Piccolo Nido — Restaurant in Boston

My boyfriend and I planned on coming here for our first trip to Boston. After seeing so many wonderful reviews online, as well as the lowered prices on their website when doing research, it was easy for me to decide which restaurant was a good pick.

When my boyfriend and I arrived at the restaurant, the first red flag was that the restaurant was almost entirely empty (one table seated) at 6:30pm. We arrived at what seemed to be the back entrance of the restaurant, looking in and seeing a man on the phone in a somewhat confined space in front of the door. This entrance also had a giant column RIGHT in front of the door. Feeling confused at this point, the man on the phone opened the door and asked “are you coming in?” I replied yes and entered as he held the door open for us. To my surprise, as we walked passed the door, the man stopped us and I realized this was the owner as well as the front entrance.

We were seated and given our menus. Restaurant decor itself seemed okay overall, very generic but fine. When we were deciding what we wanted to eat, I was absolutely baffled when I saw the prices on the menu! They did not follow the website prices at all, adding almost an extra $10 per meal! This was a total surprise and somewhat inconvenient as this was one the main reasons of going to this restaurant in the first place. However, we told ourselves this was our vacation and we wanted to be optimistic. Both of us decided on the gnocchi nostrani (still saying online $15.50 as of one hour ago, but we both paid over $23 each, cannot remember the exact amount on the top of my head).

With these new prices, we expected a higher quantity and/or higher quality meal. Unfortunately, this is not what we received. We first were given at most three pieces of what seemed like yesterday’s bread and cold butter that broke the bread when you tried to spread it. Even Carrabba’s Italian Grill knew to give us olive oil with red pepper flakes. The food itself came out fast, however the food was mediocre to say the least. My one goal of coming to this restaurant was that I would receive an authentic sauce that made my mouth water. I was not expecting instead to receive a water-like sauce. The gnocchi tasted store-bought, reminded me of when I attempted to make gnocchi myself at home (overcooked and bland).

Another note I’d like to make is that one thing I was very excited to experience was the welcoming atmosphere I read about in so many reviews online. This felt like the polar opposite for my boyfriend and I when we were in the restaurant. As we sat at our table, it almost felt like the owner purposely ignored us as he greeted other guests coming in as well as going to other tables and asking how their meals were. The only interaction we received from the owner was when he gave us our food and then after I paid for my meal and was walking out the door.

Finally, something I did not see myself but was noticed by my boyfriend, when I was counting my money and calculating the tip (I did not want to pay, but I hate confrontation and just didn’t want to deal with the drama, after seeing bad reviews of this place I’m glad I did pay), our waiter continuously looked over my shoulder to see how much I would be tipping him. When I say continuously, I mean over and over, “trying to make it slick” as my boyfriend put it.

This restaurant was an absolute fail and I can’t highly recommend finding another one of the many restaurants in the area. Galleria Umberto’s was a hole-in-the-wall restaurant that absolutely blew us away with their pizza, I’d go there instead all day long! And yes, I am in fact a real person who did in fact go to this restaurant about 1 week ago. I understand the owner has been in business for over 25 years, and no I am not a...

(Burner Google account because the owner is very heated in the reviews… quite unprofessional) I was told the restaurant has been here for 35 years and I have no idea how. The first sign that something was not right had to be the lack of attendance: there was only three tables seated the entire time we were there. The food here was, simply put, not good. The “gnocchi” (dense cube of pasta) was covered in watery, metallic tasting sauce. The pasta dish I ordered was the most palatable (I hesitate to say good) by consensus of our group, but was still undercooked box pasta. The freshest flavor our group tasted was fresh out of a can. And the price was unbelievable for the quality of food - criminal even. While I care more for flavor than presentation, a few members of the group I was with pointed out that the presentation was juvenile. To be honest, I’ve seen better presentation at high school cafeterias. That being said, our waitress was very sweet and attentive, somewhat making up for the lack of any other positive force. I noticed that she was the only active employee up front and she still made time to make us feel attended to and important; bravo Queen! One thing to note was that as our meal ended with mostly full plates, the waitress seemed a bit nervous to take our full plates back to the kitchen. I took some time to read all of the review and noticed the sheer amount of 5 star reviews with little to no explanation for their score. If you are reading this take it as a reminder to always read the 1 star reviews before going to a restaurant.

Takeaway: Waitress was great, but everything else, like the...

After having a few pleasant dinners at Piccolo Nido, we decided to celebrate our daughter's engagement there. It was one of the worst and most embarrassing dinners we have ever had at a restaurant. We had reservations and arrived on time, we were one of the first parties there. As the restaurant filled with patrons the service, at our table of 10, the wait staff became less and less attentive. EVERYONE at the restaurant was served their dinner before us. We waited 2 hours before our dinner was served. When I asked why everyone else was already served, the owner, Pino, came to the table and in a very rude way (so that everyone could hear) said that they don't usually accomodate parties of 10, (then why did they take a reservation for a party of 10?) and that there were people with children who had come in after us, (so were we to wait because people come in with kids, not my problem!) so naturally they would be served first. We will NEVER return to Piccolo Nido again. Worst dining experience ever! Food was average by the way. Much better restaurants in...