Zizzi - Rushden Lakes — Restaurant in England

Zizzi's, the great Italian superpower!

I went to Zizzi's with my girlfriend for a birthday lunch, and was greeted with a lovely waitress, great food and amazing atmosphere!

The Restaurant:

We went lunch time so the restaurant was very empty as it had just opened, I was greeted with a lovely waitress who brought us to a table and gave us our menus and my girlfriend an allergy menu (she has a nut allergy). The area inside the Italian restaurant was very lively and open with lots of breathable area for sitting down and talking. The tables aren't too far apart from.tbr seats so you can sit comfortably back while eating (though I wouldn't recommend with spaghetti!)

The Drink:

We only had a diet coke and a passion fruit punch which only came up to around £5 which is standard in restaurants all around.

The food:

We had a starter of garlic bread with mozerella cheese, with caramelised onions on top. I my self don't eat garlic bread but these slices were amazing. The correct amount of cheese on top and the crispness of the bread was perfect. The one point I'd like to make about it is that there was a few too many onions on top and we just picked these off as we was eating.

Spaghetti chorizo carbonara - This was a delight! I thoroughly enjoyed every bite of this meal, the sauce was the right consistency, not too runny but not too thick, the meat was cooked to perfection so it wasn't chewy or crispy, the spaghetti was cooked Al dente so it was a nice mixture of texture alongside the sauce and chorizo. .

The dish came with mushrooms and I had asked the waiter not to put any in mine, the food came with mushrooms and she apologised and I was brought a freshly cooked meal without the mushrooms. 5/5 service. The dish was pleasurable to eat overall as it wasn't too salty or bland

We ordered some fries with sea salt and they were heavenly. The perfect amount of salt and the perfect crispiness of potato! A great side with the spaghetti.

Overall, Zizzi's is a lovely restaurant to go to for a casual lunch time or a whole hearted dinner with the family. The service and food is amazing and you won't be let...

We got to Zizzis at 16:40 was sat promptly and due to allergens at the table was told that an allergy manager would come speak to us, 5 minutes later the manager came over and explained everything regarding allergens on the menu and how to look at what is safe. Was asked if we wanted to order there and then but we needed time to peruse the menu. 30 minutes later we were still waiting for someone to come back to us to even take our drinks order let alone order food. We then had a different allergen menu to take our drinks and food order and had to re-explain what the allergens were and then had to repeat what we wanted to order 3 times before she went away. We noticed 5 minutes after this that she went of duty and when the food came out the allergen order was incorrect which was ridiculous and we had to re-explain to ANOTHER waiter what we had ordered for the allergen. We were also left waiting for a side order and cheese for our pasta dishes. We managed to speak with a lovely waitress called Lily who was 100% the most helpful individual we dealt with this evening despite speaking to two managers. Lily managed to sort all of our issues out promptly and when I asked for her name and thanked her she apologised multiple times for the other individuals. I found that if it wasn’t for Lily being an outstanding waiter that it would have been the last time we visited Zizzis. Thank you to Lily you were an absolute star. To the management we dealt with…highly...

Really not impressed with the food or service at Rushden Lakes’ Zizzi restaurant. Tables that had arrived and ordered after us were being served their food before us. After waiting an hour we were dismissively apologised to by (assuming) the supervisor on shift for the wait on food and offered complimentary drinks which we declined. After another 20 minutes had passed we decided to query how much longer for food and was told by our server that the food was in the oven and would be no more than 5 minutes - he was much more apologetic and empathetic. After those 5 minutes we saw our food was only just being made in the open kitchen and then had to wait a further 10 minutes for it to be cooked. When our food arrived the sauce was cold, the pizza had ingredients on that we had asked to be removed and the “sea salt and rosemary chips” were completely unseasoned. We even asked the supervisor to confirm that the chips received were the correct ones to that she replied ‘yes’ quite flippantly. After finishing, our server apologised again and fortunately items were removed from our bill as a gesture of goodwill. We were told that a member of the kitchen had covid, and therefore they were short staffed, leaving the manager to cook in the kitchen. If that is the level of quality and service when the manager is in the kitchen, we most likely won’t return...