Juliet Italian Kitchen — Restaurant in Austin

Went for a birthday tonight with an 8:15 reservation and told them it was for a birthday. There were 8:45 reservations available when I made it. We got calamari that was awful, overcooked and hard. Arrincini that was just ok. Dinner of three pasta dishes, shrimp scampi was good, fettuccine Alfredo with chicken was good and mushroom manicotti was good. The service, how they treated us was horrible. They ruined my daughter’s birthday. At 8:45 they told us the bar was closing, last call. The waiter left the check while we were still eating entrees. Then when my daughter asked if they had dessert, he said the kitchen was closed. It was 9:15. Why sit people for reservations at 8:15 if you going to close the kitchen at 9? We were rushed and pushed out of the restaurant while there was a table just starting their entrees next to us and a table of 12 still there, talking and still getting served drinks after we were told the bar was closed. It was the worst birthday dinner ever. The pasta wasn’t good enough to make up for the horrible service!

Update: just got the restaurant response to my review. How disappointing. They lie and appear to claim my description of our experience is untrue? First off I made the reservation at 8:15 on Open Table, indicating we had a birthday. Told the hostess again when we arrived. Told the waiter as well when he first approached us. My daughter’s 37th birthday. I never complained about our entrees and if anyone HAD asked us about them I would have said they were fine. If that short girl with the short blond hair I believe, was your “manager”, she did not check on us ever, she was the one that came and told us “the bar was closing, last call for alcohol” and that is the only time anyone else spoke to us in your restaurant besides our waiter who was a tall thin blond male. He sat the bill down on the table between me and my daughter shortly after we got our entrees, while we were eating them. We all finished half our entrees, except the salad which came with our entrees which we killed, ate it all the prosciutto and goat cheese salad was delicious. We finished half our entrees and had to flag our waiter to bring us 3 boxes. He dropped them at the table and left. We had to flag him down again to then ask for dessert because it was my daughter’s birthday, to which we were told the kitchen was closed. Your manager is lying, which is disturbing. More disturbing is this is your response, to accuse me of taking the time out of my day to write a review of your restaurant just to lie. Your calamari is not good, see the other reviews here. You rush people out and force people to leave after 9 when you sell reservations at 8:30, see your other reviews here. For some reason you saw fit to apologize and offer a discount to another reviewer who was rushed out. I guess you can’t accuse us all of fabricating our experience. You have service issues. You shouldn’t seat a sole at your restaurant past 7:30 max if your kitchen is closed and you force people to leave after 9. Again see your reviews. To claim you believe in the Italian custom of leisurely dining is a joke, see your reviews. If you’re closing your kitchen when people have just been served entrees then at least have the decency to tell them and let them know they need to order anything else at that time. Like you did for the bar for us at least, apparently the 12 top had different rules and got drinks served after you last called alcohol for us. They were all still there when we left. I wonder if they got offered dessert. How do you let customers seat for an 8:30 reservation and leisurely share a meal there while closing your bar and kitchen at 9? It’s not happening, just like your managers version of events, whomever she is, did not happen. You have a mean prosciutto and goat cheese salad, decent pasta, lousy calamari and lousy service. You ruined my daughter’s 37th birthday dinner, we dine out on every birthday I have a big family, this was the worst experience we’ve ever had. Those are the facts. Read your reviews, I wish I had...

Don’t bother! Horrible freezer burned frozen to reheat and serve! Even the bread is stale and tastes old/rewarmed. We’d eaten here when they first opened about a year ago and it was ok, but nothing to rave about. Then again about six months ago and it was mediocre at best but service was good. Why go back for a third round of overpriced frozen to reheat food. Because everything else around the area was at least an hour’s wait and we called first after trying to go somewhere else and they said they could “fit us right in!” But when we got there less than two minutes later, there were lots of empty tables, the parking lot almost empty. Should have just gone home but we had other errands to run and we’re hungry! Tried to give it another try. After all, maybe they just had had an off night last summer. Nope! Since then the management has gone from bad to worse!!! Horrible in fact! I ordered the chicken fettuccini Alfredo (hard to mess up if cooked fresh). But it was nothing short of inedible. Greasy, clearly using frozen to microwave chicken, and canned mushrooms-nothing fresh about it! ($24). My daughter ordered the ($29) flounder with what was clearly frozen to microwaved veggies. It was a very small portion and even smelled fishy from across the table! She ate what she could. I couldn’t even eat a third of mine. We were going to tell the waitress early on, but she was nowhere to be found for at least a half hour. Ignored us when we finally tried to politely motion for her to actually come over. My daughter managed to eat a bit more, because what do you do when the staff doesn’t do anything related to their job or seem to care? She was promptly very sick when we arrived home. And in spite of my asking for the manager (thought they should know-in order to make improvements?) after we were finally able to get her attention (water glasses never refilled and tasted like moldy ice. ) The manager could have cared less. Rude and condescending, suggesting that “it looked like we’d eaten some of it, or picked at it at least!” Really? What are you supposed to do when it’s 30 minutes after serving before your waiter bothers to check on you? I wish I’d thought to say that, but was just so astounded at his rudeness and total lack of professionalism!! Clearly failing at his job also! The place will likely go under soon. Nobody there cares…. If you don’t want to be gouged for really horrible food that will make you sick: AVOID THIS RESTAURANT!!! It’s dirty too, with tables not cleaned sufficiently, floors and bathroom filthy and uncared for, and it stinks from the minute you walk in. Doesn’t even smell like freshly cooked food. Just one of the worst experiences either of us had ever had with...

I had never been to Juliet, but had heard great things. I was in the mood for pasta and was excited this place had house made pasta. We sat at the bar which had beautiful stools and was inviting. We were the only couple sitting at the bar and there was one server there. She was friendly and attentive when we first sat down to get our appetizer and drink order, but disappeared for a good while and we waited longer than we should have to order our food. Wine was great and the arancini appetizer was good too. Unfortunately when it came time for the house made pasta we were both looking forward to, it was a complete disappointment. I had the garden pasta which was spaguetti with seasonal veggies, and my friend had the chicken parm which came on a bed of spaguetti as well. He ate his chicken and left all the pasta. I took a couple of bites of mine and took the rest home because I hate wasting food, but ended up throwing it away at home. The spaguetti came all chopped up and we both felt like 2 little kids eating pasta our parents chopped up for us to make it easier. Besides the frustrating experience of eating chopped up spaguetti, the texture was also terrible, it was thick like a bucatini but without the holes. It was just terrible pasta and not edible. The veggies on my pasta were pretty hard too so even those were not enjoyable. Right when we got the entrees and noticed the chopoed up spaguetti we asked the server why the pasta was chopped up, she said that was normal. Then we tried to eat and realized it was so terrible we couldn't so we finished our wine and asked for the check. We told the server to please send our feedback to the chef that the chopped up pasta was not at all an Italian tradition and completely took away from our eating experience. She said they had new people in the kitchen. Honestly I don't care if staff is new or not, my food wasn't free, Juliet is not a cheap restaurant and I expected the server to have handled our complaint in a more customer oriented manner. I definitely do not...