Donato & Co. — Restaurant in Berkeley

Since Desco closed in Old Oakland, I’ve been looking forward to trying out this new venture in the Elmhurst neighborhood of Berkeley. Came on a mid-week night with some friends, with the restaurant somewhere between not busy and empty. The space is glorious - beautifully decorated, with gorgeous organic raw materials, generously proportioned for an elegant experience.

But the service is where things started to go wrong, and never significantly improved. When the waiter starts off by taking 20m or so to take your drink order, disappearing several times, before asking the table, “What’s a Gibson?”, before bringing back some concoction that resembles a pickle back — you know it’s going to be rocky. Service was slow, oddly inconsistent, and not adequate for a restaurant like this.

Food - I wanted to like it more. Some was excellent. Most was bland and uninspiring. The best appetizer was their Ricotta, warm out of the oven with fresh meat and toasted hazelnuts. A faro salad was completely flavorless, paired with an unmemorable Saluni plate.

Entrees were similarly uninspired, with hit-or-miss qualities. The “Il Maiale “ was a gorgeous thing to behold. While the “Pesce Del Giorno”, a swordfish in this case, was a spartan presentation of grilled fish, tomato sauce, and scooped black rice that could have been a cafeteria line offering.

Desserts were forgettable, and largely a miss. The Crema Romana had no sense of the promised Anisette infusion, and might be best described as a bowl of bland whipped cream with stale crackers dipped in caramel — perhaps for color, if no flavor. The best was that Rustic Italian staple: the Flourless Chocolate Cake.

I am disappointed in this place. So much squandered potential. Will I come back? Probably not — I think it may improve yet, seeing that it’s pretty new. But I don’t want to go through the experience...

Decor and service were just fine. My friends came for brunch and were quite happy with their plates. I ended up having a salad from the regular menu and pancakes from the brunch . My salad consisted of a tumbleweed of Scarlet Streaks mustard in which a lovely breaded semi-hard egg was nestled, a sprinkle of caramelized walnuts added. This mustard is best as a decorative garnish and not the primary ingredient. Sorry to say it was not pleasant. I could eat only the top fronds & I found an obvious section of root. My 'olive oil' pancakes were nothing special, as my friends agreed after a taste. The latte was satisfactory. We decided to try the 'crema cotta" flavored with rosemary. Though listed also as "Rosemary pot de creme' the item looked and had the texture of 'flan'. This would have been a $9 rip-off were it not for the flavor which was delicious and redolent of just enough rosemary to make us exclaim in delight. Servers passed with colorful and loaded planks of things we should have ordered. I took home a serving of the shrimp with black Venetian rice in an orange-color sauce. It was fabulous, especially with the buttery Yukon Gold mash I added. I'll definitely go back and try some other dishes, especially with hubby next time as he would love all the poached egg and guanchiale options for brunch. Plus it has good space for...

Honestly underwhelmed. Food wasn't bad, but felt overpriced. Service was sub-par. There's was a little over an hour between receiving appetizers and main courses, and dessert drinks were completely forgotten. About a 5 minute pause between receiving the first main course and the last main course being delivered to the table, so plenty of polite staring at food. Maybe it's because we were a party of 6, but seeing as most the dishes were duplicates, that's not super acceptable.

My dish was okay, but not amazing. Overall plating was pretty, not practical. The ribs dish was served on a massive bed of garbanzo beans, maybe a whole can's worth per plate.

In general dishes were served a la carte, portion sizes were smaller than anticipated. I'm not known for my appetite, and I wasn't terribly hungry going to dinner. I did my part during appetizers, cleared my plate for the main and dessert and didn't feel like I over-ate. Those with a larger appetite may want an app and dessert to themselves.

Speaking of desserts: they were the highlight of the show, a bit small to share, but absolutely delectable. I never got the chance to try the coffee as our order didn't take, but if I were to eat here, it would probably be for a coffee/dessert.

In short, many Michelin starred restaurants are cheaper and in my opinion, more...