Émai Italian Restaurant & Gardens — Restaurant in Da Lat City

First of all I would like to say I do not like to write bad reviews and that I think our bad experience was probably an "unicum": I can very easyle imagine that people usually enjoy very much a dinner at Emai. The location is wonderful, the atmosphere is sublime and you feel like you're in a small wonderland inside the chaotic and busy context of Vietnam. We ordered two antipasti (crostata di caponata and mista) and two first courses (spaghetti aglio, olio e peperoncino and linguine alle vongole veraci). A beer and a glass of white wine. The antipasti were good, particular, not very italian (I'm italian, from Sicily, and the friend I've been with to Emai is fro Tuscany) but anyway interesting and very well presented. And this is the only good news. Pasta aglio, olio e peperoncino. Wrong kind of spaghetti, overcooked, with parmesan on the top and garlic small cut everywhere. If I would have had an allergy to parmesan, this would have been a problem. If you offer a pasta with parmesan, than you probably have to write in the menu, "spaghetti aglio, olio, peperoncino and parmesan", otherwise you ask to the customer if he would like to have parmesan on the top, or you bring some parmesan on the side. Besides, you do not put parmesan in aglio, olio e peperoncino.

Linguine alle vongole veraci. I'll be very quick here: there was bacon in it. Yes, bacon with vongole. So this was a linguine with vongole veraci and bacon. The bacon addition was not mentioned on the menu. I think I could write an essay here about the absurdness of mixing fish and meat, vongole and bacon, besides without any mention of it on the menu. But I will stop here and leave the consideration to you.

The service. The waiter took our order. After around 20 minutes our antipasti came. We wanted to ask for some more bread, we had to leave our table and look around for the waiter. After that, we remained at our table alone for 40 minutes, waiting for the first course, with our empty plates and empty glasses on the table, nobody asked if we wanted something more to drink, if we needed something. Then the spaghetti and the linguine arrived. But we had no forks. Again, we had to go looking around the restaurant for a waiter in order to have two forks. After that, we did not see anybody for around 45 minutes and, a bit tired to have all the time to leave our table and look around for the waiter, we had to ask our bill sending a message through the facebook account. Yes, you are right: we sent a facebook message from our mobile phone to the facebook account of the restaurant asking if somebody could bring us the bill. After few minutes the bill came: no apologizes, no mentioning of the fact we had to ask the bill through facebook. Nobody asked if we wanted a dessert, if we wanted something more to drink.

The bill came, there was a form to optionally fill in order to review our experience in the restaurant, which we filled, with quite bad and ironic remarks. The waiter (the owner?) then came apologizing and offering to not pay for our dinner, which was very nice, but that we absolutely rejected: we ate our dinner and we wanted to pay for it. We finally agreed on a 10% discount.

So, all in all, the place is wonderful, the people who is running it seems very honest and kind, so I believe what we experienced, especially on the customer service side, was due to some bad luck. About the food, I would suggest to explain to the customer you put bacon on the linguine with vongole and to bring parmesan always on the side (unless you write on the menu there is parmesan on the recipe).

I wish to Emai all the best and I'll surely come back to see how things work if I'll be back one...

Very disappointed the way they treat their customers. I honestly went here last year with a few friends and had a good time. Food was okay but mostly the setting is nice.

Then, I decided to come back again this last weekend June 20th 2020 with my big family.

So Friday, I called in to reserve a table for 8 adults and 3 kids. They told me they were all booked. I said that’s fine. How about the next day? Saturday night at 5pm? They said we would have to sit in the yard, which we were ok with. They did warned me that if it rains too hard they might have to cancel.

Saturday around 11am, they called me and said that it’s all booked at 5pm!!? So I said okay, how about between now and 5pm. Can we come to eat? To which they responded that I could come at 3pm and they would let us sit inside. Around 2pm, they called me again and said that because it was raining, their guests arrived late and they would struggle to meet the 3pm reservation and we would have to sit outside in the yard!? I was not very happy about it because they seriously made it looked like i’m begging them to let us in to eat? But I said ok that’s fine we will sit in the yard. Then literally 5 minutes later, Émai called me again. This time, they said their kitchen “run out of supplies” and can only provide for dinner’s reservations.

At this point, i’m just feeling completely disappointed and let down by them. Our original reservation was for dinner? You guys moved us back and now you said there aren’t enough food???

If they just straight up said NO and they don’t want to accommodate/take in a big party then we would have more times to find other options. Other if you’re fully booked. Just inform us then? Were they afraid that I would complain that they are booked?? Instead, they decide to lead us on for no reason, wasting our time.

To sum up, you guys really messed up the reservation part and really disrespect your customers. I have never felt like I have to “beg” a place...

It is evident that the owner of the restaurant must have invested quite a bit of money into the development of his/her establishment. Everything in the dining room is kept in wooden tones, with wooden windows, high quality wooden book shelves, wooden ceiling paneling. There is a grand piano in the main dining room. The music coming from the speakers is of good taste (an eclectic mix of jazz, classical music, some singer-songwriter stuff...) and stays pleasantly in the background as to not disturb one's conversation (which is not a given in a country where the music is often obnoxiously loud). It is also enjoyable walking around the large outdoor terrace for a bit, the view is quite nice as it is not disturbed by the ubiquitous greenhouses of Dalat which often are such an eyesore at other places. So, atmosphere-wise I give the restaurant five stars.

Food-wise however I found it a letdown (and the food should always be at the core of a restaurant). For a place that puts quite a bit of effort and thought into the decor and furnishing, the food was not up to the same standards. My wife and I both had a pizza, and while the toppings were okay, we were both particularly unhappy with the dough. The dough was not lofty and thin enough for what we are used to from authentic Italian pizza in Europe, and the texture wasn't quite right. The high prices would be fine, if the food had been up to par, but since it wasn't, we felt the value ultimately was only average. I consider an overall rating of 3 stars a fair one. Food-wise, I personally prefer Primavera restaurant here in Dalat over Emai, although the atmosphere at...