Mangia Mi East — Restaurant in Newtown

Where to start with this review.....I have no idea. I guess the only place to start would be with a recommendation. SO, here it is. Don't bother. Now let's talk about why.

Mangia Mi is a new place in Sandy Hook that has generated lots of excitement around the town. It is very hard to get into without reservations, and the parking lot is even harder to park in. With that sort of difficulty one would imagine that this place was the place to be, it is not.

Beware, this is not a cheap restaurant. a 3 meatball appetizer will run you $19, a chicken parm entree is $28, but if you want pasta with it you can tack on another $11! Wait, what!?! Chicken parm for $39! This is going to be good! Well, it isn't. For the PREMIUM dollars being asked, the quality does not match! Honestly, if I am going to pay that much for food (across the menu) then it better be darn good, and it wasn't.

So, our order and experience, what made this unhappy review you ask? Well frankly, the full experience.

Environment: It's fine. Just open kitchen, bar, open dining room with some family style tables.

Service: We were sat promptly at arrival for our reservation, but then it took another 10 minutes (maybe more as I wasn't so annoyed to time yet) for the waitress to come over and take our food order. We ordered and asked that it all come out together (can you feel the foreshadowing?). Part of our order came out, and other other maybe 5 or 10 minutes later. After the order came out there was no follow up until we were ready to leave.

Food: Ugh, do I even want to write this? Like I said above, this place is expensive and with that I was expecting to be wowed. I don't mind paying for great food, but that it was not. You can get half or full size dishes. The half size is more than enough of a portion for 99% of you out there, go with that. Here is the breakdown for those still following along.

New Haven "Ah Beetz": WHAT IN GOD'S NAME were we given!!!! It had zero resemblance to the wonderful food it is masquerading to be! We were given a STINKY, and I mean STINKY, gloopy, oil mess on something resembling dough that had a HUGE piece of burnt cheese on the bottom. The smell was so off putting; it was almost like bad cheese, maybe it was. We tried two pieces and left it as it tasted as poor as it looked. There was SO much oil on it that when the waitress removed the peel from the table there was a POOL of oil on the table. She wiped it before I could snap a picture. I asked if the pizza is always that oily and she said, well the chef finishes with an olive oil drizzle. Um, this was more than a drizzle!!!!!!

Meatballs: Maybe they would have been good, but the sauce they were in was obviously burnt at some point and stirred up. Yeah, I get it, "this is nanna's Sunday all day sauce", well nanna had issues. On top of the sauce being burnt, the meatballs sat in a pool of oil as well. They were a little dry, but maybe would have been serviceable, then again at $19 they should have been amazing.

Tagliatelle w/Sausage and Broccolini in Vodka sauce: Ugh, not good. I like al dente pasta, but this was hard pasta and could have used another minute or two in the water. That might have also unstuck the noodles too. The sauce did not have all the vodka burned off, so while there was a vodka taste, there was also the burn of alcohol. It made the dish in edible. Lastly, the menu says broccolini, but I got broccoli. Is it a big deal? No, but only if you tell the customer when ordering. I did say something when the waitress returned to ask if we were done. Had she come earlier, I would have said it earlier. To her credit, she did remove it from the bill.

Crispy Chicken Piccata w/Tagliatelle: Ok, this was good. The flavor was nice, the amount of sauce good, the chicken was cooked right. I would say my wife was happy with it.

Conclusion: Wow, thanks for making it this far! Mangia Mi needs work. For the prices they are asking the quality and service is not there. The food was not good and I'm out of space...

EDIT: Wow… I wonder what people are thinking when they read a response like this from an owner. While I respect that businesses have the right to reply to reviews, I am deeply concerned by the tone and conduct of this particular response. After leaving my honest feedback based on my personal experience, the owner chose not only to post an aggressive and retaliatory public comment, but also to contact me directly on my personal phone—leaving a hostile voicemail from the owner’s mother who identified herself.

And no, it’s not cowardly to not respond to calls, it’s not subjecting myself to intrusive and unproductive dialogue. The aggressive voicemail set the tone for how possible conversation would’ve went.

This kind of behavior is highly unprofessional and inappropriate. Reviews exist so customers can share genuine experiences and businesses can learn from them—not so customers are subjected to intimidation or harassment afterward.

I stand by my original review, and I hope the focus can return to constructive improvement rather than personal retaliation—in my review, I did say I enjoyed the pasta, which the owner glossed over due to being so focused on attacking me.

UPON ARRIVAL: Made reservations and did not need them at 6 PM Saturday night, THE RESTAURANT WAS EMPTY SEATING: Near the window, or windows… That were actually dirty and smudged. I mean so that you really couldn’t comfortably enjoy looking outside without wanting to grab some Windex. -Our table was dirty. Even the server acknowledged and said I don’t know how this happened? It was cleaned. NO BREAD… Are you kidding me even the Olive Garden and the Cheesecake Factory have delicious, warm bread and butter on repeat.

MEAL.. The meal was out in less than eight minutes after ordering. This immediately concerned me. It was also so hot and I mean so hot. I thought it was microwaved? Who knows….Bolognese and Chicken Alfredo. The chicken cutlet was thinner than the breaded coating on it. I could barely see the chicken through the coating. When I pulled back some of the coating to look at the chicken, it was gray, which indicates to me, microwave heating up. The Alfredo sauce was like glue. It wasn’t melted or velvety. My noodles were stuck together and the sauce had not been tossed all the way through it. It was also served in a bowl, which was gross. BOLOGNESE.. meat sauce was good. Flavorful. But not enough sauce and the noodles were dry. Mind you, these are homemade noodles and I will say, they were Al Dente and Delicious. But, at this point in my meal, I would’ve been happy with just some butter to put on them and call it a day. We requested a side of marinara sauce just to pour over it and make it edible. DESSERT.. Tiramisu with raspberry coulis was delicious. Carrot Cake Tasted like that refrigerator taste you get when something’s uncovered too long. I didn’t eat it. COCKTAILS.. I asked if the whiskey sour mix was homemade and the server said it was. I even bumped up my bill on this drink by asking for Knobs Creek.. It was a terrible drink. SERVICE: Young kids, untrained, not very attentive. But kind as they should be. Additionally, one thing I don’t like, is when you Have to ask the server their name!

I don’t quite understand why the Owner, who clearly must have put in her heart and soul when she began this endeavor would allow this to continue. Maybe she is spending too much time at the California location. You have to do better if you’re going to stay...

First time visiting and the meal was not consistent. Some parts were good some not so good. Service was fine, nothing memorable but also nothing bad. Meals came out very soon after ordering which is a pet peeve of mine. We started with the calamari. It was fried well and the fish was tender and not at all chewy, but the dish was so over salted we hardly at any of it. When asked if we wanted the portion we didn’t eat boxed we said no and explained why we didn’t eat it. Later on our server told us they took it off the bill which was kind, but no one ever came to our table to ask any questions or apologize that for us it was not edible. The Sunday Gravy entree was definitely a high point. It was absolutely delicious. Sauce had depth of flavor and every piece of meat was tender and flavorful. Definitely would eat this again. Unfortunately the cacio e pepe was not as good. It was gluey and heavy. The Caesar salad, while a little hard to eat, was also delicious. The dressing was tangy and just the right ratio of dressing to greens. The chocolate chip bread pudding was very good but we weren’t sure if it was meant to be served warm or cold. First few bites were warm and as we got closer to the middle it was cold so I asked the server if it was meant to be served warm or cold and he said cold, a little confusing. We ordered a double espresso and were told it would come in 2 cups. I have never heard this before. Not sure why if they didn’t have espresso cups large enough for a double they couldn’t use a regular coffee cup but we stuck with a single. While the meal was very inconsistent, there are other things on the menu we would like to try so we will likely...