Francesco's Italian Restaurant — Restaurant in Decatur

I REALLY wanted to love this place. We always try to support local businesses. When we were driving through Decatur, we chose to give Francesco's a try instead of going to the big garden chain down the road.

I will start with the positives and say that my actual entree which was Baked Manicotti with alfredo was DELICIOUS! It was exactly what I was wanting. My mom also LOVED the stuffed mushrooms. The French bread was also hot and soft!

So the problems... the staff was not welcoming. The waitress we had was a sweet young girl who was trying her best but she had no idea what she was doing. I don't blame her. There were two other ladies working- one mostly acting as hostess and a waitress. The hostess sometimes brought food out. I know that covid has been so bad for all businesses and so I really don't want to be too harsh, but they didn't help her at all. Every time we asked her a question, she left to find the answer. She put in our appetizer order after our main food. She didn't get salad info for 2 of us. Again, not this poor girl's fault. She was trying. She didnt have any training or help. On the way out the door, the hostess said, "I'm sorry, this is her 2nd day." When the hostess brought our appetizers out (after our food) she said, "I'm sorry, she put your appetizer order in after your food." So, instead of training her or just even helping her (it was not busy when we were there) they just blamed her. I felt bad for her. She was very kind the whole time and you could tell she was incredibly nervous.

The food: The salad was very plain: just some lettuce and a small bit of tomato. The cheese sticks were not very good at all. The garlic knots were pretty good, they were much larger than I was expecting and not the little knots I've had before but the garlic butter/oil was great. My husband ordered a twist on chicken parm that was made with alfredo and he enjoyed it. My mother and I both had the Manicotti and I had mine with cheese sauce. I would say the highlight of the meal was the stuffed mushrooms and the cheesy Manicotti, also, the French bread was quite delicious and soft. If the food items had not been quite good, I would not recommend this place, but I would say that I would give them another chance in the future because of this time being stressful for all small businesses.

Sorry for the lengthy review but I feel quite conflicted and want to give you an honest review. Always try to support your local businesses and give them a fair chance. I know they don't have the resources of...

I visited Francesco's today for lunch. I'd heard a lot of positive press for this place from reviews and also I believe it was featured on some best of north Alabama list or something...idk, I had it bookmarked for a reason! I was excited to try it out, but unfortunately I was pretty disappointed.

First, the good: unlike some other negative reviews, we had no problems with our service. Our large party of nine was seated immediately and all of our food and drinks came out pretty fast and it was all correct. Our waitress was very thorough making sure we all got the refills we needed and even brought us some extra bread.

The atmosphere of the restaurant is...okay. I like that it feels fairly open and airy, but the furniture is kinda uncomfortable and a little cheap feeling, which is fine but doesn't really give a nice Italian meal feel, haha.

Their lunch specials are quite a good deal though they recoup some of that money through drinks ($2.69 for a coke...ouch).

All that I've talked about above is fine enough...But the most important part of any dining experience for me is the food, and sadly I don't feel it delivered here.

I had the lunch special Ziti Campognoli. It comes with chicken, spinach, and mushrooms in a garlicky white wine sauce. Sounded awesome. Bread and a side salad accompanied it.

I will say this: the bread was actually pretty great. It came warm, was crusty on the outside and soft and fluffy on the inside. Luckily, I managed to make a meal out of that, because otherwise...

The salad was...meh. Kinda sad iceberg lettuce with one slice of tomato on top and some purple cabbage. It's whatever for a side salad for a lunch deal, but wow it was absolutely sopping with ranch. I love ranch, but not this much.

And lastly, the thing that should've been the best was the absolute worst. The white wine sauce was unbearably salty and garlicky, and also super oily. The chicken was mushy and had an unpleasant aftertaste - sort of like maybe it hadn't been cooked fresh? I dunno. It was altogether very unpleasant and I couldn't eat more than a couple of bites before being ready to put it aside.

The rest of my dining party seemed mostly okay to happy with the food, other than my one companion who got the same thing as me, so maybe we just got unlucky. That being said, however, I'm pretty unlikely to give this place...

Great food! Best italian in town actually. We frequently visit. About twice per month, sometimes dine in, sometimes we pick it up. But recently I had an issue. My last few orders have been made wrong. Which is ok I mean I let it go the first few times. But the third time I mentioned something. They said they would fix it by putting my name down on a list somewhere and I could pick up a replacement whenever. So I took them up on the offer and tried to go in and grab the food I was promised. When I called, this is where I am confused. The girl on the phone was very rude and treated me as if I was scamming food, said my name was not on any list. So I just had to do without. I wish I'd have known because I decided since I had that offer I would let my family go out to eat and I was going to sit home to finish some work. Easy, don't have to cook. . . . Wrong. So not only was I treated like a scammer I also missed out on going to sushi with my family. I'm not very pleased, that phone call was very embarrassing and now I don't even feel like showing my face in there again. I'll be looked at by the servers (who do recognize me when I go in) and their going to most likely think "it's that guy". And I usually never call of complain. Go figure the one time I did because it kept on happening I end up in this boat.

So now what? I hate thism it's my fault I should have had it corrected by making sure to tell them they kept getting it wrong when I ordered. But I failed to do so. Still when you order something in a specific way I shouldn't have to be on top of them to get it rightm the cook clearly thought I wouldn't notice...