I swear when I went into this restaurant they thought I was Charlie Louie from Hotly Spiced.  Recently she has had an uncanny ability to choose the worst bits of every menu.  Thankfully that seems to be turning around.  I suspect I’ve caught this affliction from her through email.

John took his dad to the doctor this morning and once he was all dressed up it was a shame to waste it.  We’d been to M2 Pizzeria and Wine Bar before and it was great.  It was so good that I wanted what I’d had before – their roasted pumpkin, feta and pine nut pasta shells with a lovely napoli sauce and topped with shaved Parmesan.

We arrived at 11:50 and were informed by the lady behind the counter that lunch didn’t start until noon and pointed us to a stack of menus and said for us to sit anywhere.  What she didn’t say was, “The chef is a fill-in and I’m the only person doing the coffee, drinks, dessert, taking orders, taking payments, clearing tables and delivering food.  If she’d told us that, I think we would have come back on a better day.

It’s a lovely spot for lunch right on the lake.  It’s salt water but because it’s man made with a lock, there are no tides or rough water.  There’s also a lovely sandy beach for kids to play on and several electric bbqs for people to use (free).

I knew what I wanted and the fellows wanted The Reef pizza for $11 (small) with prawns, mussels, crab, squid, anchovies, scallops, reef fish, garlic, onion and mozzarella.  Sounds good doesn’t it?

We found a table and John went to order and pay.  Then we sat and sat and sat.  Finally we got drinks and we sat some more.  It’s a lovely spot if you want to sit.  None of us had eaten breakfast so we wanted to eat.

Eventually, the lovely woman from behind the counter came up and said, “Who ordered the entree sized pasta?”

“Me.”

“I’m sorry but we are out of pasta shells, can the chef substitute fettuccine?”

“Sure.”

I’m really easy to get along with and I don’t gripe but when someone says can I substitute one pasta for another I expect the rest of the dish to be the same.  The last time I had this dish it was gorgeous with plump pieces of oven roasted pumpkin, lots of toasted pine nuts, rocket and shaved Parmesan on top.  It was also served with a bread roll.

This is what I got ($14) and I’ve got to say, it didn’t taste all that bad but it looked like someone ate it before I got to it.  There was no rocket, no pine nuts, no roasted pumpkin (however there were two or three tiny, smooshed bits of pumpkin) and no shaved Parmesan.  There was no bread roll and I would have loved to have had a spoon to help eat the fettucine noodles with.  It was roll and chomp – not the most elegant way to eat in a restaurant.  It did have a puddle of oil in the bottom of the dish – that was new.

The two pizzas were wonderful.  They were full of big pieces of seafood on a crispy thin crust and they cleaned their plates.  The angle I took the shot with doesn’t show how high the pizza was with seafood.  I should have taken a photo side on of a slice – it was very special.

We decided against dessert because we didn’t want to wait – and wait.

The verdict – we all would go back but it will be a while.  They would be much better off to tell folks right up front that it’s going to be a horrendous wait.  Once  you’ve ordered (and paid) it’s tough to walk away.