RIVA — Restaurant in West Haven

Riva is a new spot in West Haven with a beautiful atmosphere and has all the potential to succeed -

However - until something happens that reduces prices this will be my first and possibly last visit. I walked up to the entrance with a friendly woman who was Infront of me who her and I met with the security Infront of us. As I waited for my turn I happened to over hear the gentleman let her in for free and seemed to me that he was flirting.

I ignored it, hey perks of the job right? Paid my 10 dollar entry fee and processed to find my table where my family was sitting at. I explored the venue while listening to a okay band and made my way to the food. They honestly looked good but I've been hearing from various people that the food was over priced, not that great and lacking anything that would make spending 14 (before tax) dollars on a burger. Especially Riva burger which tasted like a expensive McDonald's cheese burger. I wouldn't have minded much if the burger came with fries on the side or something to make it worth that price. It was a really expensive "Okay" Burger. I Coughed it up to a loss and had a beer.

I asked for a tall Bluemoon and took out 10 dollars, kinda expecting to receive change and was handed a BlueMoon in a plastic cup which immediately noticed was ALL plastic cups. - ehh okay? She took the 10 ran it through the register and I stood waiting expecting some change back and she turns to me and tells me I'm all set and noticed it said like 36 cent in change was supposed to come back to me. I didn't care about the 36 cents, I was more surprised that it cost me 10 dollars for a plastic cup of beer.

In short I spent 35 dollars in 15 minutes. I left after I ate my food and had my 1 beer. So with in a half hour. I would have stayed longer if at the least the cup of beer was cheeper.

You should charge like 3.50 a beer, when people drink they buy food and they drink more.

Youre pushing customers away by doing this. I spent 10 dollars to get in. 10 dollars for a small beer and 14 dollars plus tax for a cheese burger with no sides. Not to mention I wasn't attractive enough to get in for free, but that's a matter of personal taste I guess so I won't blame you for that. Haha

But I did enjoy the cover band, I liked the atmosphere. It really boiled down to being too expensive and the food was mediocre.

Hopefully that will change in the near future and Id love to have a new regular place to have a few beers and...

Lived in West Haven my whole life, and this is a business the city desperately needed. I’m big on supporting all establishments in the community. Been there from the first day all the way to today (5 straight days), and I really enjoy the atmosphere. Yes, there’s things the establishment needs to work on, but it comes with starting out a new business. Made it my mission to work my way through the menus.

For food, I HIGHLY recommend the burgers, fried chicken sandwich and steak and cheese eggrolls. The wings are good size and sauced nicely. Some menu items, like the brussel sprout salad, were “different,” but need to be retooled. Nice idea, but brussel sprouts should be shredded instead of diced.

If you love beach drinks, then Riva is the place for you. I highly recommend Dorinda’s Day Off (named after the Mayor of West Haven), the Blue Devil, Green Knight, and West Haven Vice (Strawberry Daiquiri and Pina Colatta swirled with Bicardi or Dark Rum). Drinks are creative and so many beer choices. The cocktails are a bit pricy for the area and a bit sweet for my taste, but I’m sure as the business matures, they will get better with that. They’re still DELICIOUS! High Noons & Lucky One’s for $10…that’s my only complaint.

The cover charge is not bad when there’s a band and parking is a bit of a challenge, but you must have patience and persistence.

The staff from the bartenders, bar backs, and security are VERY welcoming and make it feel like home (it also helped that I knew many of them).

I’m a customer for life now. Stefano, Mike and Chris have done a fantastic job bringing this new gem to West Haven and I’ll continue to help bring new customers in and...

We are local and waited so long for this place to open, so this pains me to write…

Swung by to try this spot out. We were immediately greeted with finding out that there was a $10 cover charge PER PERSON at 1 in the afternoon. Decided to give it a shot anyways. Tried ordering food and ended up spending over $30 an a burger and 5 mozzarella sticks. Then we had to wait almost 3 hours for the food to be ready while fighting for a spot to sit. Decided to get drinks while we wait and immediately had a full drink fall on the ground due to there being very few proper places to set them down. Finally get our food and it’s extremely low quality with the mozzarella sticks definitely being from a frozen box that probably cost a fraction of the $14 they cost us.

I understand that this place just opened but first impressions are everything and this was a bad one. It also didn’t seem to just be us. In the 3 hours we spent waiting we heard numerous other groups complaining of the same issues we were having. Multiple people tried to get refunds for their food that never came and were told they would have to come back on a different day to speak to the manager. So it sounds like 3 days into this place being open and the manager isn’t even present.

Overall mediocre launch at best and the kitchen 100% doesn’t have the capacity to properly cater to even a fraction of the amount of people the place can hold. If a business can’t even make a decent attempt at taking care of their customers during their opening week then it probably isn’t going to magically start happening later on down the road.

Do not recommend...