Bari Ristorante e Enoteca — Restaurant in Memphis

For a restaurant at this price point, there are some high expectations and unfortunately Bari misses them.

1. They ask if you’re celebrating a special occasion when you make the reservation (an anniversary in our case). But nobody made mention of this at all throughout the meal or greeting which was mildly disappointing.
2. The atmosphere does not match the menu and price point. Coming into the restaurant feels like your coming through the back door with barely room to squeeze by bar. Paper tablecloths??? (I halfway expected some crayons) Cheap looking lights (obviously from Amazon) as the centerpiece of the table. The dining room was loud enough that my wife and I could barely hear each other talk. And while most guests dressed appropriately, it was strange to have a table next to us wearing a baseball cap in the dining room. Our waiter was young and inexperienced. After getting our drinks, we didn’t see him for another 8-10 minutes, and he certainly did not enhance the dining experience. He was your basic order taker. The atmosphere was by far the biggest disappointment.
3. The food was pretty good. My wife I ordered a multi course meal. And made sure to try many of the menu items. Unfortunately all my dishes were heavily over salted. The after dinner cappuccinos were excellent though.

Bari is a place that pretends to be fancy. They have two hour slots for reservations and charge you for missing. They have an entire Italian wine list, most of which are only by the bottle. A separate cheese menu. They’ve obviously dedicated a lot of time to their food/beverage offerings and want to be a high end restaurant. But the dining experience does not match this. We have been wanting to try this place for several months because it’s highly rated and recommended by several sites. But I can’t say it was worth it. For $100 a person, there are some basic expectations beyond food for a restaurant.

Several recent reviews on here had similar findings...

Came here on Monday to celebrate my birthday after hearing great reviews. Well, maybe we went to the wrong restaurant because the service, food and ambiance was terrible. There were about 4 tables, including ours, seated and 1 waitress. I understand the waitress is human and makes mistakes, but she was very forgetful. Forgot to give us bread and olive oil, but she did make sure to prepare individual servings of olive oil for an 8 top table that was coming in after us. She seemed more focused on preparing a table for a group that wasn't even there than tending to us. When we reminded her about the bread she flung 2 pieces of bread onto our used/dirty plates and did not offer us new ones and disappeared. She finally remembered to bring us olive oil for the bread after we reminded her about it 2 times. When we finally did get it, we barely had any bread left to dip it in, she did not seem to notice or care.

We ordered the grilled calamari for an appetizer. Served cold (don't think it was supposed to be since it was grilled) barely seasoned and cooked poorly. For dinner, my boyfriend got the halibut and I got the bronzino which the waitress recommended. We split a spaghetti bolognese for our side. I tried the bronzino, it was disgusting. Not a good cut of fish and I barely touched it. Cooked poorly. Butchered on the grill. All I could taste was char from the grill and overcooked fish. My boyfriends halibut was mediocre at best, not seasoned at all. The spaghetti was nothing to write home about.

Our waitress barely came to check on us and the food. I would have hoped for a place that is higher end, they would be a bit more attentive. And maybe show concern or wonder why a guest has barely touched their entree.

We spent a fair amount of money for terrible service and food. The food was worse than the service.

We ended up having to stop somewhere else for dinner afterwards.

At least it makes a memorable story for...

In response to the owner. Your menu is on your website. It says sample menu may not be accurate but gave enough of an idea (which is weird, you should post your menu). Also I didn’t give my credit card, it didn’t ask for my credit card and when I go to remove my credit card on Resy it says there’s no credit card on file, this may not be your fault but it is tricky of Resy for not having a credit card confirmation page, likely every other app. Also most people don’t read the one page detail for reservation to see you charge 25$ per person and I’ve never made one in memphis who has required one. I didn’t know yours had it when I made a rest apparently a few years ago and I never will.

FYI—— Resy just happened to ”Migrate Our Payment Services” today. The day I made this reservation I didn’t authorize my card and there was no card on file after I was charged by Resy to go and remove it. Definitely a glitch, which again it’s not Baris fault but not right by Resy.

Very Tricky! Don’t get tricked into making reservation on Resy for this restaurant. Made a reservation and had to cancel because they menu didn’t look good to us. They charged me 25$ per person for Bari! Resy doesn’t warn you when your card’s being held like open table does, my card’s not even on the app. I’m not sure how they charged it. I never make reservations in Memphis if they require a...