Ari Bella

Nice atmosphere but that’s about it
Cold bread and butter straight from the fridge.
Appetizer was what I suspect to be a premade frozen fried mozz. It tasted like a corn dog yuck.
Entrées were also gross and executed awfully.
My wife and I took 2 bites and were ready to leave.
So we sent our food back, paid for what we ate and left.
Server was nice. But no quality control in the the kitchen at all.

We waited over an hour for mediocre food. Journeying out of Huntington is worth it for better food + service.

Very inflexible with food accommodations. Would not substitute to accommodate vegetarian preferences without a grudge. Food was salty and service was slow. We go because of the convenience and its locale, but otherwise would not go back.

Great broccoli and chicken soup. The arugula salad likewise was excellent. Even if the pizza is ok I give it a great review on the starters, service and ambience.

We had a wonderful dinner at AriBella last night. The calamari was very fresh light and crispy and the heirloom tomato salad light and refreshing. The tuna steak dinner cooked to perfection paired with a zucchini lasagna was out of this world. The salmon paired with a bay scallop risotto amazing. Would highly recommend this restaurant. The service was great !

The food here is absolutely DELICIOUS and they are so nice with substitutions. I love the puttanesca flavor but I hate anchovies, so they don’t mind throwing in spinach instead. The pesto they serve with the bread is incredible. I wish they continued to serve it during lunch (but you might be able to get it if you ask). Dinner portions could be a little bigger considering the price (around $ 18 for a nice pasta dish), but for lunch (around $ 10), they’re the same size and it’s perfect. Ari Bella is definitely my favorite Italian place in Shelton. Only thing is that they understaff during lunch because it’s unpredictable. Sometimes when I go I’m one of the only people in there, but other times it’s flooded. Yesterday this was the case and the wonderful waitress, Linda, handled everyone with a smile on her face. Service may have taken a little longer, but everything was done correctly and perfectly, and this is attributed to her. Also, completely worth it. I definitely recommend this restaurant to anyone in town.

Food is always good, the new addition is really nice. We went on a Saturday nite and it was really busy. Will opt for a quieter night in the future.

This is a really great restaurant with delicious food. I’m only giving four stars and not five because they no longer offer pesto for lunch and the portions seem to be getting smaller and smaller. I ordered pasta with sausage and there must have been a half of a sausage cut up in tiny pieces. I know portions are small, but good is great! I do recommend and will still come back.

My boyfriend and I decided to give Aribella’s a try for lunch during restaurant week. We arrived at noon, which is admittedly a peak lunch hour, and were surprised to find only 3 tables were full. Walking in, you get the impression that this is the type of restaurant in which you wait to be seated. So we wait… and wait… until a man, who I presumed to be the owner, made eye contact with me from the bar and motioned to sit anywhere.
The décor was lovely — big open main room with tall ceilings and a «restoration hardware» ambience. We chose a seat by the window and settled in to wait for the waitress… and we waited… and waited. There was only one waitress working the room but then again, there were only four full tables. The waitress brought us menus without saying hello or introducing herself (so conveniently for her I cannot reference her name in this review). The restaurant week menu had an excellent variety of options for a salad, entrée and dessert. The only problem was that apparently nobody could take your order. For a good 15 minutes, the waitress seemed more preoccupied with filling water jugs than actually greeting the customers or taking anyone’s order. Finally she walked by and I caught her attention to let her know we were ready to order whenever she was. She nodded, walked away and didn’t come back for another 10 minutes. Here’s the point at which I should have left. Instead, I got up to go find her near the bar and asked if we should sit at the bar to make things easier. She looked at me, asked if I had a reservation and then said I could sit anywhere. It was then that I realized she had no idea that I’d been sitting at one of her tables for almost 30 minutes already. I pointed this out to her and, visibly affronted, she said «I’ll BE there». Again, I should have just left but she actually followed me to the table this time and took our order.
Another 20 minutes goes by… finally we got some bread… she brought out two caesar salads… we smiled and reminded her that we ordered tomato mozzarella salads. The right salads eventually came, they were very good and things were finally looking up. By then, more tables had filled up and another woman started serving them. Enough time passed that I actually pulled out my phone and saw that it was 1:04pm. We’d been here over an hour and we still didn’t have our main course. Our waitress stopped briefly to tell us our entrees would be right out. At 1:24 she brought my Chicken Pisano and seeing how frustrated we were, she apologized for the wait. I told her it was fine but I was very late for work and needed to leave shortly. You would think after hearing that she would have brought my boyfriend’s food over immediately with the check and a big smile. That’s not what happened. She came back from the kitchen carrying three dishes, set my boyfriend’s chicken parm down on the empty table right next to us and proceeded to serve the remaining dishes to another table. She almost walked away before remembering to actually bring the dish to our table.
I wish I could tell you that the food was delicious and it was all worth it. But the truth is, the sauce was too salty and while somehow the middle of my chicken was steaming, the rest of it was cold. The waitress never returned to our table and once again, I got up, went to the bar and asked to pay the check right there and then. While doing so, the waitress told me that the wait time was unusual and they had not been expecting this many people. I looked at her, this time without sympathy, and asked what they DID expect during restaurant week. She replied, it’s not up to her, it’s up to her employer. If it hadn’t been 45 minutes over my lunch break, I would have some choice words for him too. I was tempted not to leave a tip, which is not something I’ve ever done, and then I realized that this woman has been dealt a bad hand. Sure, she had a TERRIBLE attitude about it. And yes, when we got there, the place was almost empty and there was no reason to fall so behind. Bottom line, the service was terrible and the food was mediocre. Blame the waitress, blame the owner… whoever is to blame, shame on you.

The food was delicious but the service was atrocious. Not so much the servers fault as the manager and the chef. My wife ordered potato crusted snapper and they ran out of potatoes so the chef (instead of going back to the customer) made the executive decision that she would like the pineapple habanero snapper. They brought it to the table and my wife subsequently sent it back as she doesn’t eat spicy food and it’s not what she ordered. They apologized and said we wouldn’t have to pay for my wife’s meal and would like to get her another dish. She ordered another fish dish which took 45 min to get and when we got the bill we were told that since my wife ordered a second dish we wouldn’t be charged for the first but charged for the second. Horrible service… we didn’t want anything free but don’t change what you say or pick what a customer wants to eat. If you have a food allergy to peppers the fish would have sent her to the hospital. Will not be going back.

We have eaten here many times over the years and truly love it! The staff is very polite and efficient. We order their specials more frequently than items off the menu but my favorite salad is the grilled romaine. My husbands favorite app is the Mare E Caldo and the grilled shrimp. They do a great job with fish and the filet mignon is always amazing. A special treat in the summer is the tomato & mozz salad with tomatoes out of Angelo’s garden. I am anxiously awaiting the opening of the new dining room, it looks beautiful!

I came here with a lunch party of 8. The restaurant is halfway undergound and, particularly due to construction blocking the one wall that would have windows, felt cave-​like. Service was on the slow side. We had calamari to start. It was OK, but the coating was mushy so it made the dish too chewy for me. For my entrée I had a pizza with spinach, tomato and bacon. The spinach was not cooked properly — it was extremely watery so either was undercooked before being put on the pizza or was put on the pizza raw to start with. The crust of the pizza had a very «frozen pizza» quality to it as well — it did not have the taste or texture of fresh pizza. But the overall flavor of the dish was OK. I will note that most of the rest of my party seemed happy enough with their food (no vocal complaints but not vocal praise of it either). The individuals sitting near the construction noted that there was a strong draft letting cold air on them the whole time which sounded unpleasant. Overall a very mediocre experience and I would not return.

What a pleasant surprise for Huntington center. Great food! I will be going back.

I am surprised at a lot of these reviews. Every time I have been there it has been a great experience and delicious food and great service, although I admit it has always only been a party of two and not a larger group like some seem to have a problem with. They are pretty much the only place I have eaten at that can cook veal well.

After trying the many Italian restaurants in town, I was so happy to have found Aribella. It is tucked away behind the dental/​medical office and what a hidden gem ! My family started with the handmade pesto and bread that was given freely while we waited for our appetizers. Wow ! I knew the rest would be just terrific. We had the Gnocchi Aribella, the filet mignon and the lobster ravioli and the Seared sea scallops. I regretted eating all that bread and pesto and had to ask my server to pack up the entrees. Fresh ingredients, attention to plating and overall 5 star taste made my dinner memorable and worthy of a super Unilocal. Hats off to Chef Angelo ! We will be back !
Per the Chef the restaurant is expanding to include a outdoor patio in time for Spring.

Have tried Ari Bellla a couple of times since moving into the vicinity.
It has been quite pleasant, good food, nice service.
I like the Gnocci.
The duck was also very tasty, with crunchy skin and a nice pomegranate sauce.
So far, this in one of the favs in CT.

OMG — yummy, yummy yummy! I’m not from this area but am frequently here for business and this is my new favorite. Went with a colleague for dinner last night and it was fantastic — very quaint, extremely friendly staff who offered great suggestions and the food was fab.
We started off with salads — the Grilled Romaine and the Warm Goat Cheese salads were a great kick off to the meal. I am a vegetarian and slightly high maintenance when ordering but they let me special order my meal which was Gnocchi with baby bellas, onions and crushed tomatoes — it was absolutely delicious. My colleague got the Clams Casino and I think she may have acutally licked her plate clean. We were all set and asked for the check but our waiter strongly suggested the Fried Banana Cheesecake — seriously one of the best desserts I have had in a long time.
This place is a great find! Bön appetit!

Small place with charm. The menu is a good size and contains a lot of variety. As a lover of Italian food that isn’t the standard pasta and sauce, they have anything I could want along with the basic chicken parm, ect. The nightly specials are also very well done.
Some of their bests: scallops are always perfect, the pizza is thin/​crispy, the salads are well put together, salmon special is great, ravioli anything is really good.
Their wine list is reasonably priced and has some good selections on it.
Make sure you get a reservation as seats fill up quickly, but it is a solid bet.

I’ve eaten here many times and taken a variety of people and I can’t believe there’s not more love for this place here on Unilocal.
It’s small and could be tricky to find if you don’t know exactly where it is. It’s mostly inhabited by locals (like my parents). It’s cute and not over-​the-​top a la Il Palio nearby but could be a little noisy when it’s busy.
The food is pretty much always excellent. I always get the bruschetta because its my favorite. The basic salad is also a good choice.
If any specials catch your eye try them because you may not find it on the menu again. I’ve had a number of different entrees. The pasta with seafood is good as is the chicken parm. The menu is a little more adventurous than your local Italian place but everyone should be able to find something they like. Not a lot of red meat though so if you’re in a steak mood this probably isn’t the place for you. It does suffer from overuse of pancetta. Seems like they put it in everything and I’m not a fan. However last visit she had penne vodka that had pancetta and she’s still talking about how good it was a week later so I guess that says something.
If the gods are smiling upon you for dessert they will have panna cotta or pannatone bread pudding on the menu. Both are excellent.
Wine list is limited as its a pretty small place but ask the waitstaff and they’ll usually hook you up with something good and not too expensive.
Service is definitely a weak spot, at least recently. Something changed maybe a year and half or two years ago and it became very slow. On our most recent visit we tried to analyze the situation (god knows we had plenty of time) and the problem seems to reside with the kitchen and not the waitstaff. I wish I didn’t have to say this but you might not want to come here in you’re in a hurry.
Also Ari Bella isn’t cheap. It’s not your local pizza joint (though I believe they have pizza). Expect $ 75+/person with apps, wine, entrée & dessert. At the end of the day it’s worth the money and fairly priced for the quality of the food you get. I really like this place despite a couple small weaknesses.

Great little place in Huntington. Great food and very fast service. Friendly staff always attentive. If you want to enjoy a nice relaxing dinner experience, this is the place.