Nov 21, 2010

Fat Angelo's

Profile

                   No. 28, SōngRén Rd, Sinyi District
Phone #:   02-8729-2741
Website: http://www.bellavita.com.tw/store.php?d=4
Price Range:   $$$
Accepts Credit Cards: no
Attire: casual
Good for kids: yes
Take out: yes
Waiter Service: yes
Outdoor seating:  no
Alcohol: yes

Rating

Food Quality: 4 out of 5
Decor:  4 out of 5
Service: 3.5 out of 5
Overall: 3.83 out of 5
Recommendation: Thin crust pizza in swanky food court.

Review
My newest area of interest is the Bella Vita food court. It is probably the best food court i've seen in Taiwan, and it made me delay the exploration of the Taipei 101 food court, which is very much like all the other food courts around the island. The variety the Bella Vita food court has to offer is wide, and the quality is set at a high bar. I appreciate the different designs put into each restaurant of the food court, so that each space has its own theme.  The first restaurant I tried is Fat Angelo's. It is a Italian restaurant that has a brick oven for their selection of thin crust pizzas (~600 NT for 12"), pasta's (~400NT), or sandwiches (~250NT). The seating is not so comfortable, the decor is quaint, and the service is sort of slow. The seating at this food court is improved if you choose to sit down at "We Share Everything" which is like a posh general dining area, where the servers will order your food at an restaurant at the food court, and bring it to you. But to fully show the theme and surroundings of each restaurant I will insist on being seated at the restaurant space.
The decor of this food court restaurant gets a high rating for their use of Italian artifacts, faux stucco, and brick wall. The only downside is their seating is usually bar top, or a very uncomfortable stool-surrounded small table. For food court standards, this is pretty dope. They also have a decent selection of beverages to go with your meal. The servers were somehow very slow, and the food did not come out fast enough even though there were only about 10 people dining at the time. Their service gets docked points because of that, and also for the ludricrous fact that they ruined our order of cheese covered brocolli by burning it in the oven. Extremely unprofessional service/food prep staff. They only asked if we wanted to change our order instead of offering something for free because they delayed our meal...not cool.
The bread they offer here is better than your average bread in Taiwan. Its crispy and oily on the outside, but extremely soft and moist on the inside. And naturally, goes very well with butter. We also got a side of salad with our order of our Meat Lover's Pizza, but forgot to take a picture of it. It was a very dismissable salad, and I still wonder why the Taiwanese love to have big pieces of leaves for their salad? I hate the fact that i need to chomp my salad leaf by leaf instead of being able to fork up a combination of lettuce and other fixins with each individual bite. Is there something unlucky about cutting up lettuce leaves into smaller bites that I don't know about?

Besides the ruined brocolli and cheese, we ordered creamed spinach for our side. There was nothing to complain about this side, it was adequately creamy and flavorful. The spinach seemed fresh and not overcooked. It was topped by a layer of fragrant cheese, and it was a good appetizer.
The meatlovers pizza was kind of weak though. Sure they had 4 types of meats on the pizza, but it lacked the heartiness I would expect from a meat lover pizza. They meticulously only place one pepperoni on each slice, the ham was not fatty enough, and the sausages were ground up that you didn't get that meaty bite to it. They also skimped on the cheese. They need to put 2x more cheese make this pizza so much better; even So Free pizza was cheesier than this. I really expected more out of this, but its just a better than the average pizza. Sure beats Pizza Hut or Dominos, but nothing to bring home to momma.

4 comments:

Joan H said...

Look forward to your reviews of the various bellavita food court eats... I found my experience extremely underwhelming, especially for the price but maybe there are some gems there. The 1 piece of pepperoni per slice is kind of sad for a meat lovers pizza though. And usually I find you're lucky to even get a "sorry" even if a restaurant makes a mistake in Taiwan, much less something for free.

Johnny said...

Yeah...I have a feeling its a whole floor of pricey slightly better than average food. Such a pity, since it really is a nice dining space for food court standards.

Mike said...

Interesting review! I saw they have a new head chef (not sure where he is from, looks Italian or something) I work in the area and used to go there, but hadn't been for a while because the food got worse, but I went back with some friends and it seems to be pretty jacked up, the food is better, the service is still kind of slow but better anyway!!

Johnny said...

Thanks for your comment~ It's been about 2 years since I've visited so it's great to hear that things over there are getting a little better. I still rather spend the same money at CPK or fifteen napoletana tho~

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