La Cucina Ristorante — Restaurant in Ontario

Let me start off by saying I have worked in the service industry for 15+ years and have a better understanding than most on how things can go south quickly in a restaurant so I am a bit more empathetic than the average patron. That being said, as part of what I thought was basic training, servers and bartenders are trained to prioritize groups and tasks to keep the flow going when it peaks in busyness. It has taken a couple days of reflection to determine if I was going to contact the business (which I have) on my group’s experience as well as write a review. I have never gone to these lengths before because I’ve never had to but feel compelled given how HORRIFIC the service and experience was. My group had a reservation (important distinction from a walk-in group since they could plan for us) for 7 people on Saturday evening for a birthday. We waited 1 hour and 15 minutes for our DRINKS that consisted of flat beer and cold coffee. We kept being told “a few more minutes” from “service” staff. No management in sight, no one checking on us, no apologies for any part of the experience and waiting - very little communication and we were largely ignored. We decided we did not want to give our business to this establishment. We left money for drinks on the table and left. As we were leaving, we were berated by the staff with inappropriate comments and rudeness. They had time to be disrespectful but not apologetic or communicative. When we arrived, there were 5 other tables, one large party. This was not a situation where the restaurant was anywhere near (covid) capacity. On top of it, it’s evident the scheduling did not reflect what reservations they had or foot traffic that could come in on a SATURDAY night. It was beyond belief and appalling. I have not yet heard from management/ownership as I write this but know he owns a few other establishments in the city that will no longer receive our business. I am very supportive of trying to uplift our local businesses, specifically the service industry as they have suffered during covid, but it was evident La cuciana did not want our business and preferred running the risk of exactly what had happened - 7 very displeased patrons. Word of mouth is still the best endorsement in my opinion, there is no endorsement coming here except from me to...

I'll give 2 starts base on the food and service

I'll start with the service, cuz it really upset me at the end. At the beginning the waitress was nice, everything okay, after getting the ravioli (that actually tasted really bad in my and my friends opinion) we asked to just bring my friends ravioli with no sauce to maybe eat it, Like maybe it will taste different. So anyways got the plate with tomato sauce, one of my friends tried it and OMG a huge black hair came out, it was not pleasant at alll!!! Anyways didn't make a fuss just politely explain another waiter what happened he suuuper nice offer to take it off the bill and we were okay with that. At the end the first waitress came when we asked for the bill with the worst face you can imagine,( like it's not my fault that there was a hair in the food and that the food was bad too. ) so we proceeded to pay I nicely told her "thank you for your service the pizza was actually delicious" and she just responded with a super mean face "well at least you liked something "

Like super rude, I tipped her 20% because she was actually pretty nice until the end, that was really surprising .

Now about the food me and my friends we all agreed that the pizza is really great, delicious!!!!, the pasta es average, the raviolis were definitely the worst, maybe a really "unique" recipe but I've tried ravioli in so many different Italian restaurants and this was really bad.

I'm not sure if I will ever go back, definitely don't want to have an upset server, specially if I'm going there to spend some money and celebrate and tip them well, to have this kind...

Three friends and I went to dinner here tonight as i recommended it highly and have been here on many occasions. Tonight I was extremely disappointed to say the least. Once sat at table a server ran by and without even looking at us threw plates and cutlery on the table, I brushed this aside, assuming she was just resetting the table quickly and a different server would be over. We then waited around 10 minutes to be greeted by our server (we were there later in the evening and the restaurant was not busy, we were the only new table to be sat within 15 minutes). Our one drink, a bud light tasted rotten and skunky, our whole table tried it and agreed. We got a new beer with a meek apology. When food came out I immediately noticed a hair in my pasta. They remade the dish with another meek apology and a question of how I even noticed it. It’s also worth noting that of all the times I’ve been here for dinner, this was the first time we did not receive any complimentary bread. Which would not usually bother me, but was particularly annoying when watching all other guest enjoy there food while I waited for my remade pasta.

Neither mistakes were properly apologized for, which as an industry worker myself found shocking, and neither item was compensated for on the bill. Never mind the fact that when the bill came our server appeared “out of uniform” like he was about to walk out of the restaurant and head home. I half thought he was and someone else was about to bill us out. Extremely upset, and won’t be coming back...