This place has all the charm of an old Denny's. Â Have you seen Restaurants Impossible? Â This is it. Â Tired and run down. Â They need a facelift and help in the kitchen. Â The $21 Linguini del la mare was reminiscent of Chef Boyar di. Â It had lots of seafood but the sauce was horrible. Â What do they put in it to make it greasy? Â On top of the bill they automatically added an 18% gratuity for 2 people. Â For the price of dinner at a nice place they made sure we won't be back.
Review Source:I lived in Ballard for 20 years and was sad to see the Lombardi's there turn into a Starbucks.
But this Lombardi's is not the one I remember. Â
This location looks/feels like a Denny's or Perkins. Â And OMG that Frank Sinatra they play...I wanted to kill myself after about 15 minutes. Â What a tired, tired atmosphere.
I had quite possibly the WORST calamari of my life here. Â It was AWFUL. Â Â It resembled greasy-spoon deep fried clam strips (which can be yummy when it's called for) but this was so awful I don't even know where to begin. Â They were over-breaded, freezer burnt and fried horribly. Â They were chewy and as soon as the heat dissipated they went soggy and tasted stale. Â Good God I can't believe they put that on a plate and served it.
My Italian salad was ok. Â The grape tomatoes were especially good. Â The quality of the gorgonzola was pretty poor. Â The salad was literally DRENCHED in dressing and served in this randomly huge bowl thing. Â I should also mention that the greens smelled/tasted of seafood. Â That didn't bother me as I love seafood, but I would have been mad as heck if I didn't like fish or was a vegetarian. Â
The only high-point of our lunch was the hostess/server who was prompt and professional (albeit a bit loud). Â She worked her bum off despite being the ONLY person working the front. Â
I won't be back. Â This place was really awful.
I liked coming here every once and awhile for a girl's night, but the past several times have yielded frustrating results. Â The food is just fine, typically I stick with pizza and other snack-able things and it works. Â However, the service has a consistent habit of being in the neighborhood of mediocre to horrible. Â Last time I cruised in for a happy hour I waited for 45 minutes to even get the bartender to come over and fill an order for a drink, and that was the theme for the rest of the time there. Â I am a super patient customer, but I never think it is right to feel that you have put someone out simply because you asked for something. Â To top that off, the server kept walking right past our table, look at us, and just move on. Â I can comfortably say that I won't be back.
Review Source:My wife kept raving how awesome this place was in ballard where she worked before it closed down. So when she found out there is one in issaquah close to us she said it was a must go. We got a sausage penne pasta and gorgonzola tortellini with garlic bread as an app. We went right at lunch time, completely empty. Literally no on there. Â Should have been a sign.... The penne was decent, portion was okay, flavor was okay. The garli bread was very disappointing, the size of two tiny slices of bread cut in half with some garlic butter, 6 bucks??? wow, that was insulting. The worst pasta dish I may ever had was the gorgonzola tortellini. I love heavy, creamy pastas and I could barely choke this down. It was extremely heavy and very very salty I drank 4 glasses of water when I got home and still couldnt get hydrated. The cost was overpriced, hate to say it but national chain olive garden looks like top dog compared to this. Â Not sure if this was the same biz as my wife went to in Ballard, but she was apologizing for making me go there which shows you how much she liked it. Only thing saving this for one star is the really nice & attentive waiter.(guess its not difficult when there was no other customers there) Never will return.
Review Source:Better than expected. In on April 1 for lunch. Monday must be slow, one guy on duty for whole place so service was a bit slow. But not deadly slow. I had very good fish and chips, Italian seasonings on fish, quite good. Wife and daughter shared the seafood salad and a sandwich, both said each was quite good. So we're pleased, and we'll be back.
Review Source:Two words: Cafeteria Food...
Loombardi's had a 1970's diner feel to it, and I was really rooting for the food to be good because our waitress was truly amazing. (I gave a 30% tip!) She told us she had 5 kids, and it showed, because she took care of my son and his needs the whole time.
The food was worse than Olive Garden, and it tasted like it was from a really bad cafeteria.
We started out with the Calamari Fritti. When the Calamari came it was strips like they came from the Walmart freezer section. The Calamari was so tough, chewy and dry that I couldn't eat it. The Aioli sauce that came with the Calamari was too rich, but luckily we asked for marinara sauce which was good with the cold tasteless bread they put on the table.
We ordered the Smoked Salmon Ravioli, Grilled Salmon, and the Chicken Caesar Salad.
Where to start?!
The Salmon Ravioli tasted like frozen Raviolis and they were swimming in a rich pesto sauce which made it hard to eat. If I dunked the bread it in, it calmed down the sauce enough to enjoy it. The Grilled Salmon was really dry and tasteless with no seasoning (e.g. Salt and Pepper). The fettuccine that came with it was pre-"al dente" making it really hard and stiff. The sauce on the fettuccine was some kind of oily parmesan cheese sauce that tasted almost curdled. It also came with carrot strips which were good actually, but they didn't go with the meal. It was odd since the menu said "Vegetable(s)" with an "S". Â The Ceasar Salad with chicken was odd as well. The Chicken was freezing cold and bland, there was too much dressing on the salad, and the croutons were bland and hard. Wow! I was in the twilight zone here. It was almost as if I could turn to my right and see Gordon Ramsey from Kitchen Nightmares sitting there. Eeek!
Lastly, they served all the food on different size and shaped plates. IT was not uniform at all and people actually complained the plate was too long and skinny and the food was falling off it was they ate. It was as if they ran out of normal round plates, and had to serve things on platters and stuff. Honestly, I think the owner needs to get the chef's head examined at this place. It was really poor here...and the food was really expensive.
3 Meals, 1 App, and no drinks it was over $75!!!
Please please, someone help this place and bring some good , honest, and respectable Italian food back to the east side.
Where do I start? Craving for Italian and we drive by Lombardi's a few times a week. We used to eat here years ago when first moving to the area but was never impressed. It always looks busy, so I checked other Yelp reviews and convinced my wife and kids to give it a try.
Bad move on my part. We got home a little while ago and the sad look on my wife and kids is still present when thinking about dinner. We showed about about 6:30 for dinner and the place was fairly crowded. I'm thinking, this is a good sign. Not the case. We sat down and noticed there were pieces of paper on the floor and food under our table. Not the most pleasant thing when you first sit down. And by the way, there was an unlit EXIT sign over our heads. Not sure if that's a violation or a hint.
I asked someone to clean under the table and finally got my wish with some reluctance. We did have a good server (Brandon) and he was the hardest working  guy in the place. We ordered our food and some garlic bread to start. People came in after us, sat down, and were eating their entries and still no garlic bread. Wife ordered Minestrone soup and that was decent.
The coup de grace was when my wife ordered a gluten-free pasta dish with shrimp and crab. We finally got our food after a very long, apologetic wait. One bite and my wife started to gag. Hot, mushy past, room temperature shrimp, and chilled crab-meat. Who does that? She couldn't eat it and that was the end of her night.
On a positive note, our daughter had spaghetti and meatballs and son had chicken parm like I did. Chicken parm wasn't bad, but our son thought it was so-so and he likes everyhting. Brandon did comp the garlic bread, wife's meal, and her soup and the night clearly wasn't his fault. Someone does need to evaluate how they are running a business as this is not the way to do it. When you first walk in, there needs to be someone there, not just once in a while. Its a busy Saturday night and I'm not sure who is in charge. The place is also not clean. I wish Lombardi's was a better experience, but not this time.
I'm a huge fan of this place! My mother and I ordered off the seasonal menu and got the Poached Pear Salad (fabulous) and Baked Taleggio (mouthwatering) for starters, then split the Chicken Marsala (so, so tasty), which is on their permanent menu. Our server told us that the seasonal items would be removed from the menu once spring hit, which is too bad because I could go back for that salad and baked brie all year round (if you're reading this before spring, get these while you can!!).
Speaking of our server, she was friendly and cheery (almost made me feel like I was back in the South again) and made all the recommendations for our food, which turned out to be spot-on. A lot of places get their nose out of joint when you ask to split a plate, but this place divided our meal into two plates with no extra charges or complaining--nice! Highly recommend! The only thing lacking is atmosphere. It's more of a place to gather with a small group of friends than for a romantic dinner date for two. But for a low-key, tasty Italian dinner that's well-priced, this is your place.
Went to Lombardi's on last Saturday night. Â Â The food rated four stars (scampi and lasagna being the favorites at the table). Â The server rates two stars. Â He could have been new, but he messed up on the basics (like asking for a drink order, not getting us more bread or asking if we wanted more drinks). Â The atmosphere rated three stars. Â Nice on the inside, but we got a cramped feeling (as if they added a table or two to the area) which subsequently made it noisy at times.
Review Source:I went to Lombardi's years ago and the experience was so bad I said I would never go back. I went back recently because my husband (who was tired of eating at the same restaurants with our children) told me the place was completely different when he took our boys there. So, the whole family went the following week. I shared a margherita pizza and salmon Caesar salad with one of my children. It was really good and I'm very picky. It was very busy that night and I think we were being served by one of the owners. Our server and the owner were both very friendly and we were served in a reasonable amount of time considering how busy it was. My only complaint is that our bill was over $100. We'll definitely go back, but not on a regular basis.
Review Source:Nostalgia rings strong for me here, but I have to say the chicken marsala has been strong in my memory from birthdays since I was five. Everything is delicious, and the roasted garlic and bread first served is always wonderful. Oh yeah, mm mm butternut squash ravioli!
It has a nice "hometown" feel to it, and the atmosphere and lighting is pleasant and calming. It can be bustling or dead, but the servers are pretty good at feeling the pacing and not hassling or neglecting you. Good times.
I'm sorry to admit that we have lived in the Issaquah area for almost 20 years and this was our first trip to Lombardi's! What a wonderful experience tonight was- the food was amazing. Everything is so fresh and homemade. Kimberle, our waitress was so great. Her recommendations from the wine to the pumpkin ravioli  were right on. My only retreat was that I was too full for desert. We will definitely be going back soon!
Review Source:Had an excellent meal here. Â Well priced, good service.
Bruschetta spreads- garlic chive and the Devil one?
Shrimp appetizer
Veal Picata
Salted Carmel ice cream!!!
shared a decent $20 bottle of wine (they had a huge list of $20 wines)
Huge antique shop behind if you have some time ;)
My husband and I decided to try out Lombardi's on a whim. We are always trying to find new places to add to our repertoire of dining out options.
We both liked the roasted garlic and oil- this seems to be the one and only highlight at this restaurant.
My husband's lasagna was just awful. I have never seen such a sad, sorry, pathetic little bit of pasta on a plate. The flavor, what little there was of it, was odd. Frankly the whole dish was unappealing. The look of disgust on my husband's face confirmed how bad it was.
My shrimp diavolo could have been good. The seven shrimp were cooked perfectly and were spicy. The noodles were just oily and unappealing. The $17 price was also unappealing after the plate was presented to me.
The food is overpriced, meagerly doled out, and lacking in elements such as sauce, Italian seasoning, and overall pallet pleasing taste.
Truly I dislike Olive Garden but you are stepping way down if you choose to eat at Lombardi's instead.
I love to support local business but in this case I am very disappointed.
My advice to Lombardi's- spend some money on some sauce, get a new lasagna recipe, and please rethink your pricing.
I had heard great things about Lombardis but had never tried it. We finally decided to go and try it out last week. We got there about 5:30 and didn't have to wait at all to get seated, which was a plus right away. But, when we did get seated, we ordered and then waitied a LONG time for our salads and drinks. The restaurant was not even busy. The food was average but the service was just not very good.
Review Source:I usually love italian restaurants, but this one was very disappointing. I had the pork chop and my partner had the chicken saltimboca. Both were greasy and uninspiring. We barely ate half of our plates. I would choose Olive Garden over this place, and that's not saying much. These were $17-18 entrees and were definitely NOT worth the money.
Review Source:There aren't many places to eat in Issaquah and my husband and I have exhausted them all. Lombardi's is good now and then. The food is a little above average- not the best, but not the worst. I really like their chicken mushroom fettucini, chicken marsala, and tomato soup. The ambiance is very nice. Most of the staff is courteous but not exactly friendly.
The only noticeably bad experience we had was not with the food but with the staff- actually just one waitress named Samantha. I was very hungry and craving their chicken mushroom fettucini. My husband and I went in for dinner and from the moment we sat down it was as if you could almost feel an actual chill coming off from her "cold shoulder." She was polite but completely disinterested, did not check on us until our plates were stacked and we were obviously ready to leave, and she didn't so much as crack a smile. It was very disappointing.
Subtle ambiance with some really great food. Gf wanted linen on tables but was still a fan. Lamb meatballs and Veal Scaloppine were delicious. Bread could use toasting. Liked the complimentary roast garlic but was a little tough to eat without getting it on the hands. Waitress was enthusiastic an helped with wine selection. Overall a big fan. Way better than Tropea in Redmond.
Review Source:Went for happy hour... They have happy hour all day Mondays. Â Was so-so. Â It's one of those places that was fine-- nice staff and decent food ... But you're just not in a hurry to get back to. Maybe if it was cheaper I'd go back... Other places seem to have better happy hour deals (Ruth Chris).
Again, staff was nice, so that's a plus.
I am really surprised at the poor reviews for Lombardi's. I went there for the first time recently. My Grandparents love this place and when my Grandfather passed away recently, we went here for lunch, after his service.
The drinks and the food were really top notch. We had about 15 people and everyone was very pleased with what they had....from cheese pizze...to ceasar salad....to lamb burger....to cheese ravioli with smoked salmon. The ceasar dressing was fantastic. I do not like any dressings, but this salad was fantastic.
I would highly recommend this restaurant if you want a nice leisurely lunch.
Went last week for happy hour after not going for quite some time. Sat in the bar and had the HH wine (3.00 a glass - yesss!) and some of there HH appetizers. There were some new items on the HH menu. We had the lamb burger w/ fries, the tenderloin skewers, tuscan prawns, & the brushetta sampler. Service was better than it was previously and we chatted with the bartender for a little bit and she mentioned that there has been some changes in management which is a good thing :)
Review Source:I've had O.K. experiences here but also some bad ones. Â Never been great. Â
Went with the kids and the grandparents recently. Â One of my kids was acting up. Â Not the restaurant's fault, but servers should recognize when parents are trying desperately to get the hell out for the pleasure of others. Â From the time we decided to give up and asked for the bill to getting paid and out the door was 20+ minutes. Â Meanwhile, we're in shifts trying to get the older one some food and seclude the younger acting up one. Â And then I was asked to vacate the empty private dining room (doors wide open) where I had sequestered the screamer as "this section is closed."
Food: Â I really like the Italian salad but at $10 it's kind of silly. Â The Lasagne? Â Had it once. Â Felt like a frozen dinner. Â But other pasta dishes are pretty good.
Was there for a business dinner and lunch.
For lunch I had the lasagna and for dinner I had the chicken mushroom fettuccine.
I enjoyed both but I'm with the other yelpers on this; I've had better at an Olvie Garden. Their sauces need to be thickened up a little bit. Service was good both times.
More than likely I will be returning since it's located near where I do business.
Came here with my hubby for a nice romantic date. Â In Issaquah we really don't have a lot of choices for italian food and that night that was what I was in the mood for. Â
I ordered lasagna and I will tell you I have experienced better italian food at "hole in the wall" places in Texas where we spent maybe a 1/3 of what we spent that night.
Service was so so. And both my husband and I felt ill afterward. Â I haven't been back since and I am a bit weary to give them another chance (sorry). Â I will go to the Taco Bell/KFC that is next door before I go there. :(
Service can be spotty, I heard they underwent a management change but I am a big fan of all three locations (Ballard & Everett too) of this family owned restaurant. Â (Ballard is the best) Â Great selection of Italian wine and I am an angelica del morte junkie on the appetizer menu. Â Shrimp Diavlo is fabulous and great specials. Â They offer great wine night (Mon or Tues) where almost all bottles are a fixed price.
Review Source:A bunch of Yelpers can't be wrong. Lombardis of Issaquah is just no good. We visited a couple of months ago for happy hour and never got around to posting a review, but there's no time like the present.
We ordered spaghetti and meatballs. The dish that arrived on the table vaguely resembled watery tomato soup with two small meatballs floating in it. The "sauce" lacked any flavor, and the meatballs were just your average meatballs.
I asked to send back the spaghetti and meatballs and the waiter offered a scowl and a "What's wrong with it?" I had to explain that the sauce didn't taste like anything and that noodles could hardly be called spaghetti.
Given the food and the service, I thought that the restaurant might do me the favor of comping my revised happy hour choice, but I was wrong. Oh well, at least I know for certain that I shouldn't return.
You know, I was pretty skeptical, expecting crappy service from high school students and food that tasted like it was from Olive Garden.
Correct on the service, surprisingly wrong on the food.
I ordered the butternut squash ravioli, a seasonal special, and it was really good. Rich, creamy sauce, delicious pieces of squash mixed in... sure, I'm pretty partial to a nice autumn squash, but still... Bread comes with olive oil and roasted garlic, a nice touch.
Nothing on the regular menu really stood out to me, so I don't know if I'd have this sort of experience everytime, and without the 2-for-1 deal that the Passport provides, it would be overpriced.
Lombardi's has just been remodeled. Â Came for dinner and it was pretty crowded for a Thursday night. Â There is some outside seating.
The pasta dish I had was quite good - chicken mushroom penne alfredo. Â
I especially liked their appetizer garlic bread. It is served with toasted mozzarella cheese containing a few tiny bits of fresh oregano.
Being Issaquah's "Neighborhood Italian", I wasn't impressed.
We weren't too impressed with the food, the food was so great - I cannot even remember what I ordered. I think it was some pasta dish, the pasta was over done and sticky (either because it was precooked or cooked in too little water). The dessert wasn't great neither, again it was so great I cannot remember what I ordered.
It did however, leave me with an insight that I would not be revisiting this place again. On the whole the food was mediocre, served in a bustled environment with mediocre service and a poor value for money.
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