Cleones - Waveney

Visited this establishment for a meal on recommendation ! The menu was substantial, very nice lady called Cleone seemed to be in charge, as we have had an Italian meal called Porchetta at other hotel's before but this version was superior to anything we have tried before ! They need to keep this meal on the menu as it was a show stopper! Well to the chef.

The menu selection was good, the food served was tasty...if lacking in quantity on the mains for the price though, the staff were attentative to a point (I 'll get on to that later) the ambience...the ambience was very bad. Its worth noting the room has a high ceiling and is pretty much void of many soft furnishings bar a few rugs drapped over the walls so the sound echos and reverberates making conversations difficult to hear. We had been pre warned by a number a freinds about the noise level in the room but we took that with a pinch of salt. Alas there was an issue with noise far beyond what we where expecting. The night we took our family we were positioned by what we mistook for an open doorway or putting it another way a doorway without a door, which we took as being like that so the staff could carry drinks through from the bar. Right next to this door on the other side of the wall is a seated entrance area to the bar where on our night about 30 locals spent the whole night screaming, swearing and getting drunk. The noise level was deafening in the dining area where we were sitting, we might as well had been sitting smack bang in the middle of the crowd, this noise permutated the whole dinning area but we had the full effect in stereo. After about an hour someone walked into the room and closed the door, to our dismay, shock and disbelief we could suddenly hear ourselves talk, hear that there had been music piped into the room all that time and questioned why oh why did the staff who are stationed right next to the doorway not close the door earlier. To be honest when we walked in none of us noticed a door was present as it was already open, as stated we assumed there was no door to aid the serving staff. We raised the question with the young staff who had been very attentive to us all night, can 't fault them there, as to why they didn 't think to close the door when the barage of screaming, shouting and swearing which had been relentless for the whole time we were there was obviously too much to bare when paying good money to eat out. Their answer pretty much summed up to 'yeah it does get very loud but if it was a problem you should have closed the door '...if any of us knew there was a door then we WOULD have closed it but to be honest the staffs attentiveness should have prevailed to understand, by their own admission that the noise was far too loud and there 's a regular issue with noise that the simple act of closing the door and keeping it closed would be the correct procedure to make the dining experience a pleasant one. On the way out we bumped, figuratively not literally, into the manager, we raised the issue with her about noise and staff taking initiative, let 's just say she was as far removed from listening to constructive feedback as someone could get, verging on rude and belligerent. So eat there, the foods nice, if somewhat tiny on the portions and take some ear defenders to drown out the rabble and prey you don 't have to give any feedback to aid them into a better experience going forward because you 'll end up with a very sour taste in your mouth, especially from the manager.

Absolutely fantastic! Amazing friendly staff. Food was superb. I don’t normally like Italian restaurants but oh my this was amazing. Fab trio of veg option. Duck and steak fabulous. Puddings exceptional. We were late walk in lunch people but greeted with open arms. Highly recommend.

I looked on line for high rated resaurants, Cleones was not one of them but a local said how good it was. My wife and I were passing through and took his word for it. Result was that we had a lunch which spoilt the day. The food lacked any presentation. The meats in the antipasti were OK but we could not taste the tiny lumps of cheese in a bowl and the tastless white bread only served to soak up the oil in the naff pot of vinegar oil. My wife had a Quatro pizza which was supposed to have a thin ! base. The kitchen got the number correct; mushrooms dumped in one quarter, the other three quarters had: slices of chorizo, cheese and something with bits of pineapple. I had a lasagne which I was about to return it to the kitchen because it was just warm on the outside then I found a warmer middle Lucky me! This place only gets two stars because the service was good.

We hadn’t been for quite a while and popped in for a weekday evening meal. We were pleasantly greeted and were shown to our table. The food was lovely and the dessert option of 1/2 dessert with a coffee was a great idea. We will definitely be coming back at some time, we won’t leave it so long next time.