Izabella Ristorante Italiano — Restaurant in South Lake Tahoe

Our over all experience was just eh...

We were sat about 10 minutes prior to our reservation time at a booth that had an oddly high table and a booth seat that was low and pretty far away from the table, the table itself doesn't move so you kind of get what you get. Well I'm 8 1/2 months pregnant so that table was a no go. We asked it we could be moved to a table and they gladly moved us... The only issue was there were about 14 teen girls sitting at a table screaming at each other, while others just sat that awkwardly looking at other tables to see if anyone else was super irked by this... Their waiter even shot them a glance while taking another families order and they kept going. Our waiter came over and we asked about non-alcoholics drinks, he mentioned lemonade and I asked if it was house made his response was, "no, it's like a powder 😬" I truly appreciated his honesty though!

I ordered the ravioli and substituted the chicken for meatballs, and my husband got the spaghetti and meatballs... I have honestly had better food at the old spaghetti factory for like 1/2 the price.

We rushed through dinner because the teenaged girls decided that they needed to order dessert and yell at Erika and "like take a photo of them all on their phones..."

We were in and out of this place in 45 minutes... and that still seemed like too long.

When I mentioned it to the hostess, who was in the middle of a personal phone call... She said that it was out of her control... And if we don't say something she can't done anything about it. Remember their waiter knew good and damn well...

The whole experience was just eh, and we...

So this is a skewed review as the food was very good as was our server Greg (absent a kitchen snafu where we had to ask for our appetizer which arrived a minute or two before the entrees).

The atmosphere, however, was downright awful. A party of 6 with reservations was seated at a table for 4 with 2 chairs added to the ends and we were told we could not add the vacant table for 2 behind us even though no one ever sat there.

To compound matters there were two very loud, profane, and obnoxious tables that they made zero effort to control. While we waited to order two tables walked out, one without even attempting to order. After hearing these two unrelated groups talking about their underwear, dropping F bombs constantly, and yelling loudly the entire time I finally went to the host stand to ask them to do something. The response was that they were aware of the issue and their server was taking care of it which he was not. I finally had enough of it and asked them to stop dropping F bombs as there were multiple families in the restaurant with small children.

This finally quieted them down and as another table left they stopped and thanked me for saying something. All of the tables near these groups left with sour looks on their faces.amd O know that I was not the first or last to complain. Absolutely need to have enough courage to say something to unruly customers and the host certainly did not to the detriment of all of the other diners and to their bottom line since so many walked...

I'm not a Fan of Italian Food, but this Place Sparked Something in My Belly.

When I was a kid, we ate Italian at home a lot. We frequented Olive Garden a lot in the 90s. And I worked at Olive Garden. So suffice it to say, I don't like Italian food anymore. Then, when my work colleagues chose Izabella for a dinner together, I was not enthusiastic about the night ahead. However, I was pleasantly surprised by Izabella's take on Italian--chocking their plates with lots of flavors and rekindling my long-lost love of Italian food.

I ordered the Rigatoni Paisano ($20), a medley of rigatoni pasta, sausage, roasted red and yellow peppers, and a bolognese sauce, with parmesan cheese sprinkled on top. It was delicious--robust sausage with lots of flavors that took me back to childhood, like the character Anton Ego in the movie, "Ratatouille." I would love to remake this at home. My date ordered the Eggplant Paremsan ($19), which was a hand-breaded eggplant, served with marinara sauce, pesto, on top of a bed of spaghetti, and sprinkled with parmesan cheese. She said it was one of the best eggplants she ever ate--and she eats a lot of that stuff. We ordered a variety of desserts and shared them family style. They were all delicious and finished off the meal.

This place is a definite crowd-pleaser and has a good variety of food and drinks for...