La Riv Wood Fired Italian - Temple TX — Restaurant in Temple

Worst dining experience of 2018. Called on Valentine’s day(knew restaurant might have special menu and possible reservation restrictions) to ask for a To-Go entree(s) and appetizer(s) for my wife and I to celebrate our Valentine’s Day together. I called and talked to a woman who answered the phone. I asked “Will you all do To-Go orders today as I don’t have a reservation?” The woman, replied “Yes, but you have to order from the Valentine’s Day special menu. I replied “That’ll be just fine.” She took my order and said it would be ready in about 30-35 minutes. I left work at 6pm. Arrived there at 6:45 assuming I could come in and have my food ready for pickup. Unfortunately, that was definitely not the case. I walked into the bar entrance(where to go orders normally are picked up) and not a single person on the staff said hello nor asked if I needed anything. I young waitress looked flustered and I politely waived to get her attention and she ignored me. Another waitress walked by about 5 minutes later and I had to say “Excuse me, can someone help me with a to-go order pickup?” She directly me to the hostess stand briefly and walked away. I come to find no hostess, so I head back to the bar hoping someone can help me with my $50 meal pickup. Again, I wait 10 minutes. Another waiter comes behind the bar and I ask for water(after already being there 15 minutes). He gets me a glass of water. Then I ask Again for some help with my order. The person who I beleive was a assistant manger(if they even have one) asks me to state my order so he can go ask the kitchen if it’s ready(mind you it’s now been a hour since I placed it). He leaves and 5 minutes later he returns with “It will be ready in 10/15 minutes. I’m pretty upset at this point but I’m already here so I agree to wait on it. Then the 15 minutes go by. It’s now 7:30ish. I’ve been waiting on my food at the bar for nearly an hour. Then a woman who I presume is the hostess comes and asks me about my to go order. I tel her the other gentleman said it would be ready by now but she insists I RESTATE the order. She walks away and the owner(who is Vira I beleive, could have the name wrong) returns and assured me that she will have my order ready in another 10-15 minutes. You are probably thinking I’m insane for waiting again, but I trusted the owner to own up to their mishap and provide me with my order for my Valentine’s Day with my wife. Sadly, she never returns and I sit there looking like a fool for over an hour. Someone returns and I ask “Is my order ready?” The woman who I assumed was the hostess replies with “Its being made in the kitchen as we speak!” I retorted with “If the food is not ready I will go ahead and leave and never return to this establishment” I don’t normally ever put a review for these types of situations, but this one was extra terrible as all I wanted was my to-go order so that I could surprise my wife with a wonderful meal in which neither of us had to prepare a thing as we work long hours and have a newborn, which makes dinner during the week sometimes tough. I didn’t get to do that and I know where I will not go next time for a dining experience, La Riv. And will not refer them to any of my family or friends. Ironically, they serve a dish that I truly like, but I won’t be back. And yes, if you’re reading this, my wife and I still enjoyed our evening together as this review is just about the poor service at La...

Yesterday my girlfriend and I arrived at the restaurant at 4:30PM. We waited at the front where the Host podium was for a few minutes and noticed that the whole restaurant was empty. When the hostess arrived she asked if we had a reservation (since it was Valentine's Day) and I told her no we did not and asked if we needed one. She then responded rudely that they had lots of reservations for later and ask us if we can eat fast and leave within an hour. -__-

She then seated us in the far back of the restaurant and put us in a corner and dropped off some menus and said they had $45/person Valentines special and it was a 3-5 course meal. It took another 10 minutes before our server came to our table and I feeling pretty uncomfortable knowing we are rushed to have and the service was slow. They poured us some water while we were going through the menu and noticed that one of our glass of water had something floating in there that wasn't suppose to be in there.

During this time, another couple has came in and I could hear them tell the hostess that they didn't have reservations either, however, they didn't get a 1 hour time limit to eat and they were sat by middle of the restaurant by the glass wall with the view.

When the server (Tom) came back to our table and I told him that we were going to leave because at this rate we wouldn't make the 1 hour window that the hostess gave us to eat and we were already been there for 15 minutes.

He apologized to us as we were walking out but I had already lost my appetite. I told him thank you but we will be leaving.

Since my girlfriend was in the mood for Italian food, we went to Luigi's in Belton across from the Belton Highschool around 5PM. Half of their smaller restaurant was full but they had about 5 open tables and they asked if we had a reservation. I told them we didn't and they said they would be happy to serve us. Our meal at Luigi's was only $50 and I tipped the waitress and chef who prepared our meal $20 each. I love support local business especially when they offer great service and food.

Unfortunately for La Riv, we didn't get to experience the food but we did get terrible service from the hostess.

Only reason I didn't give this place a 1 star is because Tom our server seemed genuinely sorry when he apologized for our rude experience from...

100% Amazing Experience. Where do I even start. We called at 11am Saturday morning the day before Valentine’s to get a reservation and the day before a impending snow/ice storm. Even though they were already full, the hostess offered to take my name and call me if there were any cancellations. I got a call that afternoon they could get us in. The whole experience from the reservation to the check out was amazing. I’m not sure what any negative reviews that are out here are for. Coming from big cities where fine dining opportunities are easy to come by to a smaller suburban city with Austin an hour away, this place checked every block for what we like to spend our date nights on. We were seated immediately at our reservation time, the ambiance in the restaurant was perfect, the waitress was experienced and did her job well. Everything was COVID safe. The drink menu had some “local” drinks that we tried and they were awesome! The restaurant isn’t too big that you get lost in the hustle so everything came quick! The food was amazing and the portion size was plentiful for a “fine dining” restaurant where usually the portions er on the smaller side. As we were leaving we recognized the owner (who also owns the neighborhood wine bar and bar and grill) in the restaurant, so we stopped to chat for a moment and share our experience and thanks with her. She was extremely friendly and appreciative of our business. We live within 5 min of this restaurant and thanks to just recently moving + Covid and life with 3 kids it took us a year to get here but we will definitely be frequent visitors to La Riv and all of the affiliated bars/restaurants. We have followed them on social media since moving in and were excited to give them a try after seeing all the amazing dishes. P.S. for all the haters giving any kind of negative reviews, I challenge you to find another small business restaurant, nonetheless, that willingly gave free meals to ANYONE(no questions asked) who called and requested one during the Covid-19 pandemic. We can’t wait to come back and try all the affiliated...