Donatello — Restaurant in Great Britain

Donatellos is a Brighton institution and as a resident for almost 60 years, I always recommend it to visitors. I won't anymore. We had the worst experience there ever last night. I appreciate it was a busy Saturday night but that's no different to any other time we've been. It's always full, with a queue outside. We had booked well in advance. When we arrived our table wasn't cleared. We waited half an hour for our drinks order to be taken and a further half an hour before they finally arrived after 2 prompts, and us offering to collect them ourselves from the bar. We had ordered water for the table, which never arrived in spite of a second request for this too. Eventually one of our party went to get some himself. During this wait, the upstairs area where we were sitting which had been full, almost emptied out. We had high hopes for our food arriving more promptly. It did not. We waited an hour from arrival time to receiving our starters. I'm a creature of habit and always order the same starter and main. The garlic mushrooms were terrible. Simply a plate of mushrooms in oil. No seasoning and no discernible garlic. They are usually delicious. We had another very long wait for our food. When it arrived several of the meals were lukewarm at best. After such a long wait, we couldn't even be bothered to complain or return it. Not that anyone came to check if our meals were ok anyway. We weren't even offered the obligatory black pepper and parmesan. We had been there almost 2 hours by this point and were not prepared to wait even longer for a hot meal. I always clear my plate but couldn't eat the last bit as it was stone cold by this point. When the plates were collected we were not asked if everything was ok in spite of 4 of the 6 plates still having food on them and didn't get chance to say before they were whisked away. The desserts came quicker but it was now 9.45. Our original booking was for 7.45. These too were disappointing. 4 different ice cream desserts were almost identical. Overall I'm sad to say I cannot recommend Donatellos anymore. I felt embarrassed that we had recommended it to our friends and family and no one had a good meal. We looked for the manager to speak to before we left, to avoid leaving what could be a damaging review, but although there is usually always a member of the staff at the door there was no one in sight. My husband waited for a while but no...

We visited Donatello recently and, unfortunately, left feeling a bit disappointed.

We ordered cocktails, pizza, pasta, and a kids' menu pizza. Initially, the drinks order was mixed up — we were brought shots instead of the cocktails we asked for. Mistakes happen, and we were understanding about it, but the real issue was that after the mix-up, our actual drink order was forgotten entirely. We had to remind them well after our food had already been served. The cocktails were not that great, the fact they got our drinks order wrong in the first place should have been a sign not to order it.

Despite clearly having a toddler with us, no high chair was offered until we specifically asked, generally most restaurants are on the mark with this. The highchair given was dirty, luckily I had wipes so I was able to wipe this down for my son. Also, there was no working Wi-Fi, and the phone signal inside the restaurant was very poor. When we asked about it, the staff were unsure and then explained that it can happen when the restaurant gets busy — but it was only 4 pm, and although it was fairly busy, it wasn’t packed.

To add to the experience, our starter never arrived, and by that point, we didn’t even bother reminding them, as the food that was served was quite underwhelming. The pizzas were too crusty, the pasta and pizza both lacked flavour, and overall, the meal was very mediocre compared to other Italian restaurants we’ve tried.

While the staff were polite, they were all quite young — most likely students — and clearly in need of more training. It really felt like they would benefit from having someone a bit more professional and experienced on the floor to guide and support them.

To top it all off, a service charge was automatically added to the bill, which didn’t feel right given the number of issues we faced, from forgotten orders to lack of basic amenities.

Sadly, we wouldn’t rush back. There’s definitely potential, but they need to tighten up their service, food quality, and management if they want to leave a...

Pro: the food is edible (usually, at least).

The pizzas can be pretty hard like your eating particle board, and very greasy, but the tin of tomato paste that makes up their sauce is in date it would seem. If you pick wisely it is an entirely average meal that you could make at home.

Cons: As mentioned, in our experience at least, the pizza was hard as card, and if you don't like tomato then be prepared and pick something with plentiful ingredients, as Donatello hasn't discovered seasoning yet, so your sauce will be straight tomato paste. It's also not a great atmosphere. The inside is furnished, but rather dead other than the attempt of music to fill an atmosphere otherwise absent, and of course the screech of the chairs because much like seasoning, felt pads for chair legs haven't made it here yet.

Oh what an incomplete review this would be if I didn't mention service, after all it must surely be outstanding for the sneakily snapped on mandatory 10% service charge (so maybe add that on to the dishes when deciding if they're worth the price). The waitresses have no desire to be there and it shows. Ours just dropped the cutlery and napkins in a pile at the end of the table and vanished off. She wanted to get us served and gone as quickly as possible, and we exchanged the minimum of words that is possible to complete an order, and allergies was rather an after thought. Another was wandering around with her order pad tucked in her underwear, and the manager(?) man was bumbling around, presumably giving better service with his half open shirt if you're a pretty girl because a couple of tables were getting their share of free cocktails.

So maybe if you've got the looks, come for a drink on the house. Otherwise, stay in your house and you can make better, even if you've never used a hob before.

Edit: Oh and I forgot to mention, the "sausage" on a number of the pizzas is the fine dining Italian meat of pepperoni, down from the supermarket, but labelling "sausage" gives a sense of vagueness to promote that mock authentic...