Gusto Ristorante

Gusto is more on the restaurant restaurant end of Café as the menu is more extensive and up market than the cheaper Italian café’s on the parade do if you want cheap and quick don’t come here. It definitely is nice and reasonably consistent. Think Amalfi but a little more refined yet still a casual setting.
This time the quail was great, the seafood marinara (not the frozen Thailand marinara mix most Cafes serve) was also great as were the vegetables and wine.

2 star service… at 5 star prices!
The experience was unpleasant and expensive.
The Gusto journey began by being barked at across the restaurant by a terse man pointing out our table, rather than being shown to our table like a civilised host would do.
Once finding our table and sitting, briefly discussing the wonderful entrance, the terse man delivered menus, stating that they were sold out of most options. When asked what he recommended, it was suggested the speciality dish.
«Fabulous, we will have the speciality dish».
«You can’t, it’s sold out!»
THEN WHY SUGGEST IT?
The meal was followed by several interactions with multiple staff, asking the same questions and unable to answer our requests.
Gusto has done its dash. Adelaide is brimming with amazing food and service. Gusto’s food is tasty, but there are plenty of options in Adelaide that are more deserving of my patronage.

Not as good as it used to be… I once thought this place was delicious, professional and therefore worthy of the prices, but unfortunately not any more.
The service was lazy and basic. No drinks or water was offered while I waited for my family. In fact, no water offered at any time.
The food took a bit too long considering only 4 tables were eating in this large restaurant. The menu seemed fancy and familiar from my last visit, however the dish I was served (agnolotti) was tough pasta with a watery sauce. Not what I remember from past visits, when pasta was fresh and the sauces thick and flavoursome.
We declined dessert, so the waiter disappeared… How about asking if we enjoyed our meal? If we’d like a coffee instead? Or if we’d like the bill?
What’s going on here, Gusto? Can you improve to your former glory?

A fabulous place for dinner which manages to do comfortable dining within a relatively spacious setting. Service is efficient and menu has much to choose from.
The fresh house made pasta is amazing! I had the salt and pepper squid on my last visit and it was lovely but I think I missed out by not ordering pasta or pizza — they excel at those dishes. Do yourself a favour and order the Schiachiatta, it’s an even better option than the garlic bread.

A wet Friday night in Adelaide greeted Mrs Plate and I after we’d caught a movie in Norwood, so somewhere warm and inviting with food that would comfort the soul was a must.
Gusto Ristorante fit the bill perfectly, Italian food in winter is always a winner.
The thing I always find strange about Gusto is that when you walk in, the décor is very plain and it feels like you’ve stumbled into a branded Café, but this isn’t necessarily a bad thing as you feel comfortable no matter what you’re wearing or what the occasion is — and importantly the food is anything but branded Café food.
We ordered a Schiacciata Al Pomodoro (wood oven tomato bruschetta) for a shared entrée and it was on our table within minutes. It was topped with lots of plump tomato chunks and topped with lashings of freshly shaved parmesan. It was just what we required and disappeared in minutes.
For our main course we decided to share a Lazio pizza (potato, italian sausage, rosemary, mozzarella and truffle oil) and a Gnocchi Con Coniglio (a rabbit ragu — the Con Coniglio comes with Pappardelle on the menu but they are always happy to swap pasta types for you at Gusto).
The pizza was fantastic, so different to the usual tomato based pizza you get everywhere and the truffle oil finished it off beautifully.
As for the gnocchi, I always maintained that Rigoni had the softest, most melt-​in-​your-​mouth gnocchi in all of Adelaide but Gusto has taken the mantle. You don’t have to chew at all, it just falls apart once it hits your tongue. The Coniglio ragu was a fantastic compliment and this is definitely one of my favourite pastas.
One of the best things about Gusto is that the house red wine is VERY drinkable. I don’t know what it is, I don’t want to know (I’m a little bit of a wine snob), I don’t even know what varietal but I do know that is fantastic and dangerously cheap.
The staff at Gusto are friendly and attentive, the prices are reasonable and the food is outstanding. Gusto remains one of my all time favourite Italian restaurants and one worth checking out.

I’ve eaten at Gusto a few times. Each of those times I went the pizza and wine special, a whopping $ 16.90. To say this is good value is an understatement. The pizza has always great — typical mainstream Italian bistro style. Service is good.

AMAZING food — everytime I go here :) I have never been to this place and had anyone complain about their food. :)
I went here with my Mum, Dad and Husband on the weekend — and I had the Gnocci and Garlic Bread — and it was divine :)
Some people think that this place is a littl pricey — and granted in comparison to Brunellis or Fasta Pasta — it is — but I really dont think that it is pricey at all for the quality of the food :)
I recommend this place HANDS DOWN time and time again.
The service is great, the staff are fantastic and the food is ABSOLUTELY DELICIOUS!
Will definitely be back :)
#HappyKaren

Food is okay, nothing special, but service is awful. There are plenty of other places where you don’t get ignored or forgotten.

We went here for a group catching up. I was very happy to see a nice wooded oven, pizza for entrée for sure. The pizza was pretty good, full of flavours and tasty. However, main course were such a let down. Very big serving size, but taste was very average. Lamb cutlet was over cooked. Risotto was too spicy, over power the seafood, the prawn has no flavour at all. Bit disappointed. It a nice restaurant for family or hungry eaters, not really fine dinning. Value for money as the serve size is very big.

One of my friends used to complain about this place, until her husband took her there for their anniversary (she couldn’t figure out why) but she decided that this time she loved it! So, I recommended it for a big friend gathering on a warm Friday night .
I have to say — the food was delicious and the service was great. It was a good place to have a big group of people catching up, but I have to agree with the others — the ambiance is somewhat lacking. It was lucky that it was a warm weekend night and there were lots of people in the restaurant, which helped the atmosphere greatly, but the restaurant is essentially one giant room with lots and lots and lots of… white.
The wood oven is still visible in the back, which is a good thing, but it does need some colour and character.
However, I really enjoyed the food and the wine and would recommend it for a tasty meal!

Yes — fellow Unilocalers, you are correct. This place is a bit of an aircraft hanger, which does mean that I am pleasantly surprised by the food every time! Always hasty to judge a book by its cover I could not hide my surprise when a very discerning friend of mine suggested we pass our weekly lady date at gusto.
She’s a pasta fanatic so I conceeded, knowing it would please her. I chose the blue swimmer crab pasta and it was spot on — wow. It was quite a warm night, so we sat on the footpath with a candle on our table and made our own ambience.
I must have liked the wine also because I remember ordering dessert, which was phenomenal… maybe pannacotta w/​salted caramel? Perhaps I’ll have to go back and refresh my memory!

The food is really good, but it is good food alone enough?
I don’t think it is. For me, vibe is as important as menu when it comes to mid and high priced food. When it’s cheap and cheerful I’m more than happy to go for plastic tablecloths/​cheap lighting/​tacky wallpaper: some of the best food I’ve ever had has been at little hole-​in-​the-​wall type establishments.
But when I’m paying $ 25 for a main I want a little ambiance thrown in too. I recently went back to Gusto after a break of over 6 months, with fond memories of their wood oven pizza. I was a little disappointed. The pizza was good, no complaints there. But the place has undergone a makeover and I can’t say for the better. It was always kind of dull, but what Matt calls «understated» I call bland to the point of falling asleep — and it’s so large that sound ricochets across the whole cavernous room, making intimate conversation tricky.
Call me old fashioned but I like a little candlelight. A little romance. Even an interesting light fixture would help. With a little more personality, Gusto could improve leaps and bounds — but as it is I would rather hop across the road to Grotto for my pizza fix.