Basso Restaurant & Wine Bar — Restaurant in Westport

We attended Basso last night with a group of 10 people for a double birthday party. We made a reservation for 9PM and were sat at 9:50PM! We bought drinks at the bar during the wait. Once seated, we were sure to let the waitress know early on that we would need separate checks due to the larger party size. She assured us that was fine, but we would have to wait until we were ready to pay to divide the check. At the end of our dinner the waitress arrives with one check. We take the time to write which amount goes with six separate credit cards since she didn’t split the check from the start. She returns to the table and decides to now inform us that she can only accept three credit cards max for the table even though we had discussed this earlier. We tell her why this is now an issue and while she is scrambling to admit her mistake a random busboy, whom had nothing to do with our service the entire night, decides to interrupt saying that we can either pay with three cards or they can call the police. All of a sudden we are being treated like criminals even though we just spent the time doing the footwork for them to designate the amount for each credit card and had all the cards ready to pay. This is on a $480 bill, not including over $100 spent at the bar while we waited to be sat down 50 minutes late! We asked to speak to the manager or owner and they agreed. They go to the bartender, whom is also apparently the owner, and have a 10 minute huddle. The owner Renato finally comes to the table and after hearing our side admits a mistake was made on their end. Instead of any reasonable solution he now magically offers four cards to be run for the table, but of course this is the new maximum and cannot be exceeded. After much back and forth about the absurdity of this situation, Renato targets one of our party members and tries to get him to stop pointing out the clear mistake and easy solution to the situation by grabbing his shoulder and attempting intimidation to gain hold of the situation. The whole situation is well out of control at this point and we let him know we just want to pay our bill and leave. As a last-ditch effort to try to save any face, the owner offers us each a shot of tequila. Pretty much a hush tactic and right before we’re about to drive home. Several of us in the group have grown up in the restaurant business and this is by far the most unprofessional overall response from an owner any of us could imagine! I would never recommend this restaurant to anyone and hope no one else has to go through such a...

So let me tell you something about Basso Cafe Restaurant & Bar! My best friend and I were celebrating our birthdays there tonight. So my friend Jen made reservations for 9:00PM we weren’t seated until 9:50PM. It was 10 of us in a small setting waiting. Strike one! Before we started to order 3 people from our group had asked if the full check can be split before ordering, they said no but it’ll be split afterwards and we can pay with multiple cards. Which was fine, we ordered and accumulated a hefty bill, our group of 10 people were ready to split the bill with 6 cards the waitress said only 3 could be used. We were told we couldn’t. We asked how come since we had asked before and we were told we could afterwards. We asked to speak to the owner or manager and one of their waiters said “pay or we will call the cops” (again we are willing to pay and their reaction came out nowhere), but with 6 cards. How someone in customer service will say that is beyond me or anyone in our table. The owner arrived and we explained everyone was upset including the owner. The owner/manager asked why we didn’t ask for different checks in the beginning, we told him we had but we were told we couldn’t. The manager started to become condescending, I myself stepped in and said how someone from your staff would say that especially since we are here to celebrate a birthday and we waited for almost an hour after our reservation time. The owner than decided to be combative with my husband and put his hand on his shoulder. Also making a statement with “what are you going to do?”. To the owner or manager you happened to piss off and be extremely disrespectful to 10 guests in your bistro. Please take a course in...

Best pizza nearby. Highly recommend the goat cheese and mushroom pizza if you want pizza. Excellent dough. Puts the other pizza places in Westport to absolute shame. If you don't like white pizza or mushrooms the standard tomato and cheese one is also good. I most recently had the arugula and prosciutto pizza which was not nearly as good as the two types I mentioned above, but the dough and ingredients were still such high quality that it was delicious and fulfilling nonetheless. You really can't go wrong.

Their non pizza stuff is great too. Lovely brussel sprouts and artichoke and squid and octopus and meats, basically lovely everything. The tapas are perfectly sized for sharing or as a single appetizer. Two could be a light meal together. If you order pizza you will have leftovers which the staff will bag for you.

The speakers play acoustic covers of famous pop & rock songs, and I will admit it gives me a bit of a strange feeling when I hear a song I recognize but sung at a completely different tempo. It's great background noise but if you stop and listen it's a little eerie, but I think that might just be me so I'm not docking any points for that.

Other notes: if you sit near the left/west side of the place or at the bar, you can literally see them cook your pizza in the brick oven. There is also a disco ball. Not sure if it works.

Great lunch or dinner place if you like Mediterranean food. I cannot...