Café Verona — Restaurant in Independence

I arrived at 7:30pm. The restaurant was very bright (no dim lighting for ambience). I was seated at a table and my server, greeted me. She called me “Sweetie” and asked for my drink order. I ordered a dirty Absolut Martini straight up with blue cheese olives and water. She confidently informed me that they did not have blue cheese olives. No issue, may I please have regular olives. Yes she replied. She immediately came back to the table informing me they did not serve Absolut and gave me a run-down of the vodka they did serve. I chose Grey Goose and she proceeded. She returned to the table with a martini (not dirty and one olive. As you can see even the receipt says Olives! Olives!). She told me she “did not trust this bartender” and made it herself. No water in hand. Wow! Not off to a good start. Lightly breaded calamari with the proper garnish and not over seasoned. You could really taste the food and not just seasoning! Bravo Chef! The server proceeded to ask for my food order. I ordered the pesto from the Keto Menu, however I wasn’t “feeling Keto” and wanted the carbs. I asked if I could order that item and substitute “real” pasta. She said, “Oh, then you want the Pesto Strip (which comes with potatoes & brussel sprouts)”? I said, “No, I want the pesto pasta with steak just not the zoodles”. Wow, I suppose the customer knows what she wants, right? I guess the Pesto Strip would have been $38.00 instead of $23.00; however that was not a factor. I just didn’t want the potatoes & sprouts. I really wanted what I ordered. Again, it was wonderful! I ordered the steak medium rare and it came to the table a Perfect Medium Rare, seasoned to perfection, with fresh ingredients, and al dente pasta! Again, Bravo Chef! I was offered no bread, was not asked about salad, and was not told about the soups. I was a table of one; nevertheless a server should never assume someone’s appetite. I would have gotten a salad if offered one and I definitely would have appreciated bread even if I had to pay for it. I had to ask for a water refill (mind you the restaurant was basically empty and service is an integral part of the dining experience). I gave my server $20.00 gratuity simply because I don’t think she was trained to work in this kind of dining establishment. The bus boy passed my table at one point and knocked on it?!?!? I’m not sure if he even realized someone was sitting there as he was obviously not worried about the customers as he made a lot of noise (besides the table knock) and didn’t seem to be aware of his surroundings). I finished with the cannoli trio (to be fair, I’ve had cannoli in Italy so this was just okay) and was asked if I wanted it to go or for here. I could see at 8:15pm that I was one of two tables in the dining room and I felt as though she wanted me to leave; so I ordered my dessert to go. I tipped her regardless of her lack luster service and her repeatedly calling me “sweetie”, which I did not appreciate. It is truly not her fault that she has not been instructed on how to address and treat guests. So, I went home, ate my dessert, and had a Bailey and cream from my own bar. Guess I saved the cost of the espresso martini and she got her tip no matter what. Bottom line, next time I want calamari, I’ll order take out and enjoy at home. Bravo Chef!! The food was fantastic! Work on the cannoli, someone train the staff, and the ambience should be considered. You have a beautiful establishment and should use it to your advantage. Your restaurant has the ability to be one of the best in the area and should not be empty at 8:30pm on a Friday night. Tighten it up or no matter how good the food is you will not last long when there are so many choices in the KC...

We dinned in with a large party. The atmosphere of the restaurant is generally decent upon a non-soured experience. However, the dated look of the upstairs, creaky floor boards, and (most importantly) lack of ceiling fans and zero warning of the AC being out for our booked appointment or for patrons was a bad start to an over appalling experience.

Our waitress was generally nice, and obviously I give her grace for the error, as it was nauseatingly hot upstairs and I'm willing to believe the possibility that she's worked in the service industry before, so these words may have just rolled off the tongue from previous experience. However, when my father ordered his meal, she said "that comes with a salad, we have house or ceaser". As she went around the table, she inquired what salad we would each like and some of us began to just state our salad order before she could ask.

We had a separate waitress drop off our appetizers and I asked her if she could put another order in for appetizers. She had an unfriendly tone and stated "Uh, sure I can look for your waitress, she can put it in". Again, something that could be for forgiven given the overall unpleasant heat, but just another stop in the story of poor service throughout.

The food was overall pretty good, ironically, the weakest part was the salads. The ceaser dressing was the blandest I ever had, and the story of the Salads only gets worse.

Upon receiving our bills, we noticed that we were charged $11 for our children's $5 butter noodles and $7 for every salad that we were told came with the meal (like almost every other Italian restaurant known to man). We noted to the waitress that we were charged, and she claimed she never said that or if she did, that she misspoke. She told us that the butter noodles charge was for both our children, but the menu clearly said $5, and basic math would tell you that's $10, not $11.

While upset that our table had just spent $56 on salads that we thought were free, we were willing to let it go, but the waitress asked if we wanted to speak to the manager. So we accepted, thinking it would hopefully give some resolution to our problem. Her manager came after about 10 minutes while our kids were all getting out of hand and we're sweating due to the heat, just to simply state that "nothing could be done to fix the problem", but she could give us a single desert for our group of 10 and a single gift card to use "next time". After we pointed out the obvious that it didn't really help since there were so many of us. She went and got a separate manager who just sent her back instead of coming themselves. She then gave us a comp on two of the 8 salads and gave a gift card to one of the couples in our party, which had to suffice.

After the waitress came back, she said "I hope that was able to help fix the problem" to which my wife responded that it didn't, as our tab was still much more expensive than we had planned for, just try to be more careful next time. The proper reaction would honestly be, to just walk away, but the waitress said "sorry, I don't make the rules".

I've had pleasant experiences at Cafe Verona over the last 20 years. Perhaps those visits have not been frequent enough for me to realize organically that the salads aren't complimentary, and possibly never were. But what will define my lack of desire to return, is the lack of urgent and thoughtful customer service for a wording mistake that was...

My husband, daughter, and I went to Café Verona three days ago, during lunch. We love Italian and were looking forward to going here for the first time. We weren’t disappointed! In fact, we were completely blown away!

I wish I had taken pictures of everything but we were too wrapped up in the deliciousness of the food, the beautiful atmosphere, and the delightful staff!

This is the most gorgeous place. I sat toward the windows and noticed most everyone who drove or walked by were craning their necks to admire the beautiful and unique café. Stunning atmosphere!

I called ahead and the hostess was helpful and pleasant, completely willing to answer my questions.

Our server, Andy, is absolutely, unequivocally the reigning supreme leader of all waitstaff, ever in the history of EVER! He is friendly, attentive without being overbearing, knowledgeable (he recommended everything we had and it was ALL phenomenal!), made an effort to connect with us, and made our entire experience absolute perfection!

As I said, we love Italian and THIS Italian food was the best any of us have ever had! Chef Lillian was there and the three of us so enjoyed every bite of our meal!

The salad was absolutely delicious! Whatever the tomatoes are they put on there are amazing! Their house-made Italian dressing is delicious and the entire salad was so flavorful and had so much depth and variety but the flavors completely complemented each other.

The entrées were large portions and looked gorgeous. They were flavorful and delicious! Plenty of yummy sauce and the cheese is fresh-grated. That makes a difference! My daughter had gnocchi and my husband and I had fettuccine. My husband had shrimp and said he didn’t know how they did it but the shrimp was the most fresh he’s tasted since he lived on the coast! My chicken was flavorful and perfect, and the mushrooms (I had Chicken Marsala) were perfectly cooked and full of flavor. My daughter was raving about the gnocchi, as well! Perfection!

We split the cannoli egg rolls and the citrus shortcake with fresh berries and fresh-made whipped cream. Sooooo scrumptious! My husband doesn’t even like sweets and he loved them both!

Now, to the coffee………………man, oh, man! I don’t drink coffee black but had several cups of black coffee! It’s served so cute: lovely cup and saucer with a black cocktail napkin on the saucer with a stirring spoon and two cubes of sugar. It’s their own, special roast! The cream (I didn’t use but my daughter did) came in a tiny, chilled pitcher. So cute! It made me feel as if I were sitting in a café IN Verona!

This was a lovely and perfect experience! Oh! And a manager came by to check on us and took the time to chat. As did the hostess, as well!

As I previously mentioned, our server, Andy, is the best in the world!

Please do yourself a favor and spend some time at...