Restaurant Olivia — Restaurant in Denver

TLDR–Exceptionally rushed dining experience, aloof waitstaff, omission of mentioning that gratuity was included in check. Food was excellent but service was very disappointing. I wish I could gush over our meal at Restaurant Olivia but things felt a bit off at every turn. From what I'd read online, Olivia’s received mostly rave reviews and seemed to be the perfect place to go for any sort of celebration–great food, great service, and a deep interest in hospitality. I'd confirmed our reservation the day before however Olivia's took the added step of phoning me the "day of" to confirm personally. They asked if 2 hours would be adequate for us to enjoy our meal. I answered in the affirmative as I relish a relaxed pace when dining out. They then asked if it was a special occasion. We were in fact in Denver to celebrate our anniversary and our meal at Olivia's was the perceived high point of our stay so I shared this with them. I was told that the restaurant looked forward to celebrating with us, which prompted the expectation of some sort of festive gesture when we arrived. Unfortunately, this set us up for disappointment as our hosts never welcomed us with an acknowledgment of the evening’s celebratory nature and frankly, why bother asking if it's a special occasion if you're not going to do something special for your guests? The lackluster reception deteriorated further as we didn't find our waiter, Shane, to be particularly welcoming or cordial but rather very cut and dry. He took our drink order and upon delivering our cocktails, promptly asked if he could put our dinner order in. As we had anticipated being able to savor our time there and had been seated for just 15 minutes at that point, we requested a salad starter and a few more minutes to decide on entrees. Shane informed us that the kitchen preferred to get our full meal order at once so that they could "time it." We're all about that so we took perhaps another 7 minutes to decide on our dishes, dropping any starters from our order and requested instead 2 appetizers and 2 pasta dishes to be served all at once. As we looked forward to what we hoped would be an epic 2-hour meal, 3 pieces of warm focaccia with parmesan butter were brought to our table (delicious!)…but then a mere 5 minutes later, and not even halfway through the small plate of bread, our entrees were delivered. We quickly moved our bread plates aside to make room for the main attraction but were dismayed as top tier restaurants know that if you’re engaged in consuming what lays on the plate in front of you, it’s bad form to bring out the next course. How they missed that culinary social cue here at Olivia’s is beyond me. It would have been difficult to resuscitate the evening at that point but I held out hope. We’d seen a neighboring table that had arrived before us and was allowed to linger over their meal, enjoying some bubbly on the house prior to cocktails in honor of their celebration as well as a gift of cookies at the end of their meal. Perhaps a dessert flourished with “Happy Anniversary” on the plate rim would arrive…but no. This was doomed to be the celebration that never was. I’m not suggesting that the food wasn't wonderful…it was, but partaking in a very pricey meal within such a rushed timetable by a less than convivial waiter and without any fanfare greatly diminished and undermined the entire experience. The final disappointment was the delivery of the check which was brought to us without any explanation that gratuity was included within the pricing of the dishes (nor was it seemingly printed on the check itself). Fortunately, I'd remembered reading about this online and inquired when one of the owners was in sight. He confirmed my understanding of this important omission and prompted our waiter to stop by our table to reaffirm what had not been stated initially. Our waiter's lapse most certainly wasn't an oversight and as such, in the end, we were left feeling further disheartened, overlooked and most certainly...

Overall thought this was a great meal. It's 4 stars instead of 5 because dessert seemed both poorly conceived and executed. Of the other dishes we had, one seemed unbalanced on execution but not badly conceived. Highlights were really the service and environment which was comfortable, elegant and unrushed. Service was personal and casual, but with a high degree of precision. Overall the dinner was slow, but we were enjoying that and I think they slowed things for us. Our error was the number of rich items we ordered. The pastas are all extremely rich and intensely flavored so we would have been better off with a lighter starter and probably wine that was dryer or more robust. We had the spritz NA mocktail and the Pea Flower NA mocktail. Spritz was pleasantly bitter, Pea Flower was good but had a sweeter profile. The asparagus starter was great, seemed like steamed ribbons of asparagues with roasted whole spears, everything really nicely cooked and still bright and vibrant. We split two entree pastas ( french onion ravioli and romesco garganelli) and two half pastas (mushroom tortelloni and bolognese). Overall with the bread, this was too much food for the two of us. My wife loved the french onion ravioli. This is not my favorite set of flavors, but we both thought it delivered what it promised and the french onion broth on the bottom of the plate was really intensely flavored and delicious. The bolognese was excellent though intensely salty. The depth of flavor held up thru the salt, but a more robust wine would help with this. The romesco garganelli was the only miss for us. This came with duck confit that was so salty and overwhelming that it seemed to unbalance the dish. It had a gremolata of some kind on top that also was really salty and the two together seemed to overwhelm the other components of the dish. Bites with a very small bit of duck and more of the thinly sliced brocoli were much better and I think they could pull back and shred more finely the duck, make the gremolata more acidic or put in toasted nuts of some kind to balance out the salt. The only other issue with the dish was the romesco which ended up being a pasta component, not a sauce. This made for a stunning plate, but the herbacity and spice of romesco was not present or tastable in the dish. That was a shame because I think those brighter flavors could have balanced out the oil and salt that overwhelmed the dish. I think the concept here is great, but the ratios needed tweaking. Our unexpected highlight was the mushroom tortelloni with vodka sauce and candied garlic. Ours came out just luke warm which we were unsure if that was deliberate or not, but it didn't substantially detract from the dish. The light spice and richness of the vodka sauce with the umami of the mushroom dough in the pasta, smoke from the cheese filling and the sweetness and crunch of the candied garlic was a really great, unique and fun bite and I think showcased just what Olivia does best by working in their chosen format in surprising ways. We really appreciated that they coursed our meal for us and the sorbet intermezzo was a nice touch. The coursing put the two saltiest items together, which made sense of overall meal progression, but they were hard to eat together. Unfortunately, we were disappointed with dessert. The olive oil cake looked beautiful and we didn't mind the incredible density of the cake until the interior turned out to be dry. We didn't get intense flavors of olive oil or the moistness we expected and all the flavors of the cake were variations of sweet. It appeared to have a lemon custard dotted on it, but its flavor had no tartness to balance the sweet cream. Overall, we really enjoyed our meal and would likely come back, but would order more carefully and in most cases half portions of the pastas seemed like more than enough. Thanks to the staff for the wonderful...

Restaurant Olivia was the best dining experience my wife and I had since arriving back in Denver 2012. Behind the unassuming entrance to the restaurant on the corner of Alameda and Downing resides some of the best Italian food we have ever had and far and away the best service Denver dining has to offer.

Upon entering, we were greeted by the Host, who was attentive, friendly, and prompt in ensuring that our timely arrival for our reservation was met with equal timeliness. After being seated, our server immediately met us to provide some information about the wine and drink menus as well as check for any dietary restrictions. After perusing the menus, we settled on a glass of Montepulciano, a Mai Tai, and the arancini starter. All were spectacular. As part of the reservation process, the staff at the restaurant knew it was my wife's birthday and they brought out a small chopped salad and focaccia in addition to our arancini as well. The foccacia was doughy perfection and my wife was trying to figure out a way a smuggle the infused butter that accompanied the foccacia out of the restaurant after dinner.

For our main courses, we shared the carmelized onion-filled ravioli with gruyere and the tortelloni made with sweet corn, peach, and mint. Both were sublime. The flavor profiles that Olivia present in these dishes were so unique and refreshing, it was unlike anything we have seen at other Italian establishments. We were chuckling at the fact that there wasn't a red sauce in sight on our table.

When presented with dessert options after our main course, we let the server know we were too full from our meal and we politely declined. She then brought out some take-and-bake cookies for my wife's birthday and told us that we could celebrate with some dessert later when we were less full. What an amazing surprise (and the cookies were unbelievable).

The service was extraordinary throughout the meal. Our server and her support team made sure our food and experience was what we expected without being overbearing or too intrusive. The service was formal, yet not pretentious, and was very welcoming. As we left, my wife and I were discussing how a place like Olivia finds such great team members who uniformly understand the mission of the restaurant with all of them appearing to be on the same page. We still don't know the answer to that question.

We will certainly be back, and soon, before this place blows up even more than it has. There is no doubt that Restaurant Olivia is one of the best dining experiences in all...