Il Vero Italian Kitchen & Bar — Restaurant in Loulé

Friday, July 25th, 2025 • 2 stars

We dined in Il Vero on a Friday night after booking a table for 20:30 as a family of five, and we had an interesting experience.

In terms of the meal itself, the food was very nice. We had a few starters that were delicious and very appetising; perfect portion size and very well presented.

The sun began to set, and the employees turned on small lamps on each table. Very quickly, flies started to pour in. They gravitated towards the mini table lamps, and no citronella candles were lit to repel them. Not just a couple of a few flies, but many flies poured into the restaurant. They sat around the lamps and flew into wine glasses, leading to people becoming un-appetised and “grossed out”. I had squished about 30 flies in the space of 15-20 minutes. My family were upset and disturbed by the insane quantity of flies, and we, as a collective, decided to move inside.

The waiters knew there was a problem with flies - when we asked to move inside, the waiter said, “is it because of the flies?” They clearly have a problem on their hands. The waiter practically sighed as we asked to move inside. They reluctantly moved us indoors to a round table.

The main courses were very tasty and the food was good. I will not start to slander the food just because the atmosphere that the fly infestation created was undesirable - I must be fair. However, after the copious amount of flies that we saw earlier, it was difficult enough to feel appropriately “in the mood” to eat. The pastas were lovely though, I must say.

The staff began to lose interest in our family after we moved inside; they were clearly unhappy with us. Maybe the figured that the tip wouldn’t be great, so why bother? I’m not sure. The service slowed and it almost seemed like they were ignoring us. It felt odd and the general vibe shifted.

For a meal that had started out so well, it was disappointing for the atmosphere and the service to take a turn. The food was very nice indeed, but the general experience can only be so good when there are multiple obvious issues with the restaurant.

The strangest thing was that the restaurant had citronella candles (bug-repelling candles), but kept them inside. My father had to take a candle over to our table himself; he literally had to leave his seat to collect one. They never lit it. We had previously requested that the staff bring us out a citronella candle, and the waiter said “I’ll see what I can do” before doing nothing. They had a whole set of them inside - it was clear that they had been previously lit, but for some reason, despite the amount of flies, they excluded them tonight.

Il Vero has potential, but there are many GRAND issues that make it a difficult place to enjoy. With the amount of salubrious restaurants with exemplary food in QDL, I would advise against wasting your time with Il Vero until it solves its problems; the blatant issues are too difficult to work past to...

This time last year I wrote great food, great service, friendly staff. If you like Italian food, you'll love it. Maybe some Italian music would have enhanced the ambiance. I gave 4 stars. I returned last Thursday with friends and was so disappointed on so many levels. I have met Nuno the owner a few times and he is very friendly and hopefully he is open to suggestion. The friends I was with are regulars and they brought me as a birthday treat but were very embarrassed. They booked the table for 8pm. We arrived at 7.55pm we were shown into to the bar area and were told they were preparing the table. The three of us shared a bottle of wine and chatted away. We were hungry. At 8 30pm, one of the staff apologised and said they were running late and I understand these things can happen but it wasn't until 9pm that we were seated. Eventually when we did get to order, iit took almost an hour for our food to arrive and sadly some of the items we ordered didn't arrive. The order by the way was one pizza shared by my friends, with chips,with mixed salad, a tomato salad with onion. I also had tomato salad with lasagna. The mixed salad and chips didn't arrive. What embarrassed my friends so much, was they talked up the restaurant and felt let down. They could see many delivery pizzas leaving the kitchen while we were still waiting until 10pm for our food. Clearly there is a logistical problem. Either the person managing the restaurant is taking too many bookings or there their is a shortage of both kitchen and floor staff. We spoke to different servers who were doing their best but if this restaurant wants loyalty from their regulars who live in Quinta de Lago , they would do well to reassess the situation. Everybody wants to see restaurants succeed but you've got to get the balance right. This is not a cheap restaurant. The bill was in excess of a hundred euro, 1 pizza 1 lasagna, 3 side salads and chips, 1 salad and chips didn't arrive, we did enjoy the wine, the tomato salad with onion was disappointing with little or no onion. To be fair they didn't charge for items that didn't arrive. What a difference a year makes. I hope for Nuno this very disappointing night...

Visited tonight for my wife's birthday tonight , and had very mixed feedback from our experience. We were are party of 7, and we were all impressed with the external & internal presentations, as it was tastfully done. There seemed to be 3 areas for eating, which may influence your experience. 1st the bar area a little cold atmosphere, 2nd area nearer the cooking area, which was busy with the open plan pizza ovens and cooking areas , and then the 3rd area, with 2no. Gas fires ,more exclusive atmosphere, warm and buzzing. We were seated in Area 1, which didn't meet our needs. We were served bread and olive oil( without our wishes) and it was to be charged per person, we kindly asked to be removed. An extra cost which we thought was incorrect. Took our order and within a reasonable time came and we'll presented, but the 2no. Pizzas ( cooked within their igloo type wood burning oven) presented with cold cheese& tomatoes ontop, not as expected. There are visible signs to assist (blue badge)to help, less able bodied persons , which I felt reassured with, but when it came to paying the bill, expected myself to pay at till, rather than table service. I have a walking difficulty, which is very clear when being shown the table, but I felt not recognised, even after asking for the bill at the table.

We felt our experience was not positive, and felt it fell short of expections. The area has a vast selection of restaurants to choose from, so feel they should listen to our comments, as we are taking from many years of experience.

Sorry for sounding...