The food here is certainly the stand out however the service here could certainly use a positive lift. The staff appear to be stuck in the early stages of the depression with very little in the way of a smile to greet and receive guests.
Basic service etiquette wouldn’t dance astray at Maldinis.
We sat to an unturned table, no napkin, no cutlery....... no problem. The waiter planted the menus in front of us with no explanation as to where to locate the drinks menu and no attention to the specials of the evening.
We spotted the specials aboard the posts set up toward the roof and the drinks at the back of the food menu.
We ordered our drinks. The wine was served chilled in a wine cooler (with no ice) a taste was poured and the lid removed. Needless to say the wine had warmed over the course of our meal.
We followed our drinks order with the olives, sourdough and polenta/scallop starter. We received the entrees before requesting cutlery and napkins.
(An apology was offered) neither waiter or waitress had recognised this minor dilemma until we’d brought this to their attention.
The main courses followed some 15 minutes later (a nice break from the entrees) however our salad seemed to have been forgotten. We finished our meals and some ten minutes later our empties plates and cutlery were removed.
Our sparkling water was topped by us, as was the wine. No offer of dessert? So be it. We asked for a lid for the wine ,along with he bill. The bill was placed in front of us, and an ill fitting lid provided from the waitress fanny pocket.
The change was returned to the table, no smile, no how did you enjoy your meals simply the ol’ dump and run.
Sad really, the food here was good, exceptional actually, simple well prepared Italian, would we be back? Questionable based on the service or lack thereof. A shame really but hey if word of mouth echoes to indicate some service training has been provided to the staff? Then maybe ..... after all, the ambience atmosphere and quality are all there..... accompanying beverages are just as important to some patrons as the food, so take care and deliver the experience I’m sure the chef intend to offer his hungry guests. A note also the table two over was served beer in a can, the beer was poured into a flat sitting beer glass. 7/8 ths head to 1/8ths beer. I’d suggest he’d have passed on a top up.