Francesca's Cucina — Restaurant in City of Syracuse

Updated visit:

Yesterday 4/12 we came to dinner with our families. They’ve never been to francesca’s before and we were super excited to try and I was super excited as well for them. The apps we got were good - the bacon wrapped scallop was amazing and the calamari wasn’t too bad. Except they didn’t provide the bang bang sauce and only marinara. The focaccia bread provided was extremely salty - the top part was chunks of sea salt that we had to scrape off.

My gemelli angelloro was SO salty. i’m not sure if it was the sauce or the pasta or just everything but my mother in law got the same thing and thought the same. My boyfriend’s veal parm was good! The italian wedding soup was also extremely salty. Not sure what happened yesterday but I was parched all night and bloated because of how much salt that was in my food.

Only giving it 3 stars because of the many times I’ve came here - yesterday’s visit started off disappointing. Not only were my party and I were early to our reservation by 5 mins but we were quoted that they’re 10-15 minutes behind. We got a drink at the bar and then 20 minutes passed and I of course went up just to check in because I haven’t received a text and we’re past the time the hostess/host quoted us for. This time, it was a different person up and it was the blonde woman. She was SO sarcastically annoying when I wasn’t even being rude, hostile, and just wanted to check in. Before the other host that took care of us first could say “yeah they were here for 745” it’s 8:10 at this point, the blonde woman smiled so fake and was exaggerating her words so much “SORRY WE ARE SUPER BUSY OKAY” and then rolled her eyes when I walked away. The condescending and fake exaggerated attitude was so uncalled for. The other host also just looked at her like ??

That left a bad taste as we were only checking in. God forbid we are 15 minutes late let alone 20.. we’ll be charged for our tardiness and our table wouldve been given up!

Luckily, our server was the most wonderful and kind woman ever. Please note that our reservation was 7:45, we didn’t get our entree until 9:15 and we didn’t leave the restaurant until after 10, it was bizarre and like I said - if WE WERE LATE by over 20 minutes our table would’ve been given up and we would’ve been all...

We were there for my birthday dinner last night and it was a HUGE disappointment! Being from syracuse but moved anyway we were back intown visiting, wanting to enjoy a great dinner at a Syracuse staple. Francesca’s was a big mistake. Our server was delightful and attentive but the food was unacceptable. Our first course was 2 appetizers the risotto special and the utica greens both came out cold. We mention to our serve and she insisted on taking them back to kitchen, she returned with “fresh” appetizers that were somewhat warmer but not what I would ever consider fresh and hot. Second course we had 2 soups and 2 salad, 1- italian wedding 1- beans and greens they were ok nothing special and not a ton of flavor, italian wedding had mostly broth and 3 tiny meatballs. The caesar was inedible, even for a person who loves garlic and anchovies, it was gross, the anchovies were beyond over powering and the dressing was so thick it was soggy!! Terrible, just terrible! Moving on to the entrees, 1 was the pork chop special, again not was fresh and hot, the polenta on the special had zero flavor, it came with a marsala sauce that was barley on the plate and the cheese and greens on top of pork chop was dry and blah. The scallop special for $42.99 was suppose to be jumbo scallops and came with 3 tiny scallops and burnt veggies that hurt to bite into. The other 2 entrees were a chicken parm and was fine and the Chicken Capricciosa which was also ok. Basic and ok nothing special. Even the bread served between courses was a disappointment the bread was overwhelming rosemary flavor and the dipping sauce was spicey for anyone who isn’t into spicy. We even had a drink at the bar after and the bartenders were cold and unfriendly, barley made eye contact, (even went out of their way not to look up), never smiled or made you feel welcome. We have been to Frandescas Many times over the years and this was very very very sub par for what we are use to and have experienced on previous visits. Dissapointing is an understatement. This was just down right bad food. We were out for a bday dinner and looking to enjoy the experience and it...

summary: this place does not care about its customers at all. It only exists to maximize profits for its owner.

Here are the details: We went there for dinner with another couple on a Saturday evening, so party of four. Reservation was for 5:00 p.m. and we were on time. We were seated right away and from the time we sat down we were rushed by the waitress. We all ordered main courses and salads, and I ordered an appetizer. The appetizer never came. The salads came instantly and before we could even finish our salads the main entree came. While we were finishing up our entrees our waitress notified us that we needed to move to the bar because the next reservation for our table was about to arrive. It was 6:30 p.m., 1.5 hours since we sat down. We continued talking because we had not seen our friends in quite a few months. At 6:45 we were told by the waitress that we had to move to the bar immediately because they had a confirmed reservation for our table for 6:45 and that party had arrived. The waitress reminded us that we had received a text message saying that there was a 2-hour limit on sitting at the table. Yet they had confirmed a reservation for 1.75 hours and were literally kicking us out. They told us to go to the bar, and we went to the bar but there was no room because it was full of other people who had been evicted from their tables. Our dinner with friends we don't see very often was cut very short and very rudely.

Also, my wife's chicken parmesan was burned and my appetizer never came.

The tables are too close together and the noise level is very high. Also, they have only 1 men's bathroom and one woman's bathroom, with a lock on each door. So only one person at a time for a restaurant that probably seats about 100 people.

This is a restaurant that's run by the numbers with zero commitment to customer service. They just want to make as much money as possible and pump people through. If you are a party of two your limit will be 1.5 hours. That's a further example of how little this place cares about...