Al Vesuvio

Oh my gosh! The pizza was so good! While we were visiting the Dublin area we ate here several times. After living in Germany for 27 years and now the states I’d forgotten how good real Italian food is! The place was clean. The food was great! And the service friendly. We even had my birthday dinner there and they treated me like a queen! Loved the pasta dishes we tried too! Would love to go there again the next time we are in country.

Very good pizza. Coffee and tiramisú high quality. Excellent service too. Authentic italian food, approved by an italian.

The Diavolo pizza is one of the best pies I’ve ever had, and I’ve lived in New Haven CT! So simple, yet so delicious, it’s way more than the sum of its parts. Delivery is always prompt.

Very busy cramped little Italian restaurant where Dublin 2 intersects Dublin 4 along the canal. We made reservations for 12 and they were able to put several tables together to accommodate us at lunchtime. The staff is very friendly and efficient.
They have an brick oven for pizza and bread. I ordered the pizza and it was very good. Some of our friends ordered the pasta and said it was delicious and it did look very good. The price was moderate. But since I have found Monelli’s in Rathgar I am hooked! If you’re in the area this is not a bad place to eat.

Ordered a margherita pizza and it was pretty good. The base, sauce and cheese were good but unfortunately they used dried basil which is just not as nice as fresh. Service was good and it wasn’t that expensive.

After reading previous reviews I seriously contemplated going to another pizza joint 15 minutes away but luckily, after a day of exploring Dublin my poor body was too tired to walk anywhere but the 100m walk to get Al Vesuvio.
And I am so glad I did.
My partner and I were seated right away, in a fairly small dining room. It is nowhere near as tiny as previous posts suggest, however if you do plan on coming with a group I would probably book in advance.
The atmosphere is quite lovely too, quite intimate with the smells from the kitchen wafting through.
So now to the food. My partner ordered the margharita and myself, the diavolo. Both pizzas came out reasonably quickly and were piping hot from the stone oven.
The pizzas were absolutely delicious. A super thin crust, with fresh chilli and bits of hot salami on top of the diabolical. The only thing I did not find impressive was the lack of fresh basil on the margherita. If it a going to make up one third of the toppings if NEEDS to be fresh.
Take the option for the chilli oil too– it is a light and fruity oil with a hint of heat afterwards– just delicious with the crust!
For two filling pizzas and a drink each our bill came to € 32. Certainly worth the visit and a great pizza I’ll be using to compare future pizza meals to.
I was also impressed by the attentiveness and friendliness of the staff. Whilst busy, they certainly tried their best and I enjoyed our servers friendly and inviting manner– in my view it always makes my dining experience that little bit better! :)

Using the metrics among other Italian restaurants I experienced in Dublin, this is my rating. I might go for another ½ star but then there are few lack of imperfections here that balances my judgement into a full 3 stars. It is an ok restaurant.
I live far from this restaurant so we decided to go there due an online deal that allowed us to get 2 starters and 2 mains or pizzas at 24 Euro. So what the heck! We gave it a try on a Saturday evening.
If you are going there with a car, despite I am not familiar with parking spaces in the area, there is one along the canal (you have to pay till 19:00 Mon-​Sat). Please pay attention that on the same spot there is a parking area for coaches where after 19:00 they clamp your car. So check the boundaries painted on the road. I saw some cars clamped on my way back. Not a good digestive! :-)
Environment is cosy with dramatic stone wall, but eating area is small. In my opinion there are too many tables and it gets difficult to walk there, avoiding to touch other patrons jackets or chairs, if for example, you need to go to the toilet.
Entering the premise you feel you came into a take away place, than you realize there is a corridor that goes to the eating area.
When we came in there were 3 people in front of the door. One presumably the manager (who didn’t introduce himself) greeted us. Then a waitress brought us to our table in the corner of the room and just left. As we purchased the voucher we weren’t quite sure what we could order so afer a while she came back and we asked.
I ordered Fried Calamari for starter and Calzone Vesuvio for main. This is the classic Italian folded pizza with tomato, cooked ham, mushrooms.
Fried squid were little bit too oily. Tartar sauce was really good but small. I would have enjoyed more with some few calamari. The batter was not thick nor consistent. I would have appreciated more batter around. This is a common problem in restaurant where they don’t give too much attention to the batter and calamari itself haven’t dried properly before putting into the batter.
Calzone was too gummy. I would have enjoyed better a little crunchy feeling. I have been trying to order calzone in every restaurant I go but still cannot find the one :-)
I tried a slice of pizza from my wife but again was little bit too gummy dough. I suppose it is the way the regular customers or Irish customers like the pizza, so I cannot blame anybody.
I haven’t counted with my wrist watch but we experience a delay between starters and main.
I almost forgot to write that due to lack of management skills on the tables area, after we finished our starters, we had asked to move to another table :-) This was not certainly the end of the World so we laughed a bit about it :-)
We ordered 2 Italian beers but also asked for tap water. Unfortunately tap water taste clorine so even you put a whole lemon in it still taste like a swimming pool :-D
If you wanna give it a try, I advise you to not book on Saturday as it is really busy and room is small.

If you are in the mood for Italian food in Dublin, this place is great and affordable. Service was great, good variety of Italian red wines. The pasta is homemade fresh and they use the freshest ingredients.
I had the pasta carbonara, the pasta was not over cooked and the ham on it was divine. My husband had the pizza and that was a large pizza with an amazing crust cooked to perfection. The restaurant is mainly known for pizza, the individual pizzas are large, they use very few ingredients which makes their pizzas taste amazing.

Ok ok, I’m Italian and I hate to eat Italian food outside my country … But I have to say that is not bad at all. The owner is obviously Italian. Pasta e pizza are good (try the calzone or penne alla vodka) and the price is absolutely acceptable. Good service

I wouldn’t say that Al Vesuvio is the best or most authentic Italian restaurant in Dublin, but it’s a good’un for when you’re going out for lunch with the office and want to keep things cheap enough.
All of us were happy with our meals –by no means amazing quality, but all of us were happy with our meals for the price we were paying! Nice and friendly staff too!

Maybe 2 and half stars? It should really stick to what it is good at — the pizza, which is lovely and thin. However, starters such as the school canteen-​style soup served in horrible basic school canteen-​style bowls do not fly with me! I always think a soup says a whole lot about a place. It has to be the easiest thing to make. If you can’t get that right, and are so scabby you have to water it down further… It speaks volumes about the laziness of the staff/​managers/​owners. My friend’s ravioli wasn’t too great either, and her mozzarella tomato starter… Again how can you get something so simple, so wrong?!

We ordered delivery using Just Eat from Al Vesuvio, two starters and two mains for 30.50 EUR inc delivery.
The garlic bread was ok. The chicken wings were ok, but the sauce was no where near how the menu described them: «served in our famous hot sauce». The sauce was sweet if anything, but not spicy in any way.
For main courses Al Vesuvio go for quantity over quality. For 8 EUR the pasta portions are very generous and appears to be good value, but the Bolognese sauce on my spaghetti was very bland. When I pay for it, expect it to be just as good if not better than the SpagBol I make at home.
My partners main was also bland; it was meant to have chilies in it, but again it was not spicy nor hot in any way. Neither of us ate much of our main dishes.
Driver went to wrong address also, so my main dish needed to be reheated. It can happen and driver was very apologetic, but we gave full address and very clear instructions with order to avoid this. I probably would have forgiven this if the food was any good.
An expensive, mediocre and disappointing meal.

Excellent. Best Italian in Dublin, I’ve never had pizza as good in Ireland, pasta, antipasto all really good, and a great selection of Italian wines. Go with the tomassino.
The staff are friendly and attentive, and even if you sit there for an hour after finishing your dinner they never try to push you out no matter how busy it is.
I can’t speak highly enough of this great authentic Italian restaurant.

The food here is great. It reminded me of food I’d eaten in Italy. .. which I guess it is given the place appears to be run by Italians. We had spaghetti carbonara and pizza and both were delicious The eating area bigger than it looks from the street and is super clean and nicely set up. While a bit squeezed, it’s not too loud. I’d go back if I needed a place with a large menu and reliable quality.

Came here for lunch, great lunch deals first of all. e10.95 for a starter and a main was great! Seated straight away, no waiting around. Soup was amazing! Real flavour, and a genuine Italian taste. The main course came shortly after and I have to say this was one of the nicest pizzas I’ve had in a long time. So simple, yet so fresh and well done. There was genuine effort put into cooking it and you can tell!
Staff were very friendly too and the waitress was more than willing to help. The only downside is that I had to rush a little as I was on lunch but will definitely be back, and would recommend this place to anybody in the area for lunch time.

Friendly staff and excellent food. I’ll definitely come back.

Awesome pizza, I really recommend the on with rocket and prosciutto.
Not very expensive and it was recommended to me by a ton of Italians!
Can it get better?