il vecchio — Restaurant in Pacific Grove

For our 34th Anniversary we decided to try Il Veccio, 🇮🇹 restaurant in Pacific Grove. It came highly recommended thru reviews and we wanted to try something out of our comfort zone. Also we read that on Thursday night they have a live Jazz band from 6pm to 8pm. Parking is a little tricky so go a little early to find parking. They do have some parking in the back of the restaurant. Reservations is a must...they get pretty busy. When you walk into the restaurant take time to turn around and read all the notes about the restaurant that they posted around the exit door. I love how they tell you about the history of their pieces to where the furniture is from and how old. Pretty cool!! We ordered the bread service, Eggplant fries and Charcuterie board for our appetizers. The Eggplant fries was delicious and the middle dipping sauce was a perfect partner for it. I ordered chopped garlic to add to the bread oil which I highly recommend. Beet salad was delicious and actually big enough for a main meal. The burrata cheese and candied walnuts that was in the beet salad really gave it that extra special touch and yumminess. My husband had the Caesar salad and Butternut Squash ravioli. Which he enjoyed and ate all of it. I honestly got so full from the appetizers and delicious beet salad I didn't eat my traditional Carbanara pasta. I ordered the Italian sausage with it too. I will let you know it was super delicious later that evening and was big enough for me to share with my son as a late night meal. The crispy prosciutto was ABSOLUTELY DELICIOUS and I've never had an egg with my pasta but I really enjoyed it! We didn't give Il Veccio 5 stars because we compared it to experience we had at Basil restaurant in Carmel. Even though service was nice....they were so busy that the waiter really wasn't able to connect with you and explain a little more about the dishes. Live Jazz was pretty cool and their Gelato Creation for dessert was divine! You can tell Il Veccio is a local favorite since a lot of families were there to celebrate their special evening together. So definitely check them...

While searching for another restaurant, I mistakenly walked into this restaurant. It was packed, of course, it was dinner time and it was a Saturday night. This restaurant is really cute in its' style, kind of funky, eclectic, rustic, and european-ish. Despite the separation of the main seating area to the bar area, this restaurant had a very open feeling.

Being that the restaurant was packed and I didn't have a reservation and it was just me, I wound up sitting at the end of the bar. The hostesses were kind enough to put a chair at the very end of the bar and let me squeeze in. The menu was simple, not a whole lot of options to it. I had been wanting a good hearty bowl of Clam Chowder Soup, but because I mistakenly walked into this restaurant, I didn't have the option to get Clam Chowder, as this restaurant didn't serve Clam Chowder, I ended up ordering the soup of the day, which was a "Beef Vegetable" (I can't remember the exact name of the soup), but it turned out to be really good, very hearty, healthy and filling. I also ordered a side of grilled vegetables which ended up being leftovers the next day!

It had become pretty cold that evening, so with my meal, I ordered a cup of tea. But instead of just giving me a cup of tea with a little metal teapot, I was given a regular pot of tea. I thought that was decent of them, and from what I recall it really wasn't that expensive. They had some pretty decent tea flavors.

The Bartender who waited on me was really nice and attentive, although the restaurant was packed and it was a busy night, he did a great job serving his customers. I walked about 4 blocks to get to this area, in search of the other restaurant, but I believe parking was all street parking and it wasn't very difficult to find spaces. From what I could tell from how crowded the place was, was that it was a very popular place. Seeing that there wasn't any open seating was pretty comforting, it gave me the extra assurance of their quality of food...

This was one of THE WORST dining experiences I have ever had. The food was good but if you don’t have a good dining experience then it doesn’t really matter how good the food is. We were a group of 10, business colleagues, who had had a long day and wanted to go out and enjoy a good meal together. We were referred to this restaurant so we went. We were greeted by the hostess who seated us and then our server came, who was curt and rude from the outset. She gave us water and took our drink order. It took over 35 minutes to get our initial drinks and two of our party didn’t get their drinks. I asked politely if they could get them and she shrugged and reminded me of how busy they were. I asked no more than three times for refills on water and finally the busing staff gave us refreshers on water. The busing staff also served us our dinner. We finished our meals and waited and waited and waited. We were not offered dessert, refills on drinks, while the table next to us continued to get stellar service. The gelato looked amazing but we wouldn’t know. After waiting another 25 minutes after our meal was complete we finally got up and asked for our check so we could get out of there. The check was over 450.00 and they were gracious enough to add a 20% gratuity for a server who did absolutely nothing. I’m curious if the busing staff who did the majority of the work saw any of that 75.00 tip that we were required to leave. I tried to talk to the owner but he had left and the hostess was nice enough but again reminded me that they were very busy and understaffed and that she would give my number to the owners and they would call me. They never called. My question is, if there are not enough servers to provide the level of service necessary, then why are you seating a full restaurant? Bottom line, I will never go back and would never recommend this restaurant to anyone no matter how good...