with fresh (!) bigger prawns. The other meal was deep fried prawns. By the glass I have ordered PINOT GRIGIO and Nero de Avola. All of the meals were done in a good way. The dough of the Pizza was prepared very well! And - as already have mentioned before- the prawns were fresh!!! What a pity that later Evelina has cared about other guests and not about us so I have done orders at her colleagues. The house wines were okay. We also ordered ice cream charged with expensive 7 €. The bill finally was 61 €.

My subjective individual rating:

LOCATION: 4 STARS SERVICE: 3 STARS QUALITY AND PREPARATION OF MEALS: 4 STARS PRICE AND VALUE FOR MONEY: 3 STARS AMBIANCE: 4 STARS

Finally I can recommend...

Probably the worst service I’ve ever had and that’s very hard to beat btw, a short young brunette woman was our server, she started by barely sitting us, then following with an atitude saying she didn’t know the menu so she couldn’t serve us, then came back because her superior told her to continue doing her job, she asked us what we wanted to order while rolling her eyes, not making eye contact and running away before we could ask for something else, then she proceeded to write down every word of the name of the meal we were ordering and it’s ingredients and for us to point it out with our finger while bringing the menu close to her… even when it was spinach ravioli, then proceeded to give us drinks that were without gas, no ice, no lemon even when asked before. In the end she proceeded the whole “service” with her terrible attitude while at the same time taking 20 minutes to bring us the machine to pay by card which had to be another server bringing us. The food is nothing special, some options are over priced, service is horrendous and there was a cockroach right in front of the entry door. Take your money...