Giuseppe's Ritrovo — Restaurant in Bexley

This is a difficult place to review - while we did have decent food (more like 4 star, rather than 3), we were the only customers in the restaurant (besides one gentleman sitting at the bar, it seemed as if he were a regular) during lunchtime - regular lunchtime, not late lunchtime. When my mom & I walked into this establishment, we were seated in the very back corner of the restaurant. We were a bit puzzled as to why we wouldn't have been seated by a window, or something a little more attractive than beside the kitchen. As I'd mentioned before, the crowd was very thin, so there was only one server working - and most of the time, she was absent from the front of house, leaving us with empty beverage glasses throughout most of the meal (which didn't bode well for the spicy pasta dish that my mom had ordered). Overall, there are so many other very good Italian restaurants in Columbus and the surrounding areas - I believe that this one will not be at the top of our list. Service makes up 60-70% of your dining experience - and when you have a server who makes it apparent that she isn't interested in serving you, your experience is ruined. I think that there may be a false idea that servers believe, that women aren't good tippers. Years and years ago, that may have been the case (which is why I always make sure to tip when eating out with my mom - I do not believe in the $1/per person tip that she does). But anymore, anyone of us who are over 30 have likely been a server in a restaurant or bar at one time - or have worked in the customer service industry at one point in our lives. We are knowledgeable of what good customer service is - of how much a server can truly help in enhancing your restaurant experience - and most of all, how to tip very, very well to those who deserve it. Because we once speed walked from table to table to the kitchen and the drink station in...

So, when we (my girlfriend and I) got there we asked the hostess how long the wait was going to be and was told 15 minutes. Half an hour later we are still waiting so I got up to the hostess and ask again and she says to give her a second to go ask. So she goes off for like 5 minutes while I'm still standing at the hostess desk before coming back and then saying another 5 minutes. Finally, we get seated and then we are sitting looking at the menus for another 5 or 10 minutes before our waiter bothers to even say hello and you can imagine we are starving at this point. So we order the polpette as an appetizer because we hadn't gotten the complimentary bread yet either. We also ordered our entrees of the asparagus ravioli and chicken ravioli- we wanted to do the crab ravioli instead of the chicken, but they were out of crab even though it was relatively early into the night and it was the only item on the menu with crab in it, but whatever. The polpette comes out and is actually pretty good (so 2* instead of 1*). Anyways, a few minutes after we had finished this app is when they finally brought out the bread, but it was a single piece so that was a tad disappointing. Finally, the main courses came out. The asparagus ravioli was fine, although at that price I wish there had been more, but the chicken ravioli was just bland and if we didn't look inside it, wouldn't have known there was chicken at all. Probably not worth the prices, and with lackluster service, probably best to not go without a reservation either if you don't want to wait an hour just to...

Overall, this is a classy, high quality restaurant, if a bit pricey.

If you are someone who is concerned with portions being too small, I'd recommend getting pasta, since the portions seem larger.

That said, my order, the short ribs and gnocchi, were delicious. I wished there was more of the ribs, though. The sauces are tasty, everything is well cooked.

I was looking forward to trying the tiramisu, but it was somewhat late in the night and they had sold out, which I think in itself speaks to the quality of it. It might also be that they simply don't make enough to properly meet the demand, but I digress.

While I personally am underaged and can't drink, the selection of beers and wines (imported ones too, how cosmopolitan) seemed impressive.

They also don't leave bread at the table. They bring it around in a basket and serve it to you. Bit of a weird practice if you ask me, I kind of wish I could just have bread with my meal, but hey.

As you can see, they engage in a few practices that some might go so far as to call stingy, but I think that if you're willing to pay a bit more than usual, it's a generally...