RustiCucina — Restaurant in San Diego

TLDR: Food is expensive and so bland. We were seated 30 minutes late for our reservation. No one liked their mixed drinks or the wine we got with dinner. The table was too small for 6 of us. No one at our table could hear the waiter or see the menu.

I'm very surprised this place has the rating it does. It may be that the quality used to be good because a lot of the pictures on yelp or google reviews aren't even on the menu anymore. And just my observation.. a lot of the 5 start reviews have almost professional looking photos of the food.. seems a little suspicious to me. Anyways, see our disaster meal detailed below:

Parking: There was no parking and we had to drive around for a while.

Reservation: We checked in on time for our reservation and were seated 30 minutes late.

Seating: Our party of 6 was seated at a cramped table that looked like a 4 top, at best. We could barely move our drinks and food around to reach anything. My partner had to hold his drink glasses in fear of them getting knocked over every time anyone reached for anything.

Ambiance: It was so loud we couldn't hear the waiter at all. And it felt like he did NOTHING to try to talk above a whisper. Our table of six 30-year-olds had to keep relaying what he said based on whoever he was closest to. It was also so dark half of our table couldn't read the menu. Again, we all have perfect hearing and vision. Next, one of the bussers knocked one of the 50+ dirty glasses lined up on the bar onto a patron and it shattered. He walked around without a care in the world, did not apologize, and took several minutes to even start cleaning the glass. He missed half of it, some of which was under my table and all around us. Also, the single use unisex bathroom was dirty and smelled like urine.

Drinks: We all ordered mixed drinks and split a bottle of red wine when our food came out. No one enjoyed their mixed drinks and the house red was pretty bad. A couple people in our party didn't want to finish the single glass.

Food: Last but not least (or probably least?) is the food. We tried 3 appetizers and the 'best' was the calamari. It was well fried and decent size and portion. But that's where the compliments end. We also got the fried burrata and the garlic bread. The whole table agreed the fried burrata just tasted like a mozzarella stick -so we paid $19 for each person to have 1 bite of a mozzarella stick. And the garlic bread tasted like cake dough somehow. All 3 apps came with the exact same marinara on the side, so it felt like just eating a bunch of basic fried food with a bland marinara.

For the main course, it's ~$25 for their build your own pasta which is just fresh pasta and a basic sauce. Any additional protein is $6-13 on top of that. Super expensive since all of the sauces were pretty terrible. For example, I felt like I could have made them from trying a recipe for the first time.. and I'm no chef. I ordered the cacio e pepe fettuccini. The pasta was obviously fresh and cooked well but the sauce is what ruins this overpriced dish. It just tasted like cream, so essentially like a bland alfredo? My partner got the carbonara and it tasted the exact same. It was really bland unless you got a huge (too big) chunk of super salty guanciale, which just overtook any flavor in that bite. The portions were ok I guess but again the quality was not there for the price you pay. After everything, not a single person wanted to order anything from the dessert or drink menu after our meals.

Forced Tip: I forgot one last thing. While the server was attentive, albeit whispering, they automatically add 20% to tables of 6 or more. Not really sure why I should pay an automatic 20% no matter how bad the service could have been. Fun way to end the disaster of a meal.

p.s. sorry I didn't take any photos. I guess I wasn't very motivated to based on...

TLDR: Underwhelming is the best word I have for this restaurant.

Service: I went with my wife on a Saturday at 6:30 with a reservation. The host sat us outside and assured us that there would be enough heaters to go around for all the folks sitting outside. Unfortunately the heater that was placed next to us ran out of gas and there was apparently no backup. So we moved to a different table closer to a different heater (still outside). About 5 minutes later another table was cold so they moved the heater that we were sitting next to closer to them and we ended up freezing again! I'm sure the staff are trying to please everyone, but bad on management for not having enough heaters to keep customers warm and for not having enough propane to use them! The staff who were very friendly and accommodating. The host was personable and made us feel welcome and our server was happy to help us move tables when we got cold (not that it did us much help). 3/10

Food: My wife and I shared the garlic bread for an appetizer. I thought it was pretty good, but a bit bland. She thought it was soggy and only ate a single piece. Lots of parmesan and little garlic flavor. I had the Chicken Parm. The chicken itself was delicious! Crispy and stuffed with Prosciutto. The sauce it came with though was very bland. Almost like blended tomatoes with no seasoning. It also comes with fettuccini which was delightfully chewy and cooked well. My wife's order was the Cheese wheel special, which was a shrimp and smoked salmon cream sauce. The presentation was fine, the server poured the already made sauce in the wheel and mixed it a bit, scraping the sides before serving it. He was very friendly while doing this, and served it with a smile. The taste of the pasta however left much to be desired. The shrimps were the micro-sized kind that are smaller than a dime, and the smoked salmon was diced and mixed with the sauce. The dish felt confused, the richness of the cheese and cream sauce not really connecting with the smokiness of the salmon. It also really upset my wife's stomach (she is NOT lactose intolerant). We declined to get a dessert, as the food hadn't been very good and we were both freezing. 2/10

Drinks: My wife ordered the lavender mojito and it was excellent! Very well balanced and the lavender did not overwhelm the mint. 10/10

Ambiance: The restaurant was LOUD! We were told when we were sat that outside is quieter than inside, and if that's true I don't know how anyone could carry a conversation in there. Outside my wife and I were almost shouting because the tables near us were being so loud. The décor was very cute, giving a very warm vibe to the whole restaurant.

Overall: I truly do not understand how this restaurant has (currently) 4.6 stars on google. I feel like I went to a different restaurant than the one that people are describing here. This was our valentine's day dinner early, and we were so let down that we're gonna redo dinner somewhere better. I would not recommend...

I hope anyone who reads this learns from my lesson! I had been wanting to try this place for a while and decided my birthday would be a great time to finally give it a try. Overall, the service was good and the food was pretty tasty. We ordered a bottle of wine and a salad to share and we each ordered the Chef’s Cheese Wheel Pasta.

There were a few things that really brought down the experience. The biggest being the Chef’s Cheese Wheel Pasta. It was pasta with a little bit of chicken, spinach and cherry tomatoes in a vodka sauce. The presentation was great and the flavors were good, but it was mostly noodles with a few slices of chicken and tomatoes. I know this was my mistake for not asking so everyone learn a lesson from my mistake, ALWAYS ask what the market price is. We got the bill and the pasta cost $47 dollars each!!!!!!! The next most expensive thing on the menu was the filet which was around $40. This pasta didn’t even have seafood or steak in it. This price for pasta is absolutely ridiculous!! There is nothing that justifies this extreme of a price for pasta! I’ve had cheese wheel pasta at other restaurants for much less and was equally as tasty. I’d recommend getting any of the other pastas on the menu based solely on the pricing!

The other 2 things that deterred from the overall experience were that we had put in the reservation that we were there to celebrate a birthday. I am not one to get vocal or boasty about my birthday so we didn’t say anything to our server directly. I had ordered the crème brûlée for dessert, which the consistency was a bit too runny. A couple minutes after I got my dessert the table next to us got a dessert brought to them with a candle and everything. I wasn’t hoping for a complimentary dessert or people to sing but a little candle to make a birthday wish on would have been nice, especially since they did something like that for another table. If in reservations people put in special occasions it would be nice if it wasn’t ignored.

Overall the ambiance was nice, the servers were friendly and the food was good, but whole experience was disappointing and I probably won’t return there to celebrate any special occasions. Who knows, I might give it another try sometime but I’d definitely be sure to stick to the...