Il Paesano Ristorante Italiano — Restaurant in North Bend

tldr: Friendly service, terrible food, made us both sick, outrageously high prices. Read on for more details.

I hate to leave such a poor review because the staff was actually really friendly and attentive, but the food was so bad that even the best service wouldn't make up for it.

To start, the bread we were given was probably a few days old, and wouldn't have been very good even if it wasn't stale. The crust was mushy like it had been frozen or stored in the refrigerator. It was served with some olive oil with WAY too much seasoning in it. I normally devour bread, but after a tiny nibble, this offering sat untouched.

We should have taken the hint with the bread, but we were quite hungry and already seated, so we ordered two pasta dishes from their specials list: a lobster ravioli and a penne dish with meatballs and sausage.

First, the "lobster" ravioli... it started off seeming almost okay, but after a few bites a strange and unpleasant taste started to become more noticeable. I'm not sure what the source of the bad flavor was, but I would guess that this dish was a 'special' because it was really old and they needed to make room in the freezer. As for the lobster: neither of us could taste anything that remotely resembled lobster. The sauce was a basic bland cream sauce with some chunks of what we were told were chanterelle mushrooms and the whole thing was covered in that pre-shredded parmesan they sell at Costco.

The penne dish was more of the same: the only things on the plate that tasted less than a month old were the meatballs, but they were very bland. The sausage tasted like they discovered it in the freezer when they chiseled out the ravioli; it was the consistency of a microwaved hot dog, but even a little more rubbery than that. The penne was clearly the cheapest grocery-store dry pasta they could find. All of that was swimming in the greasiest bolognese I've ever seen, smothered in low moisture mozzarella and the same cheap shredded parmesan.

Now, I probably wouldn't even be writing a review for this place if they priced their menu based on the quality of their ingredients, but after only ordering those two dishes, and NOTHING else, our bill was $70, not including tip. If you're going to charge 4-star restaurant prices, you can't serve truck-stop quality food.

Now for the kicker... both my wife and I started feeling ill not too long after we left. Neither of us ate much of our dishes, but it was enough to cause both of us moderate digestive distress.

We expected better given the high rating on Google reviews, but we were sorely disappointed. I suspect they're either buying reviews, or the people in North Bend just don't know what Italian food is supposed...

Our experience did not align with the over all reviews of this place on google. We were excited because of the high remarks received. When we arrived things went smoothly enough and we were greeted by a nice gentleman who sat us quickly and got our kids menus and crayons. The first, younger, host/server was kind and helpful. The next server with curly hair seemed aloof about our presence. she did the job took our food order and brought us it but that was about it. We ordered the fresh mozzarella, tomato & basil dish which was very bland with the mozzarella having little flavor at all. I ordered the tortellini pasta in cream sauce which wasn’t bad but maybe just not for me. Partner ordered the spaghetti carbonara and that wasn’t good at all. The eggs were scrambled in the pasta giving it a strange flavor almost Like breakfast with the bacon-y flavor of the pancetta and the scrambled eggs. We have had many carbonara and this was not right. The bread and olive oil delivered to the table was tasty but that wasn’t an ordered dish. This was our experience and wanted to put it out for people to be aware and keep their expectations reasonable amongst all of the high remarks received. We won’t...

Pasta was bad. So dry and wasn't cooked very well. No sauce on the pasta. I thought it would be a nice place but its not. Cheesecake factory is better. Place is expensive. I wish I can post the pic for proof

Hi Giordana, THE manager. I saw your reply and I don't know or have the option to reply back to your message. First off you are wrong, I'm not upset because you don't have saffron rice. I politely asked your server if you guys have saffron rice. And why would I be upset because of this. Your right, there were/are plenty of places to eat but we drove by and thought that we would try your place since we were not from the area. I have a picture of the plate that was brought to me and wish I can post it for people to see but don't worry, I can post it on IG, FB and Yelp. Secondly, you shouldn't reply back negatively. Thats just goes to show that you need customer service and how to deal with people's responses. You should learn how to turn negative feedbacks into a positive. And for lying through your teeth of me getting upset of not having saffron rice, I would put a curse on you but I won't because God knows who's...