Mondo's Ristorante Italian — Restaurant in Tulsa

This incident unfortunately had me leaving the facility before asking for the name of the main jerk having dealt with, even without his name I will never forget his face. He was an older man, didn’t appear having a traditional American appearance, but his rudeness wasn’t the start of a bad restaurant experience. I realize busy businesses try their best to better the rush periods, including suggesting sitting at the bar, if able, for “quicker service” or to simply avoid the wait times for a reg table. Walking in alone the bar idea was an instant suggestion to me. I was hesitate only because this exact scenario happened to me before only I was suggested to try the upstairs bar. (Guessing the downstairs bar was already full.) I attempted the upstairs idea, & after the downstairs incident I would strongly suggest avoiding both bar settings in this facility. It did NOT seem to make any of the services quicker at all, AND included some of worst customer service I’ve ever witnessed! Both bar workers instantly showed annoyed attitudes to see a customer taking up a bar seat only to seek food & not alcohol. This was evidenced by instantly becoming invisible to the staff. And only to be heard/acknowledged after having to attempt getting the worker’s attention multiple times. Greeted w/ the same annoyed attitudes. Mind you, the downstairs bar didn’t seem to be busy at all, & definitely not to one’s asking for their alcohol fixes. Even those w/ food orders being served at the same time. They definitely received better all around service. I had to request my reg drink order, & after asking for a straw, since it was never offered, this rude older worker guy made an ugly scowl while going to grab one for me. Felt like I almost owed this jerk an apology. I will go ahead & note this part in the story, not that it really should matter, but my fav thing to order here is a simple dish, as in right around 20 dollars, but for the one appetizer like item, 20 dollars is a good price for what was just mentioned. Now this next part, I’m a little uncertain on the actual “menu requirements,” but I’ve been under the impression that their baked bread came along w/the lil entree I ordered. (As in I’ve always had one given before just never been addressed so rudely about it.) I did ask a diff bartender instantly after being seated about the bread while ordering the drink. He said it was fine, & would have it out. I waited a good amount of time, w/nothing, thinking they would just bring the bread out with my main order. I mention this because other customers on each side me did receive their bread appetizers. & had even asked for more. I was literally to the moment of either just asking for it to go so I could pay and leave, OR just simply leaving, when my main entree was actually brought. I do believe another worker made a joke of having to charge for the bread, I wasn’t sure if he was serious or not. He walked off w/me thinking he was only joking. I wouldn’t have been bothered if he wasn’t kidding. I then asked for my ticket & to go box, the bartender brought both of those requests to me, BUT then the older jerk comes up & informed or clarified that the bread is only given with “actual meals.” Or they have to charge extra. Guess my 20 dollar entree doesn’t make the cut. Him saying this in front of everyone ear range was obviously embarrassing & somewhat insulting. Seems like he placed another piece of paper over my original receipt, so I’m thinking maybe it is an extra charge & he updated my receipt to add that extra charge. I seen no changes on the bill, so I’m not sure why he had to put on such a jackass performance. The petty extra charge would have been perfectly fine w/me. Not that big of a deal, but his lousy service was! I did manage to address their “service being crap & super slow” before he left my personal space. Needless to say, I left NO TIP & I am not sorry for that in any type of way. Just felt I needed to share this experience & hope it never finds another customer. I personally regret ever taking a seat at either...

We have been to Mondos before and the food and experience was very nice. Something has changed! We thought the food was very good before, service was great, but this time it was a mess. The food left a lot to be desired and service was chaotic. it didn’t look very busy when we arrived so that can’t be it. The hostess and greeters were friendly and welcoming. Our waitress was fabulous, fun and personable. I cook a lot, especially Italian cuisine, and host dinner parties in my home. It’s not hard to make great Italian dishes. We ordered a couple appetizers which were not too bad. The plates were huge which wasn’t necessary for the food on them. With the cocktail and wine glasses, water glasses, individual appetizer plates for four, there wasn’t much room left on the table. While we were still eating the appetizer, the salads come out on big plates! No big deal but I would expect a high end Italian restaurant to know how to make a classic Caesar salad dressing - not Mondos! What happened to the mayonnaise, pressed garlic, anchovy paste, extra virgin olive oil …? Caesar dressing is so easy to make and hard to screw up. How could this happen? Maybe they ran out of the Caesar and thought no one would notice the difference if they got the other menu option which was a “vinaigrette!” I could forgive that. You do what you have to in a pinch, just acknowledge it and move on. But that wasn’t it. The kitchen sent out a sample in a cup with a message “this is Mondo’s Caesar dressing.” I said, “No, it is not a Caesar, it is a crappy citrusy vinaigrette!” Then servers, not our waitress who was great, started to come to the table with entrees - not what we ordered which was annoying. After they figured out they were for a different table they went away calling out the name of the entree hoping someone would claim it. Finally our food came out, again on huge plates. Okay, it looked like a lot of food. However, the servers started to put these four large entrees on the table with the empty appetizer serving plates, appetizer plates, large plates of salad that no one ate and the glasses, etc etc. There was no extra room on the table - literally no room but these servers just started to push things around to put more plates on an already crowded table. I called our waitress who ha to stop the servers and made them clear the table. So two servers stood there each holding two plates with our food getting cold while the table was cleared. Chaos. Okay the table is cleared and our entries are on the table. I can’t speak for the others but I had the chicken piccata. Another fail. The chicken was a single piece of breast meat, very tough and thick that had grille lines. You don’t grille chicken for piccata to cook it. You pound it very thin to about a 1/4 inch thick, dredge it, brown it in olive oil and quickly sauté it in the sauce to a point of tender goodness to finish. Maybe it was another tough spot for the kitchen. There was a different entree on the menu with grilled chicken so maybe the kitchen figured “ this will work, they won’t noticed, the salad didn’t come back.” I don’t want to think the kitchen doesn’t know how to make a Chicken Piccata. And it is not served on top of a mountain of over cooked spaghetti. It is usually served with a small portion of linguine on the side or under the chicken but it is linguine not spaghetti. The Chicken is the point of the dish but pasta is cheap and makes an impression of a lot of food. Okay, I get it but not necessary for good food. My wife had Veal Marsala, another classic that was ruined with a thick tough piece of meat. Veal is a flavorful, delicate piece of meat that can be tough to get right and you shouldn’t try if you don’t know what you are doing. Sadly we won’t be back. Like I said, something has changed. This was not a quiet, delicious, enjoyable dining experience. And I apologize for the rant but for the disappointment and dissatisfaction of myself my guests, the opportunity to share this terrible experience is the only thing of value...

This is very unfortunate for me to have to write this review, as Mondo’s is one of my favorite restaurants to dine at in the Tulsa area, and my little girls favorite place to celebrate birthdays. I had an unfortunate interaction with the oldest member of the Mondo’s patriarch while dining on the night (Saturday evening between 8p-9pm) before Christmas eve. Me and friend (his first time ever eating at Mondo's) from college chose Mondo’s to celebrate his recent achievement of him becoming a certified teacher, so we chose to sit at the bar downstairs to avoid the wait for a table. It was loud from it being mildly busy for a Saturday evening, and the holiday music was played at a glaring interval to set the atmosphere. There was a table next to us singing happy birthday loudly enough to get my attention(with no issue), as well as many other people around the bar were speaking loudly to compensate for the heightened levels of holiday cheer throughout the restaurant. (This is something to remember)

We were having a great time until….I was complimenting the restaurant staff on their great service, and how good we have been treated while dining. Then just moments later, we were greeted by the oldest member of Mondo’s ownership that was previously sitting at a reserved table by himself in the left corner of the bar area, proceeds to walk toward us to say “do you mind keeping your voices down”. I responded by simply saying “sure” as other tables behind us were louder with chatter. I just continued to talk in my normal tone of voice previous to our encounter, as he walked back to his table after our interaction. I was then greeted by many of the restaurant bar staff apologizing for the interaction, after being singled out. Now, to make things even worse he then proceeds a few moments later to loudly berate a kitchen staff member(whom shift appeared to be ending)sitting right next us at the bar, making for very uncomfortable experience. After being stood over and talked down too, the staff member apologized to us for him being disrespected.

Before leaving, I was supposed to order my wife’s dinner to go, but choosing to just to leave instead. The impression of feeling that our patronage was not worthy really left a bad taste for me, and my friend. This is very unfortunate again as Mondo's was one of my favorite places for my family to dine, before being left with a feeling of not...