Italian gone awry 9 October 2005

There are hits and there are misses. And this miss was a blind shot in the dark, a shooting of the moon … Had heard so much about Belinni’s that I was prepared to write tales regaling the place. After all it is Italian-owned, and Italians love their food, right? Plus, they say that Doreen Fernandez, noted culinary critic, used to come here a lot.

But alas, our dinner experience left much to be desired, in all aspects of restaurant running, at least from this diner’s POV.

Maybe you could call the place “quaint” but to me it reeked of a business trying to cut costs. For one, the resto is smack in the middle of the Marikina Shoe expo in Cubao – err, fine Italian dining amidst shoes? The resto tried to evoke an Italian air with intricately painted scenes in Italy, on the walls and ceiling, and a personalized touch (the names of the owners). And why did Bellini’s in Greenbelt 3 close? Hmm …

The invisibles need to eat too
We entered without so much as a glance or hello, and realizing that no one was coming to us any time soon, we proceeded to seat ourselves at the table of our desire. It took a while before the menus came.

Tables were quite close together, you could hear what the next table was talking about. Our table was so small (well, it was originally set for 4) that I couldn’t read the menu without possibly knocking over the array of glasses. Ha, and when the large dishes finally came, it became quite a juggling act.

The minestrone wasn’t worth the money, sad to say. It seemed like it came from a can, but the fresh vegetables were trying to hide the fact. It was ok, but not outstanding.

The minestrone needed some bread, but surprisingly, no house bread in this Italian resto. Just a few slender bread sticks which they obviously weren’t going to refill. We asked for some foccacia and was informed there was a separate charge for the balsamic vinegar and olive oil we so love to slather our bread in. Fine. The bread was acceptable (was it old?) but pricey – 40 pesos for a saucer-sized piece, plus additional 35 pesos for the vinegar and oil. We were edgy that it was actually olive oil as it was so pale and thin and tasteless, you wonder if its plain old coconut oil!

One more chance (drumroll)
Well, I was willing to still give them a chance. After all, we had ordered things we love.

The fresh spinach ravioli in white truffle sauce (ravioli tartufo). Ham and spinach in homemade ravioli with a cheesy white sauce. We haven’t yet ventured making our own pasta, so we wanted something to base our experimentations on. Sadly, it was the only thing we liked. The pasta was light, the spinach savory enough, and the sauce was its saving grace. Tried topping it with some grated parmesan, but it was a disaster! The parmesan tasted stale! And funnily, the rude waiter (more on that later) seemed to notice we were quite generous with it. He quickly whisked it away after we had done using it!

Now, the risotto frute de mare (seafood risotto). I LOVE risotto. It was tasty, and had just enough seafood bits in it. But surely ye jest that that was RISOTTO (I know it’s too expensive to use Arborio or some other Italian rice, but even a good malagkit would’ve done)! As a result, it wasn’t al dente, it was just a dried out lugaw. And I guess the bad parmesan was here too.

We usually order dessert, but in this case, was just so unimpressed, we passed.

Service, what service?
Compounding the mediocre Italian cuisine, was the generally terrible service. I told you about the lack of welcome already. While there are exceptions to the rule - one young waiter was polite and respectful as should be, carrying away our used dishes as needed. But one waiter who served us was discourteous and a brash loudmouth! Another rather old waiter – we asked the olive oil on - was equally disrespectful. We had the vague feeling of being harassed because of their curt replies to our queries. Hey, we are discriminating diners and we love to ask questions!

Highway robbery
About 800 pesos went to our little experiment, as we were reminded almost every step of the way by our penny-wise waiters. Oh, plus 6% surcharge for use of a credit card. Hmp. No, I wasn’t buying a washing machine or any appliance, I was paying for a meal!

Paying the bill (no we couldn’t bear to leave a tip), I think it would take wild horses to drag me back there. Now, here’s where Doreen Fernandez and I would disagree. I have no doubt that she was given the red carpet because God forbid bad reviews in a national newspaper. But even an ordinary diner like myself, shelling out my own hard-earned money … I deserve that treatment too. And don’t tell me any different.

I realize the harshness of the restaurant business. How does one strike a profit while staying true to the philosophy of feeding good food to its customers? But that’s not my problem, it’s Bellini’s.

Besides, the women’s bathroom smelled of cockroaches and the men’s was clogged. A restaurant’s bathroom says a lot. Think about it.

We’d earlier gone to Gateway and thinking back, we had willingly passed up Italianni’s to experience the pleasures of authentic, non-commercial Italian cuisine. Not to mention our cushy parking space next to a Lexus.