Nothing exceptional unfortunately (Jamie's Italian (Bath))

Member Name: Treesrgood

Product:	Jamie's Italian (Bath)
Date:	06/05/09 (118 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Interesting Furnishing!

Disadvantages: Pretentious, predictable.

I went to Jamie's on Sunday with a large group of women so we were luckily enough able to book. I had tried to go before with my family but had declined to wait over an hour for a table! It is ridiculous that you cannot book and this results in lengthy queues outside. I wonder why this is?
All in all it was rather odd. The service was very slow - I'm not sure if they were trying to be relaxed or it was because we were a group of 10. The menu was alright but I had expected more. I'm a vegetarian who fortunately eats fish so I chose the prawn linguini. There was not a large variety especially for anyone who didn't eat fish or if you didn't want pasta. There is definately room on the menu for an inspired vegetarian dish (or two....) - with all the wonderful ingredients available in Italy this would have been very simple. I hoped that this being Jamies the pasta dish would have been something really special. It actually turned out to be something that I could have rustled up at home in about 10 mins and it was missing one of the ingredients listed in the menu (fennel). It was not worth the £10.85 and it was not particularly filling. Some of my fellow guests were pleased with their meals (tuna and chicken) but the meals looked incomplete to me . There seemed to be a lot of rocket on all our plates. Maybe I should have avoided pasta as it is very difficult to do anything exceptional with it (and we have it all the time at home) but all in all the food was rather disappointing. The tiramisu I had for dessert was fine but once again nothing special.
Strangely enough, considering the queues outside to get in, the turn around of tables was very slow. As we sat in the restaurant for most of the evening we could see that it took ages for staff to clear tables once diners had left before they sat new people down. I wondered if this amounts to a ploy to leave people waiting (inside and outside) to create an impression of popularity. I'm so glad I hadn't waited because it would not have been worth it. There were plenty of staff but its not obvious what they are actually doing.
I like Italian food and have used and liked Jamie's recipes but this restaurant is a disappointment. There are better Italian restaurants in the area. I do not understand why Jamie hasn't put more of an effort into this restaurant. There are wonderful ingredients from Italy that can be combined together in amazing ways but this restaurant is not very different from an Ask - just more pretentious and pricey. In fact I would say this whole venture smacks of complacency and arrogance. I would not be in a great hurry to return

Summary: Could and should have been so much better.