Valentina – Clapham Junction

Valentina have recently opened a Clapham Junction location. I have been to their Notting Hill location for a Unilocal event many moons ago and as I stepped in I was reminded of that night. The front is a shop and deli which allows you to pick up Italian foods. The back is a large Italian restaurant.
We came with a group of friends on New Years Eve for dinner. I had a main course of tagliatele and meat balls which (when it eventually came) left me completely full. They had an operations management nightmare with my meal which was at first forgotten, then incorrect before arriving when everyone had finished eating. It was annoying but the cost was taken off our bill without prompting. In spite of those issues I will definitely come back because the food was great.

We came here on New Year’s Eve and it was great. I ordered cauliflower lasagne and chicken. Big portions, reasonable prices.
They lost my husband’s order and then brought him the wrong pasta. That was somewhat annoying but they did comp him his food.
I will definitely be back!
Oh, and another plus – the blue leather benches are super plush and cozy.

When I heard that Valentina was opening I was quite happy about it, I have been to some of their other restaurants and had decent experiences. From the outside the newly decorated restaurant with the Deli shop looks great and a vast improvement on what came before. However the restaurant was a huge disappointment. The food was not that special, it was tasty and well cooked but it is ultimately the service and attitude that lets this place down. Our waiter for the evening was quite abrupt and was very dismissive, we had to ask him three times for our bottle of water that we ordered at the same time as our bottle of wine. He informed us that the kitchen was out of rocket, so this would be missing from everything we ordered but never offered us any alternatives. He delivered half of our starters at the same time as our mains, again we had to ask him if these had been ordered and he dismissed us because he said he was very busy. When we placed the booking we informed the receptionist that it was my friends birthday dinner, she mentioned that as it was a special celebration they would deliver a round of prosecco on the house… Unfortunately when I mentioned this to the waiter he had no knowledge of this. I would of been happy to leave it at that and mark it down as a bit of miscommunication, however our waiter then went to the manager who after consulting returned and demanded to see my friends ID to prove it was his birthday as we could have been lying to him. Once the ID was displayed he didn’t apologise and said he had never heard of anything like free prosecco but would give it to us just this once. I tried to play it down but it was highly embarrassing especially with other diners in earshot. Overall this place could do with a serious look at the level of service they offer, there are some really great restaurants in Clapham and if they don’t change they way they treat customers they may struggle to have returns.