Casa Nostra - Ben Lomond

This place is awful. I 've been there a few times now for friend 's parties or whatever. I now feel confident that my experiences were not one-off bad days or what have you.Let 's start with the obvious. This restaurant is very expensive. An entree and a beer, split an appetizer, expect $150 for two people. That puts it in the highest price bracket in Santa Cruz county. With that in mind, every bad thing I have to say about this restaurant is just doubly bad.The food is consistently lackluster, at best. Until tonight I have literally never had a lasagna that I didn 't like. Theirs was soggy and heavy, but largely devoid of meat without either being vegetarian or having the panache one would need to put into a vegetarian lasagna to be taken seriously. Cheese was cheap, meat was mostly subbed out for soggy flavorless mushrooms and similarly uninspiring spinache.Several friends offered me portions of their food, none were good. I do not recommend the veal, it was horrifying.Service was only marginally better than the awful food. One waiter, also handling bussing for every table there. We couldn 't get this guys attention if we were on fire. To his credit, ha seemed like a nice man, but he did not seem overly experienced, and could not have handled even the modest number of customers by himself even if he were the best.I saved the worst for last. We were a party of 10, several couples. Naturally we would like separate bills. They demanded a mandatory 20% tip, extra for splitting the bill, and YET EXTRA per card. It was insane. It ended up being something like a 35% sur charge on top of their very high prices. We rebelled and one of us paid by card and the rest of us venmo 'ed him our share of bill. Still we were stuck with a 20% mandatory gratuity for terrible service.In summary, there are other, much better places to spend your $75/plate. Shadow brook never disappoints for about the same price. Crow 's Nest rarely disappoints for about the same money. And, of course, Scopazzi 's is just a little farther down Highway 9, about the same price, and fantastic every time in every dimension of what one could want in a restaurant.

We were visiting from the City and enjoyed some of the best Italian dishes we’ve had in a long time. I had the delicious bolognese while my husband devoured the amazing short ribs. Everything was outstanding!

Lovely experience, couldn’t have been more pleased! Our server, Spencer, astutely recommended the wine and steered us right when we asked about specials, etc.The food was delicious and the bread was excellent too… what’s not to love? The outside seating within a redwood cathedral was spectacular, and couldn’t have been more beautiful. Even the presentation of the food was great and the service was exemplary.Gotta love this place! We were delighted and will be returning on a regular basis, without doubt. (We recommended it to our daughter who’s been looking for the pre wedding dinner spot…it’ll be perfect for her party of 25-30, can’t wait!

This place is beautiful! A beautiful outside seating area was where we were placed. We were given water and menus right on the spot. The trees towered over us while we dined giving the right amount of shade to light ratio. I can keep going on about how nice the outside dining area was.The food was good and filling, however the water we were given was room temperature and honestly didn't taste very good and set our appetite off but not by much. We may had been forgotten after we were sat since we waited for about 30 minutes before any orders were taken ,keep in mind we got there 2 hours before closing and there were about 4 visible filled tables. They did make up for this though, with our drinks being complimentary. Thank you! Vegetarian options: They have vegetarian options. Be sure to ask if meat is in sauce if you do not know what kinds of sauces they offer. Parking: The restaurant offers a paid parking or valet experience. If you wish to not pay for parking you can find a place down the street in town and take a short walk to the restaurant. If not they have paid parking for your convenience.

We have been to this restaurant two other times, and we thought we recalled that the food was good. We ordered two glasses of White House wine, and it tasted like it was loaded with synthetic oak flavoring. The bread was so dried out we could not eat it. We got the Calamari Al Forno appetizer, and it was small pieces that were tough and overcooked. My wife ordered the Lasagna, and it was so bland she only ate a couple of spoonful's. I ordered the Linguine al Frutti di Mare, which had several types of seafood that did not taste fresh. I know that business has been slow, but that is no excuse for serving food that is not fresh! We were definitely not impressed, and the tab came to $94.07 (before tip). We do not intend to try this restaurant again.