Bella Trattoria Italian Bistro — Restaurant in Riverside

Please read before booking a special evening here!!!!! Made a reservation here about a month prior to our visit. We checked in early for a 6pm reservation. Reservation was for 7 including a baby and 2 birthdays being celebrated within our group. We waited outside in the cold for an hour and still weren't seated. We then walked inside and found a manager who apologized and offered us a free dessert for the birthday guests at our table and our very long wait. We continued to WAIT and WAIT. When we were finally seated we were given bread with oil and vinegar (the bottles were grimey and covered in oil) and a drink order was taken. We ordered food right away because we were all starving at this point. Our salads ($10 side salad) arrived and we still didnt have drinks. We reordered drinks now with another waitress. Drinks finally arrived. That will be it for drinks- we will NEVER EVER get refills. Not on water. Not on any drinks. We asked for more bread for the baby. She was enjoying her piece which she dropped it. They told us no problem. Our food arrives- no bread for the baby. We continued to ask every time a server came by. We were then told they had to bake the bread fresh. Ok awesome right? Well just like the drinks we NEVER EVER got any more bread. We even asked for a plain piece of bread...nothing fancy. I'd pay them for a lousy dinner roll. Nope- no bread. Yet they continued to deliver it to other tables. Anyways back to the food. The kids Alfredo ($8, without a drink or side) was tiny! The size of a side of pasta. 2 people at our table had veal which they enjoyed. I ordered a pasta with shrimp which was supposed to have basil in it....I don't think the chef who garnishes plates is not trained well because he threw a handful on whole spinach leaves on top of my pasta. Definitely not basil. The free desserts (for our extended wait outside in the cold) came (still no drink refills, no bread refill, yet they still say they are working on it). We sing our 2 bday guests happy birthday and pay our very expensive bill for a very disappointing dinner. Things to keep in mind....this restaurant is tiny! Maybe 12 tables inside....and a handful of tables outside. So a reservation won't matter if people don't get up from their tables. You will wait- in the cold. The other restaurants in the mission inn are much better! This one is lacking and not up to par with what you would expect from the mission inn. The prices are fine dining prices, but the servers are not trained as such. When I called to make the reservation this was the restaurant with availability so I went with it on whim. Don't do that! Pick a different day/time or even eat outside of the mission. Sadly our night celebrating my husbands and mother in laws bdays was ruined because of our experience. One more thing. This restaurant is basically a covered patio enclosed by glass so probably an after thought to the mission inn layout however the ambiance is nice and you can see the lights and people passing by. The ONLY good thing. Still...

I applauded the hosts, the waitress and the servers who frantically and apologetically served my guests at the Bella Trattoria restaurant of the Mission Inn in Riverside last night. I also appreciated the kind gesture of free dessert to make up for our inconvenience. However, the entire dining experience was in fact a nightmare and an extremely embarrassing one to me as the dinner host. (1) First, I made the reservation a month ago and even called the restaurant several times prior to the dinner reservation to ensure our booking was in good order. Our reservation was at 6pm. When I checked in at around 4:15pm. I was immediately told that they “triple-booked, “ confirmed by Manager Shelby who she did not know if they would have our table ready by 6pm.” I was also told the kitchen, with no advanced notice, changed the menu on us one day prior to our reservation and the dinner selections (family meals) I submitted for my guests a week prior were no longer valid. So they had to pick their selections from the menu all over again and only to find out Tortellini was sold out. (2) As stated earlier, our dinner reservation was at 6pm and we were only seated nearly after waiting for an hour, and after proposing to sit outside in the patio which they accepted. (3) Then, another surprise came only to find out they squeezed our seats around several smaller tables to make up a long table so tightly to the point that no adults or a child (all my guests were adults) could comfortably sit and dine. I had to remove three chairs from the long table, removed a dirty cup and re-arranged the utensils. Some table settings only had a fork on the napkin while the rest had all three utensils (two forks and a knife) together. It was a mess. It took me another 10 minutes to rearrange the utensils and the seats. Because of these reasons. my guests were not seated until close to 7pm. (4) After we finished the main course, our waitress literally disappeared. We waited for about 20 minutes before I asked the host to find her to take our dessert and coffee order. By the time we finished our meals, it was already very late and the restaurant was already stacking up the chairs inside and getting ready to close for the evening. I hope this review is helpful to you, and the management team at the Mission Inn will take it seriously, evaluate the past poor reviews of repeat incidents, and thus to make positive changes for the good of the present and future patrons. Positive changes can only begin from the top! Poor leadership yields poor customer services. Eventually, it will hurt your bottom line and your brand as a whole collectively or even get the municipal’s attention ! It is with no justification and explanation that me and my guests had to experience what we did at Bella Trattoria in Mission Inn! It is shocking! It is a shame to the restaurant and...

We decided to eat here because we couldn't get a reservations at Duanes.

We had the absolute worst service from the moment we got there. We had reservations for 645p and dint get sat until 7:15p. We watched our table sit empty the entire time we waited.

We sat down and the serve Jacquline came by after 10 mins and told us about the menu, and quite a few items on the menu were not available. She was quick to walk away but I got her attention, she came back, and I ordered some garlic bread. We waited for another 15 mins. By then, another server came by to drop off the bread, and I asked her if we could place drink orders. She sent Jacqueline back. We ordered drinks, and I ordered a side of limes with my drink. 10 minutes later the drinks came and she brought lemons. I told her we were ready to order, and she said she would be back. We finished the bread. After that, Jacqueline passed by our table 4 times, and on her 4th pass, she acknowledged she'd be back. Again... she was helping other tables but, she kept returning to those tables without stopping by ours.

The manager passed by and noticed we were sitting there looking displeased. I told the manager everything. (By this time, it was close to an hour since we has sit down.) The manager took our order and walked away. This was the last time we saw the manager... During this time, I finished my drink to see how long it would take to get a refill. That took 25 minutes.

30 minutes after placing our food order, Jacqueline came by and wanted to verify what we had ordered so the order could be made!! My food arrived 20 minutes after that, and my wife's food arrived almost 10 minutes after my plate. That's unprofessional and rude. My food sat and got cold since I wanted to eat with my wife. We had planned for dessert but by the time Jacqueline came back around, we had enough. If any of the restaurants in the area weren't so busy, we would have gotten up and left.

We saw servers constantly helping their own tables but, Jacqueline was usually nowhere to be found. I have never not tipped anyone. I almost did not tip but, I did anyway. Just not as good. I get that good food service has dropped off since Covid but, this...