La Vita E Bella (Permanently Closed)

I love the atmosphere of this restaurant. It is small and a little out of the way in downtown Calgary, but the dining space is so warm and inviting that I would highly recommend checking it out.

Our waitress was lovely and extremely knowledgeable about the menu choices, including the specials, and I wound up ordering based on her recommendation. I was not disappointed.

The dish I ordered, was a lobster pasta, with a delicious Alfredo cream sauce. The sauce was unique, and a delight to the taste buds. They were also not at all skimpy with the lobster, as I find most places are with seafood pastas​.

I am by no means a light eater, but the meal was so filling, that I was unable to finish more than half of my portion.

I will most definitely be returning here on my future trips to Calgary, and I would encourage any lover of Italian food to do the same!

Three of us had a wonderful experience here on a Friday night. We sat close to the bar which was a quiet spot. Staff were very friendly and helpful. When a more private table became available before we began dinner they offered to move us there without us inquiring just to make us even more comfortable. Service was quick and the food was delicious. There was complimentary bread with oil and Balsamic for dipping, the kale salad was marvelous and the pasta was extremely fresh and filling. We will be returning.

We dined back in early February on a Wednesday night. The food was great, but the service was a different story. The waitress was nice and pleasant all night until the end of the meal. My friend had bought cupcakes to surprise me for my birthday. I guess she had given them to the waitress to keep in the fridge, hoping to serve them at the end of our dinner. There was a misunderstanding as I think the waitress told my friend that the restaurant policy was to charge a plating fee if she was to serve the cupcakes. My friend misunderstood, and thought that it would be fine if we just didn't use their dessert plates/cutlery when it came time to bring the cupcakes out. As we sat at the table eating the cupcakes, the waitress rudely came up to the table and announced to the entire party that the point was not to just eat the cupcakes without the plates, but that we shouldn't be eating them at all in the restaurant if we didn't want to pay the plating fee.

I understand if this was the restaurant policy; however the waitress did not have to rudely announce it to the whole table. It was clearly a misunderstanding to which we apologized for, but the least she could have done was to politely pull my friend or anyone aside and let them know. The restaurant was empty at this point, we were the only ones around, and we had spent a significant amount of money ordering wine, appetizers, and mains. If she wanted to maintain any level of customer service and retention for the future, she should have handled it better. On top of it all, after we all paid our bills, she never once said thank you, went to the back of the restaurant, and didn't even see us out when we left.

If not for this poor taste left in my mouth, I would have gladly come back, but there are too many good restaurants in this city for me to return to a place where we were treated this way.

Phenomenal! By far the best Italian restaurant in the city. The food is fantastic and so is the service. Had a party of 10 last Saturday and could not have been happier. Will be back.

Excellent homemade pasta! We arrived before the kitchen opened and they were more then willing to let us sit and have a drink while we waited. Service was very friendly and informative making for a great first time. We are absolutely coming back and highly recommend this place! :)