TerraMia — Restaurant in England

Had high hopes but was very disappointed! Visited as a group of 8. Arrived to be met with confusion by staff who couldn’t find the booking despite my friend having called 3 weeks prior to make the booking. Eventually sat down even though the restaurant advised they had double booked.

The waiting staff then took approx. 20 mins before they took any drinks orders. Between us all, we had 2 bottles of Pinot and ordered another to be told they had ran out of Pinot?!

We had to wait approx. 30 minutes for our food orders to be taken…2 hours later we had still not received our mains despite not even ordering starters. After asking various times where our food was, we kept being told it “had been plated up and was coming out” for around 20-30 minutes. We complained to the waitress saying that waiting 2 hours for a main course was not acceptable, who responded in a rude manner and backchatted to me disputing the time it had taken. Upon the eventual arrival of the food, everyone in the group was no longer that hungry and just wanted to leave! The food arrived piping hot so it had either been microwaved or the waitress had been lying when she told us 20 mins prior that it was being plated up.

My friend ordered the prawn & pea risotto but couldn’t even eat it as it just tasted of puréed peas.

AVOID this restaurant - would not recommend at all. If you want good Italian food and friendly customer service then visit...

So we recently tried here after being gifted a Groupon voucher for it. This was for a starter and mains up to a certain value. This review is based on if we were to have paid full price, though.

The service was efficient but not overly welcoming with a lack of smiles. We liked the interior which was spacious and light.

We had the mussels for starters, which were tasty, though there were two closed unedibles in one dish and three in the other. We were given free complimentary bread to go with them, though didn't particularly enjoy it.

For mains we had the chicken dishes. We enjoyed them but felt they were somewhat overpriced at around £17/18. With a needed side, it would have brought the mains total to around £23 which feels excessive. We had the sautéed potato's which were good and there was plenty to share. We also had the garlic butter spinach, which whilst good we were unable to finish due to the heaviness combined with the mains choices - perhaps our fault. I'm not sure if by design, but the chicken dish with the mozzarella had a large pool of oil around the edge of the meat, which didn't do wonders for the presentation.

Overall I'd sum up the experience as "nice enough", but wouldn't rush back. I'd probably give 3.5 stars if possible. Also please take in to consideration Italian isn't our favourite cuisine - others may have enjoyed the same meals far...

We had barely sat down when a row erupted. Customers all around were complaining about the pizzas. Behind us the pizzas were being served runny. In fact there were complaints galore. We watched 7 or 8 pizzas being returned. Staff instead of accepting there was an issue immediately were very argumentative. I and others were looking at this situation and were not impressed with how it was being dealt with. Why were they even deemed fit to serve?

Eventually staff accepted defeat and said there was an issue with the ovens and pizza was now off the menu.

We had no intention of ordering pizza having watched this show. In fact we were debating whether to stay or leave.

We decided to stay and I ordered Lasagne and my wife the veal. The Lasagne was served so ridiculously hot, it burnt the roof of my mouth. My wife had the escalope of veal. Her food was fine. When the bill came we were overcharged by £4. I didn't challenge this error as I didn't want to cause a scene for £4. Overall, our little date night had become a total disaster. I had no intention of adding a row to the night as well.

Southend is full of good eateries with excellent service but unfortunately this isn't one of them based on...