D’Novo Restaurant

Nice vegetarian menu. Good freshly made pasta with mouth watering sauces. Enjoyed very much. Will visit again

Good food. Expensive but the appetizers were delicious. The main course was ok. I ordered dry pasta and didn’t find it amazing but the Beet Salad were good.

I went to a party here last year, and called recently to inquire about pricing and availability. I spoke with Marcos (who is apparently the chef) and he promised to email me prices. I never received them, so I called and talked to a girl who took down my number and promised Marco would call back in 30 minutes! A day later and I’m still waiting. I guess they don’t need my business, and I will be sure to discourage others from going here as well.

Absolutely love this place. Pasta is always fresh and authentic. Roasted beet salad was amazing. The goat cheese complimented the beautifully cooked beets perfectly. I ordered the stambocca chicken, and it was amazing. Prosciutto was crispy and the chicken was perfectly prepared. However, I do wish the service was faster. Food took about an hour to come out. Our waitress was very helpful and was patient with our questions. Great experience overall.

nice and friendly place. on weekends they have live music. tasty food and reasonable prices. the owner is very creative. i liked his idea of combining theater performance in the nearby place with the donner in his restaurant. one suggestion is to embelish somehow the interior of the place. it looks quite bland and simple.

The pasta was excellent, and the salad was very fresh. They really know their pasta sauces. The pizza was mediocre, there’s better places in town for pizza. I’d definitely order delivery again from this place. I hope they make it, because they’re in a horrible location.

My brother and I took my grandmother out for dinner to D’Novo. The service wasn’t the best; the waitress asked if we wanted more bread and then didn’t bring it over. Also, when our meals came out she asked if we wanted fresh pepper or parm cheese and when we responded yes, she left both of them on the table for us to serve ourselves. HOWEVER, all that aside, I had their daily special seafood risotto. It was the best seafood dish I’ve had in a long time. The clams, shrimp, calamari and muscles were very fresh! The risotto was cooked to perfection. I gave this restaurant 5 stars bc I believe a restaurant shouldn’t be downgraded based on service (you never know what’s happening in your servers life); the food was something to brag about. I left a very happy customer and would definitely recommend it to others.

Not impressed, was there for a party, service beyond slow, some dinners never came. Front of the house not full, so not sure what the holdup .My steak dinner. Was just ok.
Probably wouldn’t go back, especially if it’s for a catered event.

Had lunch today. Everything was great. Even though the server had not yet come in, the cook was very accommodating and handled everything professionally. The food was excellent and everyone enjoyed it. The calamari was beautifully prepared, fresh and tender. The salad was fresh and the soup delicious. My friend raved about her rigatoni and peas. We order from them for delivery often and are never disappointed.

My husband and I were crestfallen when chef/​owner Marcos Calle’s restaurant Felice closed after a long and successful presence in Oradell, NJ. We, like countless others, sorely miss Calle’s innovative interpretations to classic Italian fare coupled with exemplary service in a congenial environment. So, we traveled from Bergen County to check out his newest eatery, D’Novo Restaurant, in Metuchen. We were delighted to discover that D’Novo Restaurant continues the Calle tradition of excellence in serving up scrumptious Italian cuisine. We will make the journey again and again!

I ate the Farfalle with salmon and asparagus in vodka sauce and it was delicious. I was here with a large group and they were very accommodating. It is a BYOB so that is another plus! Their complimentary tomato bread is a nice touch and very good! A great Italian restaurant and I cant wait to go back!

D’novo is honestly one of the best Italian restaurants I’ve ever been to! The pizza is perfectly crisp and delightful! I personally recommend the bruschetta pizza! I’m extremely picky once it comes to my pasta, I prefer it al dente. I told the waitress to specifically tell chef Marcos to make my pasta perfect and he didn’t fail to amaze me! Hands down one of the best chefs around! I look forward to visiting here again! Such a warm and welcoming environment!

Highly enjoyed lunch. Had the Stracciatella soup and chicken Milanese which I highly recommend. Light lunch that was very flavorful. Will be back soon and will start ordering delivery from here regularly.

Third, maybe fourth time eating here… and I really want to like it and want them to succeed. So this will be more a plea to mgt than a review. Ditch the lighting, it is so un-​nerving my wife will not come back and she likes the food. She says it looks like a bad disco… my buddy says a strip club.
Last night… no meat on the entrée menu? Just chicken and fish, which is okay but c’mon how about some bolognese sauce or a piece of veal… or beef?
Espresso machine was broken… again?
Again, your pasta is terrific, price is so reasonable. Look, Metuchen has lost two Italian restaurants in the past couple of months, this is an opportunity to take over. For me the perfect combo would be Torino’s location, décor and service (those guys are the best!) and your food. You would rule the world.

Went back again to one of our favorite new restaurants. The hostess seated us promptly and then our server Erin came to take our drink order and told us the specials. Then Chef Marcos stopped by our table to say hello and tell us about a special ravioli appetizer he was offering, after the description we both had to order it.
We shared a Caesar salad and then had the ravioli and it was delicious. We both ordered pasta, I had the Fettuccine Alfredo w/​lobster meat, sun dried tomatoes, and zucchini and my fiancé had the Cavatelli w/​kale pesto, fresh ricotta, and string beans. Both were made with fresh pasta which is always the best. As usual everything was great but I think I ate less then half and brought the rest home because this time I was determined I was going to have desert! I’m glad I left room, they had a special Banana flambé crêpe and it was delicious.
All in all another great evening at D’Novo

As customary of Unilocal reviews, I want to write about the food. However, I can’t because I didn’t get to taste any. I’ve never written a negative review on Unilocal before, but this was the worst customer service I’ve ever experienced.
We came on a Friday night and the place was pretty full, which is usually a promising sign. I was in a party of 3 and they seated us on the pizza-​side of the restaurant because the wait would have been very long. We ordered bruschetta and pasta. After the bruschetta came out we did not see or hear from any staff again for an hour. When a couple sat down next to us and got their pizza within 10 minutes, their waiter mentioned something to the owner because we saw the owner yelling at our waitress and gesturing to our table.
I think if the waitress or owner came over to apologize, our experience would have been salvaged. However, not only did the waitress pretend nothing was wrong, she told us our food would be out in 3 minutes (10 minutes later, still no food). Finally, my boyfriend walked over to the owner and asked what was going on. The owner, without saying a word, turned around and walked to the kitchen. My boyfriend was left standing there not knowing whether we should wait for a check, so we put down money to cover the bruschetta and left. We even got some comments from people waiting for their takeout that they were shocked at how we were treated.
Anyone who conducts a business this way should not be in customer service.

A beautiful night out, turned into a night of inexpressible dissapointment. I was with a rather intimate group of people who were all very hungry and very excited to try a restaurant we had heard was «out of this world». They were absolutely correct… but not in a good way.
If hunger is the best spice, this place is about as hopeless as a bounty hunter in a sarlacc. Not only did we wait about an hour and a half for the food to come out, the reason according to the manager was because they were preparing my girlfriends pesto without nuts, but the wait didn’t even make the food taste better. The pesto without nuts was just no pesto, which means the dish was just pasta with string beans. The linguine papadillo (or whatever it was called… pasta with meat sauce) tasted as if the canned sauce was infused with undercooked ground beef and pasta that was almost too soggy to pick up with a fork. And the chicken, oh lord the chicken, it tasted EXACTLY like the single serve Italian seasoned chicken from perdue. I would’ve been a bit more sympathetic if they had done something creative with the darn dish but all they did to make it nut free was exclude the main ingredient of the dish… after the waiter had talked to the chef to ensure that he could make a nut free pesto. Sigh… and all of this is just made worse by the overly expensive dishes and small portions.
This is what you get from a restaurant that is attached to a pizza place… actually no, because most of them are delicious. I would only come here again if I craved disappointment and I would only send somebody, if I had a deep dislike for them. I’m honestly shocked this place has such a good rating, but then I figured they probably rated themselves…

My Husband and I visited D’Novo when they were opened just 3 weeks. Not only was the food delicious the service was outstanding. We were made to feel very welcomed by the owners and wait staff. When we left we knew we would return very soon. I did just that returning for a Ladies Lunch a few weeks laterPlan to return on a Saturday evening in the very near future with a group of friends.
Highly recommend D’Novo.

Seriously unimpressed. First off, the menu is practically unavailable online. I think I either found it on facebook or here. Went with the D’Novo pizza, which says all veg and all meat with goat cheese and mozz. Probably should have asked what «all» meant, because I hate olives and they were everywhere. The real selling point was the goat cheese, which neither me nor my wife could taste. That aside, it was just not good pizza in a town with 10 other pizzerias.
The calamari was all tubes and tasted very fishy. The breading was mealy and practically falling off the fish. The marinara was probably the best part of the meal, and an important part of Italian cooking for sure, but not enough to make up for the bad calamari. The other sauce, I couldn’t even tell you what it was supposed to be. It was brown, maybe peanut? It was a sauce I couldn’t decide if I liked or not the more I ate it. Weird.
Also ordered a caesar salad. They dressed it for a pick up. I live 3 minutes away, so it didn’t wilt the lettuce, but if you live any further just skip ordering salad or you will get home to a clump of dressing soaked green mush.

Be sure to check this place out! Even though they have only been open a couple of months the food and service were 5 star worthy. Be sure to try the eggplant and mozzarella appetizer. My friends each had one of the homemade pastas; I had the special risotto — all were so good we were torn between finishing it and saving some to take home.
Can’t wait to return and work our way through the menu.