Signor Valentino — Restaurant in Wales

A very unfortunate experience in a place I used to absolutely love going to. I can honestly say I'm usually very lenient and understanding with restaurants, but there was little to be happy about during this visit.

To start off we weren't offered a drink when presented with menus, despite it being boiling hot. It took 20 minutes to actually then have someone come to our table, despite the restaurant being less than half full and 4 service staff available at least.

The starters came out in good time once our order was taken, but the quality left a lot to be desired. My mozzarella garlic ciabatta looked like it had been grilled about 4 hours ago with the cheese basically solid and the shredded parsley being the only remotely fresh part of it. My partner enjoyed her calamari which seemed fresh and was tasty, so some saving grace.

The mains then arrived shortly afterward, again in good time. However, I was presented with the wrong dish and upon informing the waiter was asked if I would like him to change it, which I found a little odd given I had ordered lamb meatball spaghetti, not the seafood pasta.

Due credit to another waiter who apologised for the error and assured me my meal would be out soon. Mistakes happen and this by itself wouldn't usually bother me in the slightest. However, coupled with the rest of the experience it was just another disappointment on the list.

The waiter wasn't lying when he said it would be out soon - fewer than 3 minutes later I was provided with the meal I ordered, at which point all was forgiven.... until I looked down to see a dish hastily dumped on the plate with the peppers barely mixed in, kind of in a pile haphazardly to the side. The sauce itself was edible but not delicious as I'm used to describing the food here. Patches of the dish were still cold and most of it luke-warm, suggesting it had been heated in a microwave. The meatballs were passable but not something I would expect to pay £15 for - neither of us finished our plates out of sheer indifference for what was in front of us.

After finishing our meals it took at least another 15 minutes for our plates to be cleared with a still-not-full restaurant being served by now 6 floor staff seemingly bustling around but managing to ignore our table entirely (they did manage however to serve the wrong drinks to the table next to us in the interim). With empty drinks glasses on the table we were hoping to be offered more (the mojito and aperol spritz were probably the best part of the whole affair), but unfortunately this very basic service item was also absent - entirely unsurprising at this point.

We were neither offered the bill or a dessert menu, so after another 10 minutes of being ignored by an ever-growing population of staff I managed to snag one just as he was rushing off to look busy to ask if we could pay. A few minutes later we were handed the bill to the tune of £65, which they had the audacity to automatically add a 10% service charge to. It was at this point that I decided to write this review, having been thoroughly disappointed yet characteristically forgiving until then. The assumption that I would want to pay extra gratuity for such poor service is ironically, gratuitous.

As I said at the start of this review, I am typically very lenient and can understand that the post-covid world comes with new pressures for restaurant staff. However, with the small army available for service today and a relatively small restaurant many of the aspects of our experience were entirely unforgivable, before you even mention the food.

I absolutely hope this place is able to improve going forward. This is not an experience I would ever want to repeat. I'd also highly recommend a different smoking area for kitchen staff so guests aren't walking past them smoking as they approach the front door. We were in the restaurant for an hour and 25 minutes in which time we had only managed to have one drink each, a starter and a main (which were all served extremely quickly once we had actually managed to order). Not worth...

It’s not often I leave a review but this place is awesome. Mostly because of the AMAZING food and staff. Admittedly the decor could do with a lift but it didn’t detract from a great lunch. The head waiter and waitress today struck a balance between attentive but without being intrusive - the food was exquisite - clearly good ingredients - no scrimping - great portion sizes - …… as lunches go was it cheap? No! Was it expensive ? No! It was priced perfectly for what it was which was EXCELLENT QUALITY AND SERVICE!! One minor advisory to the owner whoever she or he may be is don’t let your place look run down. The ceiling plaster had cracks in it and the decor is looking ever so dated. A good business invests back in itself to stay relevant …. A lick of paint and a good idea could make this place as good as the staff and food !!! I would go back. 100%^!!! Two thirds of our party today were meat eaters but one third vegan and genuinely that vegan pizza today with quality quality ingredients including tenderstem brocolli and the best vegan cheeese sauce I’ve ever tasted was surprising! But equally my meat eating friend said her chicken cream sauce was the best - you’ve clearly got it right whatever you’re doing! However one minor is the aesthetic !!! It’s dated and it will make people not realise what a quality establishment they’re walking in to ! A full renovation isn’t needed ! But filling cracks with poly filler and adding a splash of colour I’snt difficult! If you need a...

Visited Signor Valentino’s last Sunday evening for a meal with my wife and daughter.

My starter of skewered chicken was excellent; my daughter had garlic mushrooms, which she appeared to enjoy, although I thought they appeared to have come out of a tin.

For our mains, my wife and daughter both had the same pasta dish which they said was okay. I had a risotto, which according to the menu was made with Arborio rice, however what I was served was definitely not made with Arborio rice! The rice grains did not stick together as Arborio does, and they were soggy and overcooked, and were surrounded by a puddle of watery “sauce.”

I have eaten risotto in many restaurants in Italy and the UK, I also make it myself occasionally, so I know exactly how it should look and taste. I’ve even made it in a rice cooker, which is not intended to cook risotto, with satisfactory results! Apart from a visit to a restaurant in Manchester almost thirty years ago, where they too substituted an inferior, and probably cheaper rice for the Arborio, this was the worst risotto I’ve ever had.

We ordered desserts, although we were sorely tempted to cut our losses and go for ice creams from Cadwallader’s, down below. For dessert my daughter had the Profiteroles which she appeared to enjoy; my wife and I had the Panna Cotta, which I thought had a “heavy” texture.

We are...