Oliveto Cafe and Restaurant
Oakland, CA 94618
Phone: (510) 547-4381
- Price:
- $$$$
- Cross Street:
- Shafter Street
- Best of Citysearch:
- Italian Food 2007, Bar Menu 2006, Italian Food 2004
- Hours:
- Mon 11:30am-2pm, 5:30pm-9pm, Tue-Wed 11:30am-2pm, 5:30pm-9:30pm, Thu-Fri 11:30am-2pm, 5:30pm-10pm, Sat 5:30pm-10pm, Cafe: Mon 7am-9pm, Tue-Thu 7am-10pm, Sat 8am-10pm, Sun 8am-9pm
Editorial Review for Oliveto Cafe and Restaurant – by Citysearch Staff
The Scene
Oliveto is actually two restaurants in one: a casual cafe with much-coveted outdoor tables on the ground floor, and a more formal restaurant up a sweeping staircase on the second floor. The restaurant, located in the heart of Rockridge, has a pleasant Tuscan-villa feel, with a crackling fireplace and lush flower arrangements. Service is pleasant and knowledgeable.
The Food
The menu changes daily, but recent highlights have included succulent spit-roasted Niman Ranch beef, toothsome rabbit pâté, fresh mozzarella with baby artichokes and luscious squid-ink pasta with white shrimp and basil. Grass-green spinach ravioli, unadorned but for a dribble of olive oil, sometimes seems like it needs more than plain sheep's milk-ricotta filling. The downstairs cafe's menu is built around the wood-fired brick oven, with cold plates and salds side-by-side with pizzas and baked pastas.
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User Reviews for Oliveto Cafe and Restaurant
11/12/2007 Posted by phields
We gave this restaurant another try after 7 years of a boycott because our friends wanted to go there. Boy, was this a regret! Our waiter was unfriendly and acted like he was bothered to describe the dishes on the menu. But we had to ask because we couldn't understand anything on the menu. They try too hard to try to make the menu sound fancy with pasta names,etc. but it's annoying. It's not like we are hillbillies from another planet - we go out to fancy restaurants all the time and consider ourselves foodies. When I finally got my fancy-can't say the name pasta, it was horrible. It tasted like dog food! To be sure I was not out of my mind, I had the other 3 people at my table taste it and it agreed. Yuck! I had to send it back and switch it out for the fish which was edible but not that much better. These people are the smartest people on earth! Let's serve crappy, can't say the name pasta and other food because people won't know the difference anyway. Well, only non-foodies or someone without a taste bud! We will never return to this restaurant again. They can fool other diners but we done with the charade.
Pros: Location
Cons: Food, service, menu wording (no descriptions - just fancy pasta names)
07/29/2007 Posted by nydaniele
Probably the chef would be better off staying in the kitchen (probably) instead of making some bad imitation of salumi. Disappointing dinner and disappointing his salumi that I have tried several times. From a native Italian (from Piemonte) point of view, tonight's dinner was merely ok, carne cruda was not anything close to what it should be (why the hard-boiled egg, there should be a raw egg yolk in there, or are you afraid no one is going to order it?). The pasta was overcooked and the bolognese way too spiced up. Sorry but you can't still (and probably never could) call yourself authentic. Ciao.
Pros: Nice ambiance
Cons: poor cooking skills
