Zizzi - Bristol Cabot Circus — Restaurant in Bristol

We have a taste card, and Zizzi is the only restaurant in Cabot Circus which will take it. "Great!" We thought. "I'm sure it'll be lovely." We were incorrect.

The décor inside is nice enough - though decorative dried pasta in jars in an Italian restaurant should have given away the quality of the food before we even ordered. No right-minded italian chef would cook with anything but home-made pasta, let alone decorate with it.

We ordered Squid rings and the Bruschetta to start. Squid rings had the consistency of rubber o-rings, clearly already cooked before they were even battered and deep fried. Upon cutting open they would spring into a straight piece of jelly rubber, not to mention the oil dripping and soaking the napkin on the plate. Literally the most disgusting squid I have ever eaten in my entire life. The Bruschetta was cold enough that anybody with sensitive teeth should not ever order this dish. The tomatoes were straight from the fridge and near freezing point, leading to an actually unpleasant starter. Had it been ten degrees celsius warmer, it would have been more than passable. Alas, we were unwilling to spend the first ten minutes in the restaurant doing what is quite possible the first time anybody has waited for their food to warm up before they eat it.

For main we ordered Risotto Pesce and Pollo Proscuitto. The Risotto sported the familiar squid rings of the starter, so I once again had to battle to even get it onto my fork, let alone down by gullet. I would highly recommend cutting them at least once as I can very much imagine the squid rings prying open your throat, they are so elastic. Muscles and 3 prawns (both comically overcooked) also graced the bowl of "risotto", and were edible. The risotto itself quite clearly came from a bag - when you cook risotto you are boiling rice for a prolonged period there should be a viscous, starchy sauce along with it. This risotto had no sauce, and tasted like rice boiled with chicken stock. The Pollo Proscuitto was totally inedible - tough to the point of cracking teeth. It was sent back, and in exchange we had a Classic Caprina. The pizza was actually rather nice, with juicy tomatoes and goats cheese on top.

Service was fairly average and considering the obviously pre-made nature of the meal it should arrived more promptly than the half an hour we waited. They removed the Pollo Proscuitto from the bill, but it made no difference as we had a taste card.

I would like to emphasise that just because somebody has a taste card (half off the bill) it is an entirely voluntary agreement that the restaurant enters into. There is no reason why somebody who has one should expect a qualitatively different meal if they are ordering off the same menu.

For 2 starters and 2 mains, one beer and a glass of wine the total cost was £26 which is eminently reasonable. However, if you do not have a taste card the cost would have been closer to £45, which it definitely was NOT worth. Bizarrely this is not the worst meal I've ever eaten in Cabot Circus - that dubious honour goes to Giraffe barely twenty meters away which was so awful as to be completely inedible start to finish.

In...

I am not one to usually leave reviews, especially bad ones as i have worked in the hospitality industry as both a waitress and bar staff in similar restaurants for the past 7 years and understand the stress the industry is under at the moment.

I went for a meal with 9 of my friends. The host said that we should order using the QR code if we were going to pay separately because its easier that having to sit there and go through the receipt at the end. We all thought this was a great idea because it is always awkward sitting there adding each persons meal up at the end. No complaints about the meal itself, it was alright. Fast forward to paying. Each person selected what they were paying for off the digital receipt, payed, and added £6-3 extra as a tip. I was the last to pay (only one person can pay at a time). The host then came over and said we owed £40. My meal only came to £25. (Keep in mind we had already tipped a minimum of £24) he then said that we hadnt payed the service charge however it is optional…. It is also not calculated into the online receipt, which is what they told us to use… we tried to explain that everyone had already added a tip on to their payment, therefore we had already paid the service charge, which was calculated at 15%. They were adamant that we hadnt payed it and wouldn’t take it off the amount (even though it is OPTIONAL and i entire ordering process was not done through any of the staff, they forgot 2 of the extras people had ordered, and had to ask two or three times for water and salt +pepper). Cut to the end, i ended ip paying the £40, therefore we payed atleast a...

Service was slow and the food was relatively bland. My starter (garlic bread with cheese) was quite nice, however it was obvious it had been prepared in a rush as it had been cut inconsistently and some pieces were overloaded with cheese while others were completely devoid of it. This was meant to be served with olives however they'd run out, so we just had to make do with no reduction of cost. The main course was nothing to write home about and different people on my table had wildly different portion sizes.

The glass that was given to me originally was dirty and it took them ten minutes to replace it with a clean one. The staff themselves didn't seem to be making much effort to socially distance: our waitress repeatedly leaned over our table, making us all a bit uncomfortable given the guidelines, and others gaggled around the passage to the bathroom in order to socialise with each other, making it hard to get by them at a distance.

When I politely hailed a waiter over to ask for the bill he waved his arms around like he was not expecting anyone to need him to wait on tables.

Our bill was wrong on their first attempt. Again it took them so long to correct it. This place also does the annoying thing of adding a tip onto the bill by default in order to pressure you into it, despite the fact their shoddy service wasn't really up to it. Also the "10%" tip is calculated before any meal deals or discounts are applied, so we ended up being pressured into tipping £7 on a £45 tab, which is pretty...