La Dolce Vita — Restaurant in Belmar

We had my sister's baby shower here over the weekend. As we were pulling up to the restaurant we could see Christmas decorations through the windows of the room we were going to be hosting the shower. Over a week after Christmas, and the room was FILLED with huge Christmas balls, hanging from the windows and chandeliers , several wreaths, and giant red poinsettias on every window sill. Everything was bright red and green. Not the best back drop for our woodland animal themed baby girl baby shower that was supposed to be rose gold and pink. It was disappointing to see the room set up this way knowing a baby shower was coming, and it was into January already. My mom asked the staff if there was anything we could do, if we could take anything down and they replied "no, and I think it's pretty." My mom replied that it clashes with everything we worked so hard to plan and that the holiday is over and it does not look good for the party. She expressed that she was upset about it but the staff would not do anything about the decorations. Also, we had 4 roundtables set up for our shower, but the rest of the room was still set with four tops and place settings that I had to break down myself to make room for gifts, dessert, and other decorations/games. The waitress took me aside and explained that the manager was a on his way and was ready to ask my mom to leave because the staff claimed she was being abusive. This was utterly false, and she was respectfully complaining which she was entitled to do. Unfortunately, for the sake of the shower and to avoid conflict, we had to let it go and assure the waitress we would not say anything else. However, this was very upsetting. This manager that was supposedly on his way never came to talk to us at all. Never to check in and make sure we had everything we needed, never to address our concerns, nothing. Ive been in the restaurant business for 15 years, serving private parties no less, and what we experienced from this place was a far cry acceptable at this point. Finally, we paid $30 a piece for "assorted dessert platters" that were just dinner plates of mini cannoli's and a slice of cake. Not at all worth the money.

The entrées and appetizers were good, the waitress was nice, she did a good job of providing the bare minimum of service. I had to thank her for giving me a heads up that the manager was coming to kick us out, and apologize for complaining about things we were unhappy about. It is just very disappointing. I am positive the staff portrayed my mom very differently than what was actually going on, and if he had taken 5 minutes to come and see for himself, then maybe he would have known that and avoided this review. I mean, threaten to tell us to leave because of our complaint? I just never experienced anything like this...

My two friends and I took a day trip to Belmar on 6/29. We were on the beach across from La Dolce Vita, saw they had happy hour and some food, and decided to walk there from the beach for dinner. We were first seated at a table, but learned that table service didn’t include happy hour, we told our server we’d be moving to the bar. Once we got to the bar, a few bartenders approached us. One, a middle-aged man (probably late 50s), asked for our IDs. My friends and I are 23 and 24, all college grads (one’s a teacher), and we had valid IDs and backup forms of ID (credit cards, student IDs, etc.). The bartender bent our IDs in half (which I understand, having worked in bars/clubs), then gave them back while cracking jokes about our IDs and getting other staff and customers involved. He said things like, “That’s a great fake ID,” which at first seemed like a joke because he took our drink orders. Mind you, I don’t drink so my friends both ordered a canned drink (surfside or high noon) and I ordered a Shirley temple. Until he came back two minutes later and said, “I believe you’re over 21, but others don’t. If they say we can’t serve you, we can’t.” It was confusing because we thought they were just cracking jokes with us about looking young, but we just said oh okay and were getting our things to leave. My friend mentioned to me a younger woman bartender, Natalie (mid-20s, mid length brown hair) kept looking at us, and thought maybe she was the one worried about us being too young. When I glanced over, she was already staring, and when she saw me look, she threw her arms out, stepped toward me, and aggressively yelled, “What?!” like she was trying to start something. I’m 5’2”… it’s not that hard to get big on me, I just wasn’t expecting it over a Shirley temple and from a member of the staff. I get that working in service is tough, I’ve been there. But mocking paying customers and trying to fight them isn’t how a business...

Loyal customer no more. I do not like to write negative reviews however, I must write this one. We have been dining here for three years both during the summer and off season, hence loyal customer. The food has always been great and I have no issue with the wait staff, in fact we know several by their first name. Last Saturday we had made a reservation for 2 people, as always we brought our 8 pound yorkie, and this has never been a problem. it was a little chilly that night, so we requested to sit inside the tent which had only a couple of tables occupied. We were told we can't do that. We then asked to sit on La Terraza side of the restaurant which had no one sitting there but we would like to order from La Dolce Vita Menu and were told we can't do that. So we sat outside in the cold ( loyal customer) and asked if they had a temporary heater (like most restaurants do these days) and again we were told no. During this entire time the owner was outside and saw, us as he talked to his friends. He never even bothered to come over and see if he could make some accommodation for us. People walking by said "aren't you guys cold" and we said yes but they won't let us sit anywhere else. On our way home my wife and I decided to call the restaurant and speak with the owner. We were told he was not there, despite us just leaving and seeing him. We spoke with our server by phone and asked to give him a message that we would like to speak with him. That was Saturday and today is Thursday, no call back, that is disappointing. We just wanted to tell the owner how we felt that night and wanted nothing more from him. In these difficult times I would think that a loyal customer who has a concern would be something that an owner needed to address, I guess we were wrong. La Dolce Vita will be missed but we...