Ottawa Foodies

Mangia used to be my favourite restaurant in the market, and we found them incredible and quaint and with wonderful food and good service.

(Here's where the HOWEVER comes in):

However, about two months ago, after they reopened their doors, we decided to check out their patio. I ordered the gazpacho to start and the mussels and frites as my main, my partner ordered one of their pizzas.

The gazpacho came quite quickly and was the most divine thing that I have tasted all summer. It oozed of tomato goodness and hints of cilantro and maybe even a bit of mint, topped with good olive oil. It took us about 15 to 20 minutes to eat a small bowl, we were savouring it so much.

A good forty-five minutes later, our food still hadn't arrived, and there had been no explanation from the waitress (and they weren't particularly busy). Over an hour into our "meal", the food finally arrived and the waitress spilled the frites and much of the mussel sauce all over the table. It took them another 15 minutes to bring me another plate of frites, by which point I was finished my mussels and didn't feel much like eating the frites alone. My partner's pizza was cold--not cool, cold--and was missing two of the ingredients--fresh oregano and sundried tomato. How do you forget TWO ingredients? When we mentioned this to the server, she muttered something about dessert on the house, and brought us dessert menus. We told her that we were planning on going to a movie, but since the service was so slow we had missed it. At that point, instead of apologizing and offering us something for next time, or taking something off the bill (which I don't agree with usually, but in this instance!!!), she told us that since we missed the movie, we should simmer down and have some dessert. I believe we threw down $40 and left.

Outside of the gazpacho it was the single worst dining experience I have had in Ottawa. I like to enjoy my meal. But I don't like to wait an hour for it to show up.

A nice quaint restaurant with good service. My husband always orders the spaghetti with veal meatballs and I've enjoyed their linguine with chicken. I had another one of their pastas which I found to be very salty but I suppose that was to be expected since it had olives in it.
Their Greek salad is AMAZING. The feta cheese is the creamiest you've ever tasted and the touch of fresh mint had me running to the supermarket the next day to duplicate the taste and aroma.
They serve complimentary bread that is warm and fresh. It really does have that 'family restaurant' feel.
Even if you're not in the market, it's worth a trip down to see for yourself.