Not too impressed with Delizia (Restaurant is permanently closed)

Note that this restaurant is permanently closed!

A while back I wrote a review of the restaurant City Brasserie og Vinbar (see the review on this link) and I said that it was always empty when I was there and I didn’t understand the concept. Well, the following week the restaurant was closed as it when bankrupt and a new place opened soon after. The location is still perfect as it is located in the middle of Skagen in downtown Stavanger and this time the place is called Delizia and they serve Spanish tapas and Argentinean food. I was actually present when the restaurant opened and I was hoping that I would get to taste some of their specialties but instead we just got some really boring and simple tapas and it was impossible to get an impression what the food would be like in the restaurant. At least there was a free flow of champagne and wine ;-) Actually in the end we got so hungry that we went to the restaurant itself on the opening night and ordered some food but that was a disaster as it took like an hour to get the food. But I don’t blame them as it was opening night.
Just a week or so I went out to eat with my family and I decided to give Delizia a new chance. On the entrance door and on their Facebook page it states that they are open on a Sunday so I sent them an e-mail saying that I wanted a table but I got no feedback. I should have called of course but when I got to the restaurant it was very closed indeed an no one picked up the phone when I called. I got a reply the following day by mail saying that they had reserved a table for me on Monday night.
Again we decided to give them a new chance and we went there on a Friday evening before going to the movies and I did not make a booking in advance. I don’t know if this place is jinxed or what but when we got there it was basically empty with only like 6 other people in the restaurant – maybe most people come later on at night. The menu is split into an Argentinean section and a Spanish tapas section. After being in Madrid recently I think it will be hard to surpass the tapas we had there so we looked at other options. I decided to go for chicken confit but in my menu there was a small pen doodle next to it so I thought someone had just played around with a pen. On Nikki’s menu there was a pink marker on top of the same thing. When the waiter came over to take our order it turned out that the chicken confit was not available. Come on guys – if you are not serving this anymore you should try to cover up the menu item in other ways. Nikki went for lamb chops and I decided to go for the mixed paella as a replacement for the chicken confit.
The paella was served at the table which was a nice touch. The waiter came in with a paella pan and he put the paella on a plate for me at the table – and it contained horse mussel (blåskjell), chicken pieces, shrimp and it looked quite good. It would have been even better if it was served on a hot plate to keep it warm longer. The paella was quite good but a bit on the salty side - but even if it was bright yellow I could not smell or taste any saffron and that is a bit strange. Nikki was quite happy with her lamb chops. When we wanted to pay the bill we had to wait for a while as there was only one guy working on serving the few guests that were there. But at the time when we wanted to pay he came out with a paella dish for another table and it took him a while to prepare the dish.
So to conclude: I have only had a couple of meals there and so far I have not been very impressed. And it annoys me a bit when I find something on the menu that I really want to have and it is not available anymore – if it is permanently unavailable you should mark it properly in the menu. It also looks like the menu displayed online is not the same menu as we got at the restaurant! The prelude to the visit was not that positive either with the confusion about opening hours (are they open on Sundays or not?) and the online reservation form is not very impressive. I’m not sure what the problem is with this place – as mentioned earlier it has one of the best locations in Stavanger but still restaurants fails to succeed. Maybe it is the layout of the place and that makes people a bit confused about whether this is a bar, lounge or a restaurant. You can read more about the restaurant on their homepage http://www.deliziabar.no/.
Regards
Gard
gardkarlsen.com – trip reports and pictures