I knew going in to this the service at Ciao wine bar is not the greatest. I tried to pre-order my appetizers and offered to give my credit card over the phone, but they wouldn't let me. Darn.
I arrived at 9:30 on friday and was seated at a table for ten and waited ten minutes but nobody came to take my order. I didn't want my guests to wait to eat, so I tracked down a server on the stairs and ordered a bunch of appetizers and platters.
We had:
The bruschetta - good sized portion. A bit on the garlicky side.
The Buffalo mozzarella and tomato - This was great! Huge hunk of cheese.
The cheese platter - excellent mix of sweet and savoury.
the Salumi platter - really spicy salami, which I like. I've had better prociutto.
Our server took forever to bring us water. He finally came over with a tray of glasses of water, instead of a pitcher, which to me felt like a waste of time.
One friend ordered a martini and it took like 15 minutes to arrive. The server blamed this on a "frustrating bar tender."
We had a few bottles of a fabulous Barolo.
The atmosphere at Ciao is perfect, the wine list is amazing, the food is okay, the service is sub par. I suggest coming here for drinks, not dinner, and know what you're getting in to.