Volterra

I accompanied Alex to the IMDB dinner at Volterra this past wednesday. Mmmmm… tasty.

i felt that Volterra was heavy on style but low on substance. the decor is inviting & the menu SOUNDS good but i found that most of the items were either paltry or bland or both.

as for the service, it was almost a joke. it started off fine enough but got to the point where we wondered if our server was actively trying to avoid us.

given the prices, i found Volterra sadly lacking.

So maybe my opinion is changed just a bit. We took my mom here yesterday for Brunch and were really disappointed.

I ordered the Wild Mushrooms Eggs Benedict with truffle scented Hollandaise, a dish I have ordered a few times before and was looking forward to having again.

What arrived was some oil/egg massacre that any decent chef would have never let leave the kitchen. I thought of Gordon Ramsay knocking the plate out of the would-be chef’s hand telling them to start over.

They were obviously at the bottom of the vat of the prepared mushrooms and had decided to fry them to bring them back to life. On the plate on top of the English muffins was a scanty array of very oil and over cooked mushrooms. But it is the eggs that made me send it back – they were hard boiled. They were clearly cooked for too long and the whites vaporized, leaving miniscule amounts of twisted egg white around a hard boiled egg yoke. It looked like shit on the plate, and that alone should have inspired someone (the chef preferably but if not, then the server) to have it re-made.

When it arrived I said to the waitress, “This doesn’t look good, the eggs are really over cooked.” She ignored me, asked if any one else needed anything and walked away. I tried to get her attention twice (oh yeah there was only one other table seated than ours) and finally had to call her over.

Anyway the second go round was alright but I was really disappointed in the chef and our server who clearly knew that it was wrong and simply did not want to deal with it.

I think if I had been at a diner I might have not been so ready to furrow my brow but Volterra bills itself as an upscale place, and refers to good ol’ eggs benedict as “Wild Mushrooms with Truffle Scented Hollandaise”. I would expect them to live up to the standard that they set. I may go back to Volterra but I was pretty put off.

Volterra is one of my favorite places for brunch in Seattle. With offerings such as truffle scented hollandaise, bread pudding topped with eggs and creamy goodness, ricotta frittatas, and the relaxed yet subtly fancy-ish design I am surprised that it is not packed out the door. It is the kind of place you could take your pearled and laced grandmother or your earthy pal with mud crusted keens. I enjoy the fact that I feel comfortable enough to play a game of cribbage while drinking my Bellini; some stuffy places would be all nose turn-y-down-y about that.

P.S. I do agree with Bjorn that some of the dishes portions are a tad light. For instance the Milano! Milano! could really use some toast on the side; it is delicious and worth ordering but wasn’t terribly filling. I’ve been there when the eggs benedict plate was huge and the last time when it was disappointingly scanty. This is probably a mark of different chefs, but the portion size is something I would say they need to harmonize.

I wouldn’t quite recommend Volterra for Sunday brunch. The hazelnut pancakes were reasonable, but they seemed a little too lightweight for anything approaching a filling meal.