Bellini Italian Cuisine — Restaurant in Holly Springs

For brevity: Pros- hostess was nice and accommodating. Busers moved quickly to remove unused dishes, provided water quickly and were overall very attentive. Nancy was a good server and did her best, considering. Smoked old fashion had good presentation and taste

Cons- everything else. Sat within 1 min but took 15 for acknowledgement by a server, where there were 3-4 who probably had less than 5 tables each. Dinner bread was half warm, half cold (assume was frozen prior) and tasted like nothing. The olive oil that came with it had some texture but zero taste. Ok cause good bread is sometimes not a good thing (fill up on empty carbs). Tried calamari, since we typically love it and it's a good barometer for us. Super thick, no flavor to the batter or marinara. Thought being italian, you might taste some garlic, or some parmesan or anything to easily enhance the look or flavor, nope, not here.

Second drink, not on the menu, Italian Margarita. 90% ice, tasted like bad sour mix and amaretto and felt bad, so I tried to finish all 3 oz of total liquid.

Food came out, very hot plates but Luke warm food. My linguini and clams in wine/butter/garlic sauce was straight soup. After draining the extra water and asking the server, she confirmed that's how it comes. I looked at the clams, which were already pretty small but the meat inside was approx 1/5 the size of the shell and size of a pinky nail. All good, sometimes smaller means more flavor?!?! My first bite was of the larger, unshelled clam, which looked a little off but the taste was so bad, I had to grab my bowl of soup water, turn my head from the other tables and immediately reject it from my mouth, for fear of safety concerns. I thought I would try one from the shell, in hopes it was just 1 bad clam but it was just as bad.

After that my wife questioned her lobster ravioli, which did taste a little off but not inedible like mine, so I "convinced" her to push through and she did finish her plate.

Our server was apologetic, she offered something else and to remove the charge, which should be standard BUT here is why I am compelled to review, which I've done maybe 3x in my life. I asked her to ensure the head cook and the manager were aware of not just my displeasure but my concern for serving people any more of this tainted seafood. She stated the owner was the cook, he was aware and this guy, with an almost empty dinning room, didn't even come to the table to.....I don't know, apologize, assure he would not serve this to anyone else or listen to someone that was more concerned about his other patrons, than trying to be a jerk; not my intent at all.

I know some people have given this place good reviews, I am just not sure how or why. Do better and expect better Holy...

We finally tried this place after reading great reviews raving about their food. We arrived at Saturday early evening without a reservation.

Firstly we were about to be seated at the booth right next to another booth where group of customers already sitting. It was early so the entire place was almost empty, so why don’t they try to give some space around us to avoid overcrowding (for COVID safety)?

Anyway we asked to sit at a distant table from other customers, and it was not an issue at all.

We were served by a lady called Nancy, we were not looking for a big meal so we just ordered a drink and an entree each. (Two of us)

We both ordered veal. My husband ordered veal piccata, his favourite dish, and I ordered Veal Saltimbocca, which sounded very appealing.

We both felt alarmed when our meals arrived. The plates were nice and hot, but both our meals looked somewhat anemic. The veal pieces looked rather gray and soggy. Not surprisingly, we were immediately disappointed right after we started to eat. Clearly those pieces of veal were NOT cooked freshly. It tasted as if it was cooked and kept in the fridge for at least a few days - it had that stale flavor and slimy texture. It was not fresh, I can still taste that nasty taste in my mouth. It was disgusting that we could not even finish the first piece.

The side pasta was okay, and my sauce and spinach were fine. My hubby’s piccata sauce was tasteless he said.

I don’t know why this place has such good reviews for their food - we told the server the food was not the best we’ve had, and she asked if we wanted anything else. We didn’t want to even try anything else there anymore.

We ate side pasta because we were hungry, and left most of the meat on the plate. We didn’t want them boxed. So the plates were taken away with the most of the veal left untouched.

The kitchen staff must have (or should have) noticed it, but the manager nor the chef never came out to ask us what was wrong or apologize. Nancy the server came back and asked if we wanted any desserts, but we had enough of this place, so we just asked for a check and we left. Nancy wasn’t very apologetic, just saying oh I wanted you to try something else - but it doesn’t work like that, you know. (We paid the full price for the meals and the drinks)

We never look for trouble or things to criticize when we go out to eat, but if they are charging $21 for a plate of a few slices of old smelly pieces of meat, they should know what feedback they should get.

Cary is growing fast and big, and I think we should deserve some more “decent” Italian restaurants. Does anyone have any suggestions or...

The atmosphere here is pretty nice. It seems upscale with a touch of luxury. Some of the service staff here are also very nice to deal with. However, the management here is something not to be desired. There is one manager here who is consistently very rude and speaks his mind to his customers. It seems he possesses no concept at all of what actual good customer service is. My food is consistently late each day (by 10 to 20 minutes) that I order. The prices here are not reasonable. If this particular manager does make a mistake, he will not own up to it, he will try to make you feel bad about it by saying he would never complain to a restaurant or ask for a discount anywhere, and he will moan and groan until you leave. He never makes you feel like a customer or welcome in his establishment even if you're spending big $$$ each day.

Update: We are absolutely not falsely accusing you of anything. The food was consistently 5 to 10 minutes late each day. Out of the 2 weeks we used your establishment this year, only 4 of the days were you on time. Also, you only gave us a discount on the pizzas because we order such a large volume of them every day. The one day you were 19 minutes late, not 15 minutes late. You then offered me a discount because you were 19 minutes late and I accepted. When I asked you to take the discount off the bill the next day, you were very rude and pretended to pay me out of your own pocket as some sort of insult. Who does this to their customers?

Also, I said I could make the portion of pasta with only butter on it for 30 cents. I never said 50 cents. Please get your facts straight. You ended up giving me the dish for $8 instead of the ridiculous $15 you wanted to charge me for buttered noodles. Funny enough, I was mistaken, I went out and made that dish by myself and it cost me 54 cents not 30. Also, I was absolutely not the rude party here. Learn to treat your customers with respect. We are very pleased to be getting our pizza from a new establishment well-trained in the art of...