Bella Italia - Coventry — Restaurant in Coventry

Chain 'themed by applique' restaurant relying on a cloned 'system' and, I suspect, central buying and supply. Review based on two family visits.

Welcome and ambience was fine. When we have been front of house staff have been friendly and polite attending to needs and routine quickly. Enviroment clean and functional, strangely the napkins / serviettes are 'skinny' and flimsy just about capable of wiping lips but I dread a red wins spill! Crockery, glassware and cutlery were cleaner than average as was the floor and table. Seats were comfortable.

Menu is Italian themed. I say themed because no 'real' Italian would use so much obviously bought in or shipped in factory made stuff. It's not dreadful but some of Tesco's or Morrisons stuff is better. The spaghetti a close friend had was neither average or above to start with and then was not improved by whatever cooking, boiling or microwaving it experienced. On the other hand my seafood risotto was very tasty however its likely origin in a chilled or frozen bag and subsequent ill treatment was given away by the crushed mussel shells that I had to carefully fish out fragment by fragment as clearly their state had not been noticed on tipping out.

Portions are reasonable to good, no doggy bag was offered when a couple of our number could not eat the quantities served.

Food preparation is the weakest point. I guess de-skilling has been attempted. People around us had a variety of similar small but unnecessary niggles and everything seemed to take a very long time to emerge despite it always being quiet time when we visited. This is not a place to eat before going on to something else. You may be stuck for the duration!

Pricing is over the top for the quality of food and speed of delivery and for drinks. The serving staff seemed embarrassed by the delays.

For heavens sake guys, if you are going to open a cloned 'system' restaurant you really have to get the detail right or the premium charged for consistency will be seen as a gross overcharge. In this establishment the kitchen needs discipline and...

Poor Experience from start to finish, after finding out that Deliveroo weren't delivering on the night we were ordering and Uber Eats didn't deliver to our address (3.7 miles from the Restaurant) we decided we would click and collect. Looking at the Bella Italia website we found out that 25% off mains was available for our mains with a code sent via email. We selected our Starter and Mains and then tried to use the code at, checkout. The website did not accept the emailed code. So I asked my partner to get a new code on her email which also didn't work. Because of this we decided to call the restaurant and see if they could help or if they would be able to add this discount if we ordered over the phone. 5 phone calls and 15 min later no answer as the line said "Our team are very busy please call back later". We decided to skip the code and order at full price. When I arrived to collect the order I expected to see a busy restaurant, the reason they couldn't answer my calls but when I arrived there were staff members and myself in the restaurant, NO ONE ELSE. They were unable to help in the restaurant with any online code or refund of 25%, so I took our food and headed home. When we got home, we found that our orders had been made wrong. The dishes were the correct ones but the Scotch Bonnet Chillies that were supposed to be in my Pasta were infact in my partners Duck Ragu, which mentions nothing of chillies on the menu. My partners meal was far too spicy for her to eat so ended up having to sort another meal. I tried to call the restaurant to ask for a refund for her pasta but was again met with the same answerphone message of "busy team" can't get to the phone so unable to contact them to complain. So to conclude, No Delivery, Website doesn't work, Phone line ignored / doesn't work, food was wrong / inedible. Not the easy...

The staff is polite and nice but food wise terrible. I have ordered a steak med-rare but for the £19.00 pound mark + extras for the sides I was expecting some quality, at least. Very disappointed. Steak was defrosted so, no real flavour in there, side salad was old and oxidated from exposure as the whole ingredients from the composition, peppercorn sauce bland /sour and not that pleasant when you add the grill aftertaste from the steak . My wife had some shrimps, they were decent but not extraordinary for the price range. Looks like any pub company they accepted to use frozen food ready to serve instead of warm quality Italian food. I believe that their food is an offence for the Italian brand that they represent. Huge prices, low quality. Shame on you,, Bella Italia!'', nothing Italian there! I have mentioned the problems to the manager. He said just :,, Sorry for that! '' and few minutes later he just past us on the terrace going for a quick cigarette. The same thing he was doing when we arrived at the restaurant. So couldn't care less of the restaurant issues....our waiter was polite as compensation. On big notes, if matters....wake up guys! You will never keep up with the industry changes and requests with this type of service that you are providing...