La Villetta - Carta

"The food was acceptable and I ascribed an average rating to the food however, you can find much better at many Italian restaurants in cities like Toronto and New York and it is nothing exceptional or really that good. There are also better options in Tropea. In terms of the ambiance, part of the charm is dining in the small laneways and courtyards of Tropea however, here you are packed in so tightly with neighbouring diners that it is uncomfortable and not pleasant. Perhaps the food was just off that night for dinner, which can happen however, I wouldn 't recommend the restaurant and wouldn 't go back. If you do intend to try it, be forewarned, as this is what happened to us. There were four in our party, and while I do not speak Italian, my three fellow diners are all fluent in Italian, two of whom were native Italians, and one was actually born in Calabria, therefore, there was no language barrier. When we arrived, the owner spoke to us and encouraged us to all order the same thing or we were advised that the wait times would be long. This seemed odd unless they wanted to turn our 8pm table. We wanted to try different things and recognize that it takes time to prepare good food and told him we were fine with that. Then the waitress came over, who turned out to be the owner 's niece, who again, encouraged us to all order the same thing. So, we went through that again and she became petulant and told us we would be waiting for our food. We ordered wine, water, appetizers and mains and actually, two of us did order the same thing, pasta with half a small lobster off the menu for Euro 18, so remember that for later. We waited not too long and the mains arrived but no appetizers. Enquiries were made and we were told that we had ordered the appetizers to come after the main course which was preposterous and the appetizers were not salads. The waitress insisted that we had ordered otherwise and was prepared to vigorously debate the issue. So, a messed up order, which does happen from time to time, but not the end of the world so we cancelled the appetizers and drove on. After the meal, we decided to order coffee and dessert and one of my fellow diners and I enjoy Anice (which is an Italian liqueur) in our coffee. The waitress was asked in Italian if they had Anice and being assured they did, we ordered two. When the coffee arrived, I could immediately tell it was Sambuca and not Anice. I called the waitress back and asked her in English if she had put Sambuca in the coffee and not Anice. She answered back in English that it was indeed Anice and I told her it was not and I can tell the difference. Then her uncle comes over to see what the issue was. I explained it and he said that, in fact that they don 't have Anice and it was indeed Sambuca, while the waitress still wanted to die on the hill and maintain it was Anice. The uncle then offers to comp the coffees. I understand that mistakes get made but this annoyed me as it seemed that we had been deceived trice and the waitress had a problem with the truth. Rather a disappointing evening overall but the best was yet to come, when we asked for our cheque. Remember those two dishes of pasta with half a small lobster for Euro18 each? They were on our bill for Euro 45 each or Euro 90 for two plates, that weren 't even that good. We called the waitress over and pointed out the apparent mistake on the bill. We were told there was no mistake and that we had ordered extremely rare blue lobster with the pasta. I have been around the world a few times and had never heard of blue lobster and neither had anyone at my table and I would speculate that not many people reading this review would have ever heard of this either. Regardless, we didn 't order blue lobster , we ordered the Euro 18 plate from the menu. A spirited discussion in Italian ensued which eventually involved the chef. No ground was given. So, what do you do. Fight about a poor experience and the fact that you had just been gouged for 54 Euro 's, or pay by AMEX, thereby providing them with your credit card information, and then dispute it. No, you just pay it and just chalk it up to a life experience. It is not at all the money, it is the fact that we had been deceived and gouged. While you do unfortunately hear of tourists being taken advantage of, and we were all tourists from Toronto, three spoke fluent Italian and two were native Italians and we were still taken advantage of and we are all nice, respectful people. Now, back to the blue lobster . After a bit of research on the internet, I found that they do actually exist and are sighted slightly more regularly than white unicorns it is estimated that they occur once in every 2 million lobsters. Due to a genetic defect the lobster 's shell becomes a bright blue colour, which turns red when cooked like every other lobster. The lobster is perfectly safe to eat but tastes like any other lobster and they hail from the Western Atlantic, not the Mediterranean. I think that given that it is such rare beast that La Villetta should have shown us the electric blue shell before cooking it which I am sure they would have done if in fact it was a blue lobster but on that Monday night in Tropea we apparently were served a one in two million lobster (not). This is the first restaurant review or review of any kind that I have ever written as I never complain and just take my business elsewhere in the future, however, I felt I really needed to let people know what this experience was like so that people could be forewarned."