L’Osteria — Restaurant in Bristol

Probably the worst restaurant in Bristol. After hearing about this place in other parts of the country I thought I'd try it when I saw one in Bristol, let me start this review by saying that my experience wasn't all bad, there were free Haribos at the entrance. Walked in to a nice clean dining area which looked very good. Got seated and the restaurant was virtually empty so expected to be served quite quickly. How wrong was I? Feeling thirsty? Tough. You'll die of dehydration before someone comes to take your drinks order. We waited 25 mins for the waitress to come over by which time I had already gone to the bar and ordered drinks as I was dying of thirst. Not a good start. Apparently the pizza is Good, so thought I'd try that. Now if you like eating cardboard with cheese on top them you'll love it here. If you actually like pizza you will hate it. Yes it's big but if it tastes horrible what's the point in having lots of it? My son had a kids margarita pizza which came out with no margarita on it basically bread and tomato sauce. Told a waiter and no explanation or apology, not even a grunt. Just picked the plate up took it and brought it back 15 mins later with still hardly any cheese on. The beer was quite tasty but the service was so slow ( god help you if you go here when it's busy) that I was not asked if i wanted any drinks once. I had to get every drink I had by going to the bar and bringing it back to the table. After all this we waited 25 mins for the table to be cleared and another 15 mins for the bill. Unacceptable. To say I was disappointed is an understatement. Food was mediocre at best and the service is the worst I've ever had at any restaurant ever, not once were we asked how our meal was and never offered a drink at all. You know it's bad when you have to do the servers job for them. If you want good Italian food go across the road to piccolino, same price and you'll have an enjoyable meal. As for l'osteria, I don't think I'll ever go back. first impressions count and this place couldn't have made a worse one. As for the reply underneath, how pitiful is that? Not an apology not a reason for such horrendous service or food nothing. Not only is the restaurant service atrocious so is the follow up...

Well, I am going to give my honest opinion about this restaurant. My experience was terrible. I went to this restaurant for a family meal as it was my cousins birthday. There were ten of us so quite a large group admittedly but no excuse for getting orders wrong, staff understood little English and seemed to be offended with the slightest of requests, like for example I asked a waitress who was serving us If I change the drink I ordered with my meal please as it hadn't arrived yet( waitress seemed confused with the request and told me it had already been poured out to which I replied "okay, don't worry I'll take it anyway , then she changed her mind and said "Oh,it's okay I can change it for you.......?????) A male waiter then came out with the same drink I didnt want,he did change it for me and was pleasant about the whole thing, with me showing him the same level of respect no harm done type of thing. Anyway it so happened that three people who ordered the BBQ chicken pizza did not enjoy it as it was very sweet almost as though they substitute the tomato base with barbecue sauce which is too sweet unless your a child under 10 yrs old. This is where the whole atmosphere changed, a manager came out and spoke to the people who were unhappy with their meal telling them in a abrupt way that " That is the recipe" in a kind of like it or lump it way, his approach was childish and overdefensive and to cut the story short (because I promise you there is a lot more) It ended up with an argument he accused us of being rude to staff which none of us were to my knowledge and me promising him that I would never return. On a few positives as mentioned in another review the pizza size is 18inches and the plain pizza I ordered was fine I didn't have any problem with it at all taste wise but the service is very bad if you have a large group of people or any problem with the food. This is the first review I have ever written on a restaurant and I do not usually complain about things but I was too offended by this managers way of talking to people that I had to warn others of what they may experience. I'm gonna put it down to them only being open for a short while but they need to train up on customer service starting with the...

My husband and I came to this restaurant for the first time. We came to Bristol to celebrate out our one year wedding anniversary. First everything was alright. We got seated and ordered 2 pizzas. We weren’t told that the pizzas were going to be huge. I asked the server if I could talk to the manager who came to our table 1 min later. I explained to him that we didn’t know that the pizzas were huge and that when two people come in to eat at the restaurant and order 2 pizzas they should alert the customers that the pizzas are very big. As I have been working in hospitality for a decade, such as restaurants, bars, cafes etc, I didn’t want to make it a big deal and be a “Karen” but just to let them know that it would be nice to alert the customers because I would if I were working there as I did and do at all the places I worked at. The manager said that we could takeaway the left overs and just reheat it at home and that the restaurant is very famous and that we should’ve known that the pizzas are big. I pointed out that we are staying at a hotel and it doesn’t have a fridge to store the leftovers nor does it have a microwave. In the end the manager was not apologetic whatsoever. And my husband and I decided go give the leftovers to homeless people. After we asked for the bill which another server brought us. We decided not to pay for service charge because the service was very poor. The server asked us the reason why and we told him the same thing we told the manager. We were told that it’s not the best interest of the restaurant to advise customers that the pizza is big because otherwise the customers wouldn’t spend as much. In addition, he also said that they serve 200 people a day and that they don’t remember to alert customers about the pizza size and he also said that when he sees that someone is British (as my husband) he doesn’t say anything but when customers are foreigners he sometimes do. Anyway not good...