Nearby Places
- Lido @ Ista
- Cafe
- Rim Naam
- Restaurant, Bar
- Monsoon
- Restaurant, Bar, Cafe, Dessert
- Zaman
- Restaurant
- Bobby's Dhaba
- Restaurant
Related Searches
Restaurant in Ulsoor
Rated: Poor
based on 4 reviews
Spaghetti Kitchen
Lido Shopping Mall, Ulsoor, Bangalore
41738131
| Locality | Ulsoor |
|---|---|
| Place Type | Restaurant |
| Food Type | Italian |
| Timings | 12:00 PM to 3:30 PM, 7:00 PM to 11:00 PM |
| Price |
Expensive
|
- Additional Information
-
Credit cards accepted
Air conditioned
- Tags
- italian food-chain lido-mall
- Write a Review
-
first reviewed by Fourier
- User Reviews (4)
Jul 09, 2008
All that steam for nothing
Some friends recommended this place to us. Said the food was decent and the wine list was elaborate.
So on a lazy saturday afternoon, we decided to see for ourselves.
The most charming part of the restaurant was the rest-room. Seriously. The walls sparkle and its super clean.
(you can't say that about too many restrooms, can you?)
First, things we liked about the place:
- the food is served in a giffy (I wont hazard a guess into why this is so). But, it takes about 10 minutes for them to bring you starters and maincourse, which is really good.
- the menu is reasonably spread out. You have a long list of wines to choose from, the staff are quite helpful in helping you decide what to order
- the ambience is casual, you don't feel like you have to 'dress up' for this place or hold your back straight through the meal. the tables are well-spaced, so you're not forced to sniff the other person's lunch. (especially if u have a tendency to wince at the sight/smell of different meats)
- the food is reasonably ok (though I felt the rates didn't justify it!), its not exceptional. Its a place I would visit if I was in the vicinity, I just wouldn't go out of the way to eat there.
Now, the things we didn't-like-much
- the furniture is heavy, wooden, and reminds you of one of those highway restaurants (heavy drapes, dim lighting). Well, I can't completely put my finger on it, but let's just say its not 'international'.
-although the casual ambience is good in a way, it gets way too noisy. There's no music playing, so people think nothing of adding to the general cacophony. we had a bunch of 18-year olds next to us, and by the end of it, we knew 'sensitive' details about their lives
- Now, here's the part that really upset us. Half way through our wine, we found a floating object in one of the glasses. So we called the waiter and showed it to him. He immediately brought us another glass (without even checking with us if we wanted one). We politely declined it.After some arguing, he took it back.
We go through our dessert and ask for the cheque. We find that he has charged us for that glass of wine! When we called the manager, he told us that he can send us another glass of wine, but cannot strike it off the bill.
Please note that there was absolutely no apology forthcoming, either from the waiter, or the manager, or anyone else higher up. It almost felt like they were blaming US for the floating object!
Again, after some unpleasant arguing and us explaining that we would not pay for something we didn't consume, they struck it off the bill.
Now I can understand restaurants have bad days, and accidents do happen. But my point is that when you are paying around 2,500 for meal for two, you at least expect decent quality and reasonable service. Moreover, if I ran a restaurant and found a bug in the wine (or anything), I would really be worried about it, and take utmost precautions to remedy it immediately. Or at the very least offer a sincere apology.
I think restaurants, especially so-called 'fine-dining' places should realise that in order to sustain their business, they need to deliver the goods.
Otherwise they'd have people like me write unflattering (but brutally honest) reviews and expressing displeasure to the world-at-large.
May 17, 2008
Buono
Now first of all, the reviews below me seem to be more of an outburst of rage. Two foodies and their buddies seem to have had a bad experience. But without them we wouldn't have had a review.
Italian cuisine is different. The ingredients used are unorthodox for us. Italian food is best described as an angry Italian chasing a bull down a Sicilian street because the bull refuses to be his dinner. Italian food is described by their culture, their people, their cars! The Pagani, ferarri, lamborghini, look at them, stark raving mad. Their cuisine is elegant, the prancing horse and yet mad, the raging bull.
Having said that, you must not expect an authentic Italian meal at spaghetti but an unconventional assortment of goodies.
The ambiance here is good. The bright lights actually kill the privacy a bit. Theres a lot of wood used all over and a few floor decorative's which go all quite well. The kitchen is partially open and you pass it as you are led to your table. It was actually quite warm the other day, thanks to the open kitchen and the bright lights.
I won't be able to comment on the drinks but i know they have a fine selection of wines to accompany the food.
The menu is all Italian. They have everything you desire, spaghetti, ravioli, pasta, lasagna and i'm sure everyones favorite pizza!
The waiter will take your drink order and appetizers and leave you to it. Because they don't rush your food, people think the service is bad. But isn't that how a meal is supposed to be? Aren't you supposed to enjoy your meal? savor every dish? Let the wine wash the food down your throat? Some people don't seem to get that.
The food is well prepared and more importantly presented very well. The essential part of the dish is made fresh and let me say, stewed to perfection. They use the entire area of the plate very well and every dish can be a wholesome meal.
Cheesy, tangy, creamy, saucy, molto gustoso.
I would readily suggest this place for a nice meal. If you want a wham bam affair, kfc, mcdonalds, pizza hut....
Cheers and ...burrp!
Mar 18, 2008
Spaghetti Kitchen (Bangalore) is terrible!
This weekend, Saturday lunch, we went to Spaghetti Kitchen that's newly opened @ Lido Mall in Bangalore.
Now this is an Italian restuarant in a mall, it is a part of a food chain ( yeah like McDonalds ) and even had a positive review in the previous day's Bangalore Times.
I know, I know- that should have been enough to put us off, but the bravehearts that we were, we went anyway.
And boy! Did the place live up to it's context! Apart from the really nice interiors, the place has NOTHING to go for it. Let me quickly list them for you,
1. The tables were greasy. Not clean. We saw why. There was a totally un-interested, incompetent waiter cleaning all tables - with the same dishcloth - moving from table to table. Basically he was evenly spreading the grease to all tables.
2. The service is TERRIBLE. The guys just don't care. They seem like seasoned imports from some other Spaghetti Kitchen joint. They had that distinct absent way of service and taking the order. Our waiter didn't have the patience to speak to us or listen to our order. It was almost as if the dining guest is in the way of him doing his job!
3. Our drinks were pre-prepared. We decided to drink Sangria ( it was listed as a pitcher but was not available ). It was pre-prepared and the apples had badly discoloured.
4. The food is frozen food. Make no mistake about it. It's frozen food that's then put together and served. We noticed that of both the chicken and fish we ordered. The fish was deep-fried in oil and any taste/flavour of fish had been successfully killed.
We selected 2 of their signature dishes and they left much to be desired. The food was oily and didn't have even an iota of subtlety that one would expect from Italian food. Only the Pizza appeared to be freshly made.
So there you go, the place is not clean, the service sucks, the food and drink that taste very very bad.
It is a perfect example of standardizing and mass producing a cuisine and totally ruining it.
Spaghetti Kitchen serves up the perfect example of "mall food" - unhealthy over priced trash. The best way to torture even the mildly discerning palate.
I am running back to my good old "The Only Place", "Sunny's", "Fiorano", "Via Milano" and Sunday brunches @ "Ista".
You know why? We paid a bill of Rs 1900/- at Spaghetti. This was for 2 drinks, 1 starter and 2 main course dishes.
At the same price, I can have an absolutely delightful Italian meal for two at any of the above places.
Mar 17, 2008
HORRIBLE!
I read the review on the Spaghetti Kitchen that appeared in the Times of India and did not want to visit the restaurant. However, whenever dining out in groups of more than two, majority wins and this time everyone wanted to try out a "new" place.
We reached Spaghetti Kitchen at 8:10, got a table right away and noticed that the place was relatively empty at that hour. Within a minute, even before water was served, the menu was handed over to us and the waiter asked if we were ready to place the order right away. We asked for at-least 2 minutes to decide on the order but the waiter returned back in a minute and asked us to speed up and order since they'll be having other customers come in soon and the kitchen would be busy. We placed the order right away on the spot without much decision making. Actually, we did ask the waiter to help us decide between a few items on the menu, but he arrogantly replied with "everything in our restaurant is good".
We had ordered the ravioli, a vegetarian cracker pizza and a stuffed chicken. The waiter asked if we were going to share, and we said "NO" and clearly mentioned that all the main courses should come at the same time. He acknowledged it and said that'll be ABSOLUTELY and PERFECTLY fine with them.
It wasn't perfect or anything near perfect. It was HORRENDOUS! We waited and waited and waited and waited for the food. The pizza came in first, the dinner plates came at least 15 minutes after we had started eating the pizza from the tray. There was no sign of the ravioli or the chicken. The ravioli came in 2nd and that was when the pizza had 2 slices left and the first person was almost done. The pizza wasn't anything out of the ordinary; it wasn't much different in taste from pizza corner to be frank! The ravioli was VERY VERY SPICY with red chilies! I have never seen Italian get THAT spicy! Even if they were trying to Indian-ize the dish, they should have mentioned it clearly in the menu or the waiter should have told us! We needed water badly due to the spices and there was no waiter for the table. After numerous attempts at getting the waitstaff's attention, we got up, walked to the seating staff, and asked for water. The ravioli was not edible due to the spice level! The service was horrible. We didn’t care about the below-average quality of food as much as the service that came with it!
Our wait for the stuffed chicken was never-ending. I got my main course at 9:40 when they started clearing the plates for my friends! Maybe they don't teach them that you shouldn't clear the table till everyone is done. I wasn't hungry anymore, I was absolutely ANGRY and I didn't even want to have a bite of that chicken! I tried to stop the waiter to ask him to get the food packed, but he left without even listening! I took a bite of the chicken, it was nothing extra ordinary, I can make it at home any day by stuffing a huge chicken breast in the oven for 7 minutes! The chicken was over cooked. The side of the boiled potato with the spices ok but bleh - boil the potatoes, peel and slice them and drizzle it with olive oil, oregano, rosemary, salt, red and black pepper. BIG DEAL!
We waited again for the waiters’ attention and after some 20 minutes, the first waiter guy who took our orders came to ask me if I wanted to order any desserts! I was flabbergasted - before he could finish, I just told him sternly "THAT will be enough - please get the chicken packed and the bill ready for us - we have had ENOUGH of Spaghetti Kitchen and your service!".
We got the bill after another 10 minutes but there was so sign of the packed chicken. I waited for my packed food (I'll at the least give it to the dogs on the street than throw it off there!). I paid for the bill, the manager was surprised that there was no tip for the service they provided (hell yea! what service? what waiter?!). I asked him if they dont' give out the restaurant review cards anymore, and he unwillingly gave me one. I doubt it'll go the right person - most likely they tear those away if the customer isn't happy.
After our GREAT experience at the Spaghetti Kitchen, we went the Infinitea on the Cunningham road for a quick dinner. To hell with Spaghetti Kitchen - I would NEVER go there again, take my family/friends or recommend it to ANYONE!