ROSSODISERA Covent Garden Restaurant — Restaurant in London

What a shame. This place could have so much potential. I’m going to start this by saying that I work in the hospitality industry. Me and my friend (both italian) decided to visit the restaurant as she is from the Region this restaurant promotes their food from. The food was okay-ish. We got the Salumi and Cheese tagliere which was good. But the bruschetta and the olives were pretty basic in taste with the olives being extremely dry. Definitely overpriced for what we got, but I might take in consideration that they use italian products and for that, I will overlook the prices.

Usually when the food is not that great, it is compensated by good service, but that is not the case of this restaurant. Service was horrible to say the least. We didn’t have a server assigned to our table which made it hard to get any member of staff’s attention. And you would think that’s the worst part. The main server, a man, was utterly rude and condescending most of the time. My friend ask for a glass of white wine, we were mid dinner and we didn’t have the wine list on the table. Instead of offering the wine list the man pointed at a board behind me saying “Yeah, but which one cause I can get you any wine, even the most expensive”. Which, said with a laugh? I can get over it, but it was so condescending I couldn’t stand it already. Towards the end of end of the experience we asked for an espresso and limoncello. The espresso was basically dirty water so my friend didn’t drink it.

Once we got the bill we asked for the espresso to be removed from the bill as she didn’t drink it and we noticed thay the glass of wine was charged £8 instead of £7.50 (as it was showed on the board he pointed at). The man approached our table with the wine list saying “well the price is £8 on the menu and the £7.50 is a mistake, but anyway”. As if that is my issue? You and your staff made a mistake, despite the £0.50 difference, why should I pay something extra that was not showed when I ordered?

He kindly offered to remake the coffee which we agreed to, once the coffee came he also brought some sort of digestive quoting “well the wine it’s £8.00 but i took off the service charge so there you go, this is on the house”. Our issue was not the service or the price itself. We can afford service charge, we can afford £0.50, but the condescending tone and the lack of service was just not it. Plus making it look as if the wine price issue was our mistake, when he clearly pointed at the board with the wrong price.

Overall, disappointing experience.

People don’t go to dinner just for the food, but for the experience and that experience is provided by the servers. If you don’t enjoy hospitality, don’t work in...

The food was average but the service was the WORST I have experienced not just in London, but in ANY restaurant in ANY city I have dined. Do not waste your time or money dining here. It is a small restaurant - 7 tables upstairs and maybe a few more downstairs - and typically that means service would be attentive, but unfortunately it was far from it. Somehow, the staff seemed to be in a perpetual state of overwhelm. We had a reservation and instead of being shown to our table, we were pointed toward our table by who I surprisingly later learned was the owner. Once seated we were ignored for 10 minutes. The server working upstairs walked by multiple times, failing to acknowledge us or make eye contact at each pass. She took the order of the 2 top next to us and eventually a buser or dishwasher emerged from the back to take our order. I am assuming he was not front of the house staff because he didn't introduce himself and we literally did not see him the rest of the evening after he took our order. Our starters and drinks arrived in a reasonable amount of time but it was 1 hour later that our main courses arrived. We both ordered pasta. How pasta can take an hour is beyond my comprehension, especially when the 2 top next to us, who also ordered pasta, received and finished theirs before ours arrived. In the hour we were waiting, the server passed us on at least 10 occasions, failing to engage with at all. I had to flag someone down for water and another glass of wine. I watched the owner working behind the bar drying silverware for at least half an hour while we were totally ignored. I found it odd that he was drying silverware when they clearly had enough on a tray in front of him to cover days worth of service. He was doing everything possible to avoid work and engagement with customers. Finally, I got his attention and asked where our food was and he proceeded to give an insincere apology, instead rationalizing the delay by saying we ordered something that required extra attention. I'm sorry, we ordered pasta, not a souffle. Again, the 2 top next to us both ordered pasta and they were paying their check as I was conversing with the owner. The food eventually arrived and it was quite average. The owner later comped the wine, but that wasn't what I was looking for. Based on other reviews regarding the service, it seems our experience...

Probably the worst Italian meal I have ever had. We were tricked by the glowing Google reviews and as we were in the area looking for a quality place for dinner we walked into this restaurant. The waitress was kind enough to get us a table in the basement area. The furnishing is bare with wooden chairs which were rather uncomfortable not to mention that the heat from adjoining kitchen had the whole place baking in the month of November(!) as there was clearly no air-conditioning. Coming to the food, we ordered 'Pollo in potaccio' which is 'traditional roasted boneless chicken thighs, and vegetables' - it was literally four small pieces of chicken accompanied by some cooked tomatoes in an oily sauce (couldn't find a speck of vegetables in there) and five small squares of bread. All in all it tasted like overpriced chicken wings at £16.50. Another item we ordered was 'Tagliolini a la Marinara' which is described as 'Tagliolini egg pasta, marinara sauce and courgettes' - when the dish arrived I noticed small specks of ground meat and prawns on the pasta. Since I am allergic to prawns I asked the waitress if the pasta had prawns in it, she couldn't tell for sure immediately and had to go back in the kitchen to check. When she came back she confirmed my doubt that the pasta did have mixed seafood including prawns in it. At this point I politely told her that I am allergic to prawns and that the menu does not mention that the dish has prawns in it. She denied it at first, then hesitantly took the dish back. No apology was offered for this glaring mistake! We were quite frustrated by the whole experience by this point but since we were starving we ordered a spaghetti with tomato sauce. One would imagine that this is perhaps the safest dish to order in an Italian restaurant. Alas, not here - the spaghetti was undercooked...not al dente but undercooked, raw, and frankly disgusting. I have never had this terrible a dining experience at any Italian restaurant. I am all for supporting hospitality businesses especially in these tough times but there must be some level of reciprocity by these independent restaurants in terms of quality of food and value for money. Total rip off, bad service and bad food. Avoid...