Al Forno Italian Restaurant — Restaurant in England

We were a party of 14 people on our Xmas do. Food and drinks were pre-ordered so going on a no-surprises basis. We were asked to wait downstairs until our table was ready, and you could see the whole place was actually crowded.

Went upstairs to get seated, and trust me, that was the north pole. You could feel a cold draft all around the place. Food took a while to get there (some other parties reported to have been waiting 1.5h for their food) and it was served lukewarm.

Imagine a lukewarm steak served on the north pole....well, it almost got frozen! All of us had to wear our coats while the meal lasted and some even needed to put on their hats and gloves.

We complained to both waitresses and manager who played around with the heating control for a while but achieved nothing. It was afterwards reported that it's a well known issue in this place.

The manager decided then to offer us some drinks for free -by that point everything we wanted was to move to a warm pub! After this, offered a 10% off the meal... considering the bill was incorrect and the drinks were charged at a full rate and not a pre-order one, it was not a particularly beneficial action for us.

You could see that staff were overworked and there was not enough people to run the restaurant.

I'd recommend to avoid this place during busy periods and times, probably a lovely restaurant when not trying to fit in 100 parties in...

Walked in and sat at a table that was somewhat wonky and and it was quiet, thought oh dear this does not bode well. However, I am glad I didnt decide to walk out as the food was really good. The antipasti came and it was lovely with a portion of cheese, some meats, olives caramelized onions, toasted bread and balsamic vinaigrette which made a fantastic starter. The main was a diavola pizza which was freshly made with home made dough laiden with toppings. This was a delicious pizza but let down slightly with having too much sauce and cheese which left the base in the middle a little on the soggy side however, this didnt stop me enjoying the explosion of spice and flavours that came with this delicious pizza. The staff were very friendly and cannot fault them on service but I was served by different people and no check back was given for the starter. There was a check back for the main so I did feel like staff were seeing to me. If youre looking for an Italian restaurant in Darlington this place is certainty worth a visit as some locals started filling the place up as I was eating which is a sign of a...

My friends and I were disappointed with the food and service. I had the creamy mushroom starter, mushroom/ spinach ricotta ravioli which was underwhelming. The risotto was flavourful but was overly buttery and heavy, so my friend couldn’t finish eating it. The tiramisu had very little cake and was so full of just cream. All the meals we had felt below average.

We preordered the meal for our party but there was confusion; there wasn’t enough ravioli for those who ordered it so we had to change our choices, we were handed dessert that we didn’t order, and we had to check the receipt as we were heavily overcharged with the first receipt. We also were rushed to leave the table, I appreciate it was busy, but he did not give us much time at all and we were in the middle at sorting out the receipt.

The table we sat at was also awkward that food had to be handed to us over our heads.

The atmosphere was nice and lively, with decoration and Christmas crackers. The staff were friendly and patient with our big group.

In sum, however, I would not recommend this place and don’t feel inclined to...