Florena’s Italian — Restaurant in England

Last minute decision to meet friends in Howden who recommended cocktails in Romeo’s followed by pizza in Florena’s. ‘Best pizza in the whole of Yorkshire’ was their ambitious claim. Oh my days they weren’t wrong! The pizza base was the BEST - non-doughy with the perfect amount of bite and the topping was absolutely FULL. I left 3 pieces (which is unheard of for me!) which they happily placed in a take home box for me. My daughter is VERY coeliac and the utmost care was taken to ensure her GF pizza wasn’t contaminated. They even went to the trouble of baking her a GF garlic bread to go with the mixed platter we had as our starter. It wasn’t just the pizza that was great, this quaint little restaurant feels like it’s taken a little bit of Italy and placed it right here in the heart of Yorkshire. The ambience is perfect with Friday night energy at every rustic dimly lit table - all in full view of the incredible pizza oven (it’s massive!) Great wine, super friendly staff and that all important family feel you want from a traditional Italian restaurant. For get your big chains - THIS is a little bit of real Italy and the pizza really was the best in Yorkshire. A must if you’re anywhere near Howden and if you’re not hear Howden - it’s worth the drive...

Disappointing meal and service. The food came out quickly but the service from the waiting staff was slow and they were clearly distracted in spite of the fact, there were 2 staff, waiting just 3 tables. They cleared our dessert plates at 19:10 and we asked for the bill. At 19:35 they eventually came to us and asked if we'd decided to have dessert??? We explained we'd finished our dessert almost half an hour ago and were waiting for our bill. Then when we paid, they almost forgot to take half of the money. We'd have got away with only one of us paying if we hadn't spoken up. The food was tasty but it was a shame the lasagne wasn't fresh and was topped with dried mixed herbs and dripping in an oil slick from the cheese grilled on top. Although the cheesecake was fresh, who tops cheesecake in buttercream and serves passion fruit cheesecake on top of caramel sauce? And the fried bread stick and Nutella dipping dessert was monstrously huge, over facing and unpleasantly salty. Everything was so average apart from the courgette fries which were yummy and actually bumped them up from 2.5...

Ordered 8 pizzas, 2 garlic breads (1 plain, 1 cheesy), 3 chips, and zucchini fries for collection for my birthday party. I placed the order myself the day before and it was repeated back correctly. My dad went to collect and paid in full, trusting the order was all there.

When we unpacked, only the pizzas and fries were there — no garlic breads, no extra chips — yet we were charged for everything. I rang them to sort it out and got passed around between multiple staff who kept insisting I got what I ordered, despite that clearly not being true. No apology, no ownership, no help.

I had a picky eater who was relying on the garlic bread, so it wasn’t a small thing. Eventually, they said I could pay again if I wanted them remade — seriously? After spending £140+ too. I was already taken away from my own birthday trying to sort their mistake. In the end, we just went to our local chippy instead.

Real shame, because the pizzas themselves were actually lovely. But the customer service? Absolutely appalling. Not worth the hassle. Won’t...