Ristorante Verdi — Restaurant in Bern

My lady and I swung by here on New Year's day. We made a same day 18:30 reservation online and they confirmed via sms/email.

The food was excellent! Very simple Italian cuisine that was perfectly executed. They have a good amount of vegetarian options.

I ordered their Filetto di Manzo (a.k.a. Filet Mignon). The beef was delicious and perfectly seasoned. The temperature of the steak was off, however this might be my own fault. I couldn't remember how to order "medium rare" in German, and so I said it in English. They sent over a rare steak, which I didn't mind too much. It was such a great cut of meat, it didn't bother me. So, with that said, careful when ordering temperatures, as the standards don't always translate. Here's how to order your steak's temperature (German and French) :

Rare: Blutig (G), Bleu (F) Medium-Rare: Leicht blutig (G), Saignant (F) (SeN-YoNg) Medium: Rosa (G), à point (F) (Ae - Pwan) Well done: Durch (G), Bien Cuit (F) (Bee-en Kwee)

*in the German speaking parts of Switzerland, they typically order the temperature in French.

The host, Mr. Gutiérrez, was very friendly and allowed us to select our table (which I always like). Our waitress, Ms. Marinkas, was great! Super friendly and cordial. The decor is very nice, including many pictures and newspaper clippings of Giuseppe Verdi himself. They even have one of those meat slicers in the dining area, and will slice the Parma ham fresh practically table-side (26 bucks per portion, which is pricey, but it's the real deal - Prosciutto di Parma Cavazutti dop, 22 mesi).

After we finished our meal, we did have to wait a good while for them to check back in and provide the desert menu. I'm usually okay with a little bit of a wait, but this was about 25 minutes, and was just too long. This is the only reason I didn't give them 5 Stars, it was just too long of a wait.

We loved it here and will...

Came for a quick drink, me and my wife were thirsty after a long walk and figured we'd have a quick drink each. After we made it clear to the front man that we would only get drinks (else we wouldn't be able to use the outside tables, it's ok, if it's restaurant policy I don't mind it, especially since the outside tables sit on a sloped terrain), we waited for 5 minutes to get a menu.

Instead of a menu, we had the blonde waitress come over and ask us what we want to drink. We, of course, couldn't answer that since we haven't gotten the chance to see the drink menu yet. She seemed perplexed by our request, then went back to get her colleague to come to us with a menu which we never got to see, since he held it in his hands and started asking us what we wanted. At this point we are just fed up, so we just ask for a couple lemonades and we get them fairly quickly and, to their merit, they were really good.

However, I had to go inside and ask to be able to pay and the front man told me his colleague would be with us with the check. After 10 minutes passed, I went back inside to find my waiter had no idea that we asked for the check(yes, he maybe should have checked on us, but we are a low priority table, I guess, since we only had drinks, however the front man did take it upon himself to let the waiter know we wanted to pay). After I let him know we were ready to pay, to his credit, he came to our table pretty quickly and we managed to finally end our stay there.

If the food is at the same level as the drinks, it's maybe worth a shot. If it's at the same level as the service, I'd hold onto my money for the McDonald's next to the clock tower. And even if the food is really that amazing, the ghastly service is enough reason for me to not return, since I can't enjoy a proper restaurant meal if I don't feel...

Very nice and cozy location in historic walls. Excellent Service and Food. The range of prices is higher than average and be prepared to eat starter, salad and main course if you are hungry. Regarding the generally high prices in Switzerland the price-performance ratio, to me at least, seems not justified. If you eat a dish with spaghetti one prefers a good helping and not a big posh plate with a wide rim and barely 100 grams of spaghetti in it especially not for the relatively high prices compared to other italian restaurants who can compete with Verdi in any regard. In purchase for your regular joe a pack of Spaghetti cost around Fr. 2.-- for 500 grams, restaurants buy in special stores and pay even less. Therefore not acceptable for a customer who over the years became cost sensitive especially here in Switzerland. Sorry about that but if it's not said it won't change for the better. It's just one example of what I lately observe also in other italian restaurants to probably increase the margin on meals at the cost of the customer and of the reputation of...