Poorer than poor! & thankfully the view is great!

This restaurant calls itself "authentic Italian" but there is nothing Italian about it.

The owner was at the restaurant and he came over to our table to tells us that he was suing James Cameron because he stole his idea for Avatar. That is the only time he came to our table and he was not even friendly.

We ordered four main courses for lunch and one appetizer. We waited approximately 45 minutes for our food and when we got it, it was already cold. We had to go back to work so we didn't want to send our plates back to the kitchen to be put in the microwave.

I ordered lasagna = the worst lasagna ever. I make real lasagna being Italian. Another colleague ordered a pizza and it was even worse, if you can believe it, another one order a chicken sandwich with fries and he got a chicken quesadilla with about 10 fries and the chicken was pretty dried. And finally another one order a Cesar Salad and it was a tiny salad.

If I could have given 0 on the rating I would have but I guess if I say poor at everything that pretty well says it all. Thankfully the view was spectacular on this particular day because it was really sunny.

At the end the server came to asked us how everything was, I said, I'm sorry to say it but this is the worst lasagna I have ever had and none of us were pleased with the food. She was shocked - she clearly has never tasted the food there and if she has, she clearly needs the job. So after we gave her our opinion, she went to talk to the owner of the restaurant and we imagined she gave him our rating. He looked at us and shrug it off and just wave his hand like saying "I don't care!" (that pretty much is clear that he doesn't care about the food he serves). In my past experiences when I gave that kind of rating to the server and she/he relays that message to they manager; the manager comes over offers his apologies and perhaps invites me to come again and give me a discount. NOT THE CASE in this experience.

The prices were extremely high for what we had, Cesar Salad with no chicken is $11, lasagna $16 with no salad, small salad for $7. I almost didn't leave a tip but I knew it was not the server's fault so I left 10% and that's still pretty generous. Ah and we never got the appetizer!

The main reason for giving a poor review is for bad and tasteless food, our experience as a group was not the greatest and the prices are just too high for the food quality and service, specially by the owner.

The Bellaggio at the Vancouver Convention Centre is an inviting space with wonderful views of the harbour. The restaurant is family friendly and the staff are welcoming. The space has a lounge and a dining area both with fair-sized tables and comfortable seating.

The Bellaggio boasts a decent wine list with selections from British Columbia, California, Italy, and France. The price range for their wine list is $27 to $145 per bottle. They also serve wine by the glass.

Had I patroned the Bellaggio for a glass of wine and a window seat, I may have had a wonderful experience. Unfortunately, I actually ordered from their menu. The food that was served to me was neither authentic nor Italian; it was a poor approximation and although the server - the only one in the restaurant for Sunday lunch service - was wonderful, I have to give this experience an overall rating of horrible, simply because the food was so exceptionally bad.

THE BRUSCHETTA SAMPLER ($12.00)
The bruschetta sampler was advertised as a combination of bruschetta di pomodori and bruschetta di funghi. I don't know what came to the table, but it was not bruschetta.

The server brought six pieces of white, uncooked flatbread with some toppings. The commercial flatbread was not baked, grilled, or warmed in any way and had a chewy, sticky consistency. The "pomodori" were crudely diced field tomatoes with no salt, no garlic, no basil, no olive oil, tossed onto the chewy flatbread and accented with two dime-sized squirts of reduced balsamic.Having used under ripened field tomatoes, the taste was acidic and flavourless. But the "funghi" were even worse. The bruschetta di funghi was canned button mushrooms spread over the uncooked commercial flatbread! Canned button mushrooms on top of uncooked flatbread -- it was so bad, I have describe this twice.

PIZZA SOPRESSATA ($14.99)
A twelve inch thin crust pizza with salami, cheese, and artichoke. The menu name may have been the "Soprano" but in any case, the kitchen butchered this pizza in cold blood. It was a crime to serve this pizza. Our server mentioned that the pizza was a thin crust pizza prepared in the "traditional" way. I assume she was referring to the traditional way pizza is cooked in a dorm room. When this dish came to the table I thought the server had made a mistake on the order.

A thin crust pizza must be cooked on a deck that is at least 500 degrees Fahrenheit. This pizza looked like it was baked in a plate warmer. The cheese was so slowly over-cooked that it was hard. What little pomodori sauce there was, was tasteless. The "sopressata" was standard deli meat and there was one canned artichoke heart cut into four pieces an strewn on top of the pizza. There were still inedible pieces of fibrous artichoke leaf that I had to spit out. Each piece of pizza was so limp that it flopped over when I picked it up; the cooking technique on the pizza was so poorly executed that the pizza slice couldn't stand on its own, not even with the help of orthotics and a cane.

After a walk on the seawall, my friend and myself stopped at the Bellaggio to take advantage of the 12$ pizza deal. The restaurant was quite busy for a Saturday afternoon. We opted to sit in the bar area where there were higher chairs to take full advantage of the views. The service was very good, our server was a friendly girl who helped us deicing on what to get.
We shared the salmon lox appetizer then shared the all meat pizza and a chicken and pesto pizza. The Pizza was incredible a thin crust which is my new favorite style of and for 12$ they are outstandingly great value.
As it was Saturday we indulged in martini's which were on special offer.
All in all, the experience was enjoyable and the service extremely friendly and welcoming. But most of all to get such a tasty and delicious Pizza in Vancouver for 12$ is what makes the Bellaggio my new favorite pizza place.