Il Ponte

Incident with a member of staff left a bad taste in my mouth - the restaurant runs a buy one get one free deal on drinks before 6pm. A member of the bar staff managed to get the drinks order wrong & when he was asked to correct his mistake he started challenging me, telling me to 'calm down'. At no point was I raising my voice but he refused to apologise for what was clearly his mistake & continued to 'correct' me. It was concerning that I had to remind him that I was not rude to him and to treat me with the dignity of a customer. Thinking this matter was resolved at the bar, he then continued to our table & raised the matter again in front of the other guests. As a former member of staff in the hospitality industry, I found his behaviour appalling but he appeared to not care and was in fact quite rude. Sadly this is a restaurant that I enjoyed going to but if this is the manner in which a member of staff treats customers, then I will have to rethink my patronage to this restaurant. 

Nice and cosy place to hang out with friends or just spend some quality time with the loved ones. Food is nicely prepared, there are a lot of drinks to chose from, staff are polite and welcoming and the prices are reasonable. Recommended!

we are a frequent visitors to il pnte , food is superb , service great and the ambience is lovely . I am taking my wife ,my son and his a girlfriend for a belate birthday celebration and for sure we will have a good time .

AVOID AT ALL COST
HI, I visited this “new” restaurant last night. I was hoping to have a good tasty food by instead all went wrong. The waited brought wrong type of water and he became upset. Not sure why. After he actually took the wrong order from us, he has made some little changes to our order. After words instead of correcting it he just pretended that its ok and didn’t even ask me to change it. But all fun started later, when the main course arrived. The salmon was dry and overcooked and looked old; the smoke salmon that suppose to be on top wasn’t there at all. Prawns were overcooked and PASTA was undercooked!!!
I was horrified. In Italian restaurant can’t cooked pasta!
Please avoid at all cost.
The manager didn’t even ask to replace the dish. He just offer 10% discount to us. My friend left hungry and angry and I felt embraced for inviting her to such a place.

considering previous reviews I would say the move across the road seems to have changed a lot. I found the food to lack in flavor, the service was impersonal and cold. calamari starter looked and tasted much like the one at a near by restaurant that has the word “express” in their name, tomato and basil salad had no basil to be seen and were just 5 sad slices of unripe tomatoes on a white plate. for main, veal escalopes with mushrooms and side of roast potato, same comment no a sprig of rosemary or thyme or anything remotely flavorful in the dishes. 2 small pieces of veal floating in a lot of cream and a few slices of button mushrooms. Place looks and food tastes like it should be a chain restaurant. big disappointment after reading previous reviews!

This reaturant is just simply fabulous. The food is the most delicious I have had outside of Italy. It is so fresh and a delight to the tastebuds. I had calamari starter, which can sometimes be deep fried batter rings but not at Il Ponte. They are succulent and you get a great portion size. I had the beef for main, which was cooked just right and the sauces were lovely and refreshing. I love how the food is traditional cusine, not a chip in sight! I though I couldn’t manage a dessert but the somehow it was just too gorgeous to resist!!

The service was wonderful and welcoming, adding a great Italian feel. I recommend this place to any food lover.

The name Il Ponte refers to the flyover under which is located. It’s not the most prepossessing situation, but don’t let that put you off, as this is a very decent, comfortable and reasonably authentic Italian.

Once inside, the interior is very spacious (when it’s quiet, it can feel a little cavernous) and decorated in a clean, modern style - browns and creams. There are banquettes along one wall and tables elsewhere, with a central island bar area. They have a disabled toilet on the ground floor and swanky modern toilets upstairs.

The food is pretty standard Italian - this is a small chain, after all, so the menu is interesting enough without including anything to scare the less adventurous, and the specials - such as spaghetti with lobster (£16) - provide a few more original dishes. The wine menu is similarly decent enough, with a good house red. Expect to pay around £20-£25 for two courses with wine. A bonus for me is that they are happy to supply a free jug of tap water. Good on them.

The staff are very friendly and attentive, and brought exactly what we asked; if I have a gripe it was that they were a little too attentive (but then it was a very quiet evening in bad weather, so there were as many staff as customers). It’s our friend’s favourite town centre Italian in Croydon, and I will happy to go back there.

I love this place. The staff are very helpful and polite, and always there when you need them and out of the way when you dont. This is my favourite place for whenever I don’t feel like cooking but I don’t want a takeaway either, and hasn’t let me down. Try the poussin in wine sauce, it’s great. But what I really really love is the coconut ice-cream, served in a coconut shell, simply delicious. They also have the lemon sorbet served in a lemon skin, and it also looks and tastes fantastic. And the music is just at the right level of volume, as you dont have to shout to have a conversation!

Il Ponte is simply a fantastic restaurant.
I have been there twice and the food is absolutley delicious, the staff are incredibly polite and courteous and the atmosphere is incredibly sexy.
I took a girl on there for a first date and needless to say there was a second date which I know is due to this restaurant!
Absolutely recommended!

This restaurant was recommended to us so we thought we would have something different and have a nice meal out. The restaurant is stylish and you could smell the luxury when you walk through those doors. I almost felt like we did not belong there, like we’re too ordinary to be there. We stayed and got a nice table. The place seemed to be half full and you could hear that all the waiters was Italian which made the place more authentic. The menu was a bit pricey but the food was worth it. My partner mentioned that it is one of those places you see on tv giving you small portions of food, more the decorative stuff but we were stuffed when we walked out of there. Not a bad experience after all and a nice classy place to add to Croydon.

Good food don’t come cheap.IL PONTE the place to be for ITALIAN food lovers.Service was second to none,trust me.Big up Benito and crew in Croydon.

Situated in the less-than-picturesque location underneath the Croydon flyover, this large Italian restaurant delivers what you'd expect from a half-decent Italian place: plenty of antipasti, pasta and pizza options, as well as meat and fish dishes. Nicely uncontroversial for your less adventurous friends, yet tasty enough for gastronomes not to complain too much.

Specials are almost always worth going for - e.g. spaghetti with lobster - and worth trying over the standard menu, although the pasta is cooked nicely al dente, and the pizzas are nicely thin and crispy.

When I went the other day, we turned up without a reservation with a party of 6 adults and 3 babies. The waiters could not have been more accommodating, and were incredibly helpful - they didn't bat an eyelid when asked to provide boiled water or zap some baby food in a microwave.