Mamma Luisa Ristorante Italiano — Restaurant in Newport

Super disappointing. I was excited to see that we had an Italian restaurant with pretty good reviews just within walking distance from our Airbnb. My boyfriend walked over, placed an order and paid in advance for our food. He waited 15 minutes and walked back with what we thought was our dinner. We saw that in the bag, instead, was the meal that he and I had ordered, but in a larger quantity than we expected (it seemed more like 2 orders of chicken than 1) and instead of the pasta and butter that we ordered for the kids, we got a different kind of pasta, I think bolognese, I’m not even sure at this point. Honestly it was fine though, the kids didn’t love it, but they forced it down and we figured it wasn’t worth the hassle of complaining and changing the food, the chicken was the one we had ordered anyway.

Our meal was actually pretty good, however while we were in the middle of eating we got a knock on the door, it was a very nervous-seeming waitress from the restaurant asking if we had just picked up food, we said yes and she explained that they had accidentally switched our order with someone else’s. We explained that we just thought they had made a mistake because the order was very similar, and we had already sat down and started eating. She seemed understanding enough and left. A few minutes later the owner/manager came storming over, demanding that we give the food back. He said the people who ordered it were at the restaurant looking for their food. We explained again that we had already started eating and we were very sorry, but we had just thought they made an error on our order. We asked what he expected by (yet again) knocking on our door and he again demanded that we give him the food. We asked if he was planning on re-serving our already opened food to these “waiting” customers and he anxiously replied, “No, I’m going to throw it away!”… So A.) In the age of covid he was either going to repackage our already opened, half eaten food and serve it to these waiting guests or B.) He is really just that petty. Either way he was extremely rude and refused to leave the doorstep of our Airbnb until my boyfriend threatened to get the police involved. This all took place in front of my 2 small children who have been so exited for their first real vacation. My girls were literally scared to fall asleep in our Airbnb because they didn’t know if “the rude man” was going to come back and yell at us about the food again. It was so inappropriate and completely unacceptable… I’m still in shock. If there was a way to give this restaurant negative...

I have been coming to Newport at least once a year, for over 30 years. This was the worst meal we have ever had here.

I ordered the tagliatelle with shrimp and scallops. I received a plate of overcooked, almost completely unseasoned noodles with the most overcooked shrimp and (puny bay) scallops I have ever been served. I sent it back and said the seafood was overcooked. The server did not give me a chance to choose anything else, she simply took the plate and ran off. She brought me another order of it about four minutes later. I am a retired chef. It is not even possible to cook a plate of pasta to order, with fairly large shrimp, in that short an amount of time. When my plate showed up so quickly the second time, I knew without a doubt that they were parcooking at least the shrimp, and possibly the pasta as well, and reheating it. And sure enough, I took one bite and sent that plate back too, the shrimp was dry as dust. I then ordered the squash ravioli instead, which was decent enough, although I suspected that was also reheated. Meanwhile, my husband, who doesn’t like to make waves, stoically ate his way through stuffed pork tenderloin that was as dry and leathery and overcooked as my first dish, and was probably parcooked as well and reheated. I would have sent back that mess too.

I had no confidence in their ability to make dessert after that, but my husband got the housemade tiramisu. There was no discernible mascarpone cheese in it whatsoever, it was whipped cream, sponge cake, and cocoa, and I think drip coffee instead of espresso. I ignored it after one bite, and it’s a dessert I love.

The server was sweet and apologetic about the food, the service there is fine. They just can’t cook. Avoid this place. Why it was so crowded is a...

We had been there once before and the food was outstanding the service was decent. We were excited to go back with a party of eight and it was a nightmare. We made reservations and we were staying on boats in goat island. We called for an Uber with plenty of time and he was late! 3 people were close by the restaurant and arrived on time. When we (the other 5 guests) arrived we were met at the door with anger! We were taken to the table and “immediately” hammered for our order! We all placed our orders and “eventually” a few starters arrived. A lengthy wait for the main course. It all looked awesome! I reached for the pepper mill and used it. Took a taste and then went to put a little bit of salt on the meal. The whole top fell off and my fish was COVERED in salt! I was horrified. So we called over the waitress, more appropriately compared to a general in an Asian concentration camp and explained what happened. Well….she became irrate, grabbed the salt shaker and said, you are using it wrong. We were all stunned. Then the owner or chef came out disgusted and said,” well, what do you want, a new meal?” I was speechless! Everyone is now ready to eat their dinner and it would be nice to have dinner if my own. They were very angered by this situation and begrudgingly prepared another piece of fish. The evening couldn’t end soon enough and I couldn’t get out of there quickl enough. I will never ever ever ever go back there again nor will I ever recommend the place. If I hadn’t been sitting there with seven other people and so stunned I would’ve just gotten up and walked out. In retrospect, I should have anyway and met them all later at the Black Pearl...