D'Anna's Cafe Italiano — Restaurant in Bellingham

I unfortunately was pretty disappointed in this visit to D'Anna's. I hadn't been in probably 8 years as I moved out of the area for awhile. I used to come here for my birthday dinners as a young adult and often got the Eggplant Parm, which was delicious. This time, the price of that dish had gone up about $10, which makes sense due to inflation. It's now just under $30. I was very disappointed in the flavor of the dish. Visually, it looked like I remembered, but the marinara sauce was so incredibly acidic and one-dimensional, and the eggplant pieces tasted burnt. My partner got a creamy shitake noodle dish and added chicken. The sauce lacked depth of flavor and was just 'okay', and the chicken breast we paid $8 to add was extremely dry. Our bill for two dishes and one soda came to over $70, which would have been fine if the quality and taste reflected that pricing, but I wouldn't go back even if the price were half that. Honestly, the Italian food we whip up at home is better than what we had.

Our server seemed irritated/short when we asked one basic question before ordering, despite the restaurant only being half-full. When she brought my partner's drink, she just quickly set it on the far end of the table and walked away without even making eye-contact. Very weird vibe. Then she didn't check back on us once. We finished eating what we wanted, and sat with our plates to the side clearly ready for our check for over 15 minutes, and I had to wave down a random employee to say we'd like to pay and go.

I've never left a review before, but between the unimpressive food and indifferent attitude of the server, I thought I'd share the experience. I've always raved about D'Anna's, but will no longer be recommending...

Overall good, not great.

Best bruschetta I've had in a while, with beautiful presentation too. It was all laid out so that you assemble it yourself which I thought was perfect because the grilled baguette did not get soggy and was perfectly chewy. The mozzarella, olive oil, and balsamic vinegar all tasted like they were high quality ingredients.

Minestrone soup was good, lots of parmesan, which I liked.

Entrees come with a side salad and some cheesy bread which was very good.

For entree I had the crab ravioli with white wine cream sauce. I was pretty disappointed with that dish, especially since it is one of the more pricey items on the menu. The crab stuffing tasted bland to me, not really like crab or like much of anything. The cream sauce was very good and that helped. I tried to cut open the ravioli so the cream sauce could help add flavor to the crab. I might add that I love crab and have eaten it my whole life on both coasts so might have higher than average standards.

Boyfriend had pappardelle with meat sauce and meatballs. He said it was good but not great. I tasted it and would agree with that. Best part I think were the add-on meatballs.

I also got an add-on sausage and was not impressed, neither with the overall flavor nor with the fact that it wasnt at all spicy (and I had ordered spicy vs. regular).

If I lived in bellingham I'd probably go back; maybe its hard to find good Italian out there. The pasta noodles were a good al dente texture and maybe some of the other dishes are better, like the gnocchi with pancetta and vegetables.

Overall: I recommend the bruschetta and meatballs and do not recommend the crab ravioli or...

I know that my review will probably be the odd one out. But I was completely underwhelmed with this meal. My husband and his mom had come here a few months ago and he said it was the best meal he'd had in Bellingham in AGES. So we went. The menu was great, so many options that looked wonderful. The pricing was what you'd expect from a high-end restaurant ($20-$40 per meal). I thought about getting a cocktail, but at $13 a pop, I stuck with a diet Pepsi for $3. We started with the calamari which was good, but had a number of burnt crispies that had to be avoided. And for the price (I think it was $18) the amount was small, and the plate was really sloppy looking. I ordered the linguini with vodka cream sauce and added some spicy sausage, and my husband got the chicken piccata. My first bite, I realized that my sausage was burnt. And as I dug through, I found that over half of my sausage was inedible. I put it off to the side and kept waiting for the waitress to come and check on us. She never did. My husband enjoyed his meal, and except for the burnt sausage, mine was pretty good. I would have liked a bit more Parmesan on top, but was never asked. Overall, tax, tip and everything, this meal cost over $100. I would have been okay paying $50, but this was a disappointing meal for me. I will likely give it another chance considering my husband's rave review of it from before, but if this was my only thing to go on, I...