Buca di Beppo Italian Restaurant — Restaurant in Kissimmee

The grace of Buca di Beppo was brought upon me as if it were the will of God. A few months ago I was cursed with the requirement to go to Florida for 2 weeks in succession when that was the last thing I wanted to do, I had other plans, and, most importantly, I was in a hotel Way too fancy for me in a state I had never been. I felt out of place, I thought I wanted to be elsewhere. One night, A couple of days into staying, I had planned to go to a nearby restaurant, a Spanish one, If I remember correctly. I traveled there, and we went in and made a reservation, only to be brought to a halt by a 40-plus-minute wait time. I was disappointed. Thankfully, however, we were searching for other places to eat. So, like clockwork, we found Bucca di Beppo. we called, and there was a table waiting for us. So, we canceled the reservation and headed there. The following is what makes me consider this experience the best I have EVER had at a restaurant:

When we sat down, within maybe 30 seconds of getting settled in, there was someone to provide us with water, our choice of beverage, and appetizers. Amazing service. We ordered the Calamari and stuffed mushrooms as appetizers, and I ordered a Pepsi with grenadine (something I learned from my time in New York). Within maybe a couple of minutes, I had my drink, and in a couple more minutes, we had our appetizers and were ready to order. The main dishes consisted of the Eggplant Parm and the Salmon. After we ordered, we had just enough time to wait for me to begin to admire the culture of the restaurant. Not too long, but a comfortable amount of time for me to appreciate it. I had noticed it before, but now it was more pronounced than ever. The sheer amount of culture in this restaurant was simply unbelievable, somehow exceeding the amount that I had experienced in all of my time in Florida so far, combined. on the walls, there were jokes, paintings, and art. And on the ceiling, a decorative and soft light made from multicolor string lights and empty wine bottles, neatly arranged to make an artistic light fixture. By this point, I was simply perplexed. The amazing service, the Great food, and the uplifting atmosphere. As somewhat of an Italian myself, I loved this place. And not to mention the food, ON POINT. Especially our waiter, "Big Moe", as he was called, was a true gentleman. He was kind, accurate, quick, and precise. When I say that There were not even 30 to a minute seconds that went by without some beverage in my cup before it was refilled, I mean it. This guy was on it. Come to find out, They make a PITCHER of this stuff for you and keep it in the back, ready to refill your cup. I know of not one other restaurant that does this. And, you may be thinking, The place must have been empty, right? Nope! It was packed, there were families, couples, and everyone alike. And when they say that this place was family style, they meant it, you can tell in everything there. We had plenty of leftovers, and I left feeling happy like I had never before on this trip.

Between the food, the atmosphere, the staff, the culture, the service, and everything in between, The experience I had at Buca di Beppo was enough to make me consider It to be the best restaurant I had ever been to. So, thank you to the staff, (Shout-out big Moe and the lady that thought I was taking a picture of her and posed), And thank you to Buca di Beppo For saving my trip to Florida, and making this place my favorite restaurant of all time.

PS: I had no idea this place was a chain until I looked it up, I hope this review helps pull the thing out of bankruptcy, I am hoping to god...

Been more than 10 years since I've been to any Bucca di Beppo and decided to visit their Celebration, FL location for our Christmas dinner. This restaurant is known for it's family style dining in that the small portion is suppose to serve 2-3 people, while the large supposedly serves 4-5.

Upon our arrival, we were greeted by a friendly and welcoming hostess and quickly led to our table by another. Once there, we met our waiter Randy, who was also friendly, welcoming and very attentive. He really did a great job!

After ordering our soft drink beverages, we started our evening with an order of fried calamari and an order of chicken wings(Not shown in photos).

Before the appetizers arrived, we were served some hot, freshly baked bread, which had a nice crispy crust, along with an olive oil and balsamic vinegar mixture to use for dipping. Personally, I could have gone with out the vinegar or just some good old fashioned butter instead.

When the appetizers arrived, the wings were perfectly cooked, hot, juicy and very tasty. The calamari, on the other hand, I found to be extremely tough and very chewy, which is usually the result of large squid being used instead of the smaller, more tender variety. I also found the calamari portion to be rather small for the 2 to 3 people they claim it serves.

As a second course, we chose to have a Caesar Salad, which is also not shown in the photos. The Romain Lettuce was fresh, crisp and both the dressing and the croutons were quite good. The portion size was decent, and easily served 4 adults.

Finally it was time to order the main courses. We settled upon a small order of Spaghetti with Meatballs, a small order of Eggplant Parmigiano, and a large order of Chicken Parmigiano.

Let me start by saying this, I grew up on the very best homemade Italian food cooked by a mother that born in Italy, and the main dishes ordered were all very good! It's not often that anyone will here me say this about any Italian restaurant.

The spaghetti and 2 very large meatballs was very good, tasty and the portion was more than expected. The chicken parm, 5 generous pieces, was nicely cooked, tender and topped with a very pleasing tomato sauce. The eggplant was my personal favorite. It was also a generous portion, nicely prepared, perfectly cooked and so very delicious!

I ended my evening with a cup of cappuccino and a piece of their Italian Creme cake. Both hit the spot nicely and it was a great way to end a really good and very satisfying meal.

With the exception of a few crumbs found on my chair, both the restaurant and the men's bathroom I found to be very clean.

The only big negative review I have to offer about this location is that they really need to do a much, much better job of cleaning and inspecting both their dishes and silverware prior to placing them back in use. This was the only reason why I chose to give this Bucca di Beppo an overall rating of...

Honestly one of the worst and most uncomfortable dining experiences I’ve ever had. Our waitress basically told us at the beginning that there were a lot of big parties coming in and that we should “get our orders together quickly” then disappeared for 20 minutes and brought our drinks all at different times. When she finally did take our order, she then said “I didn’t know you all wanted separate checks” even though no one had mentioned this yet, and seemed incredibly angry and exasperated and that’s when it took a turn for the worse. She seemed flustered and angry at us out of nowhere the entire rest of the meal. Then at the end she didn’t ask if we wanted dessert, handed us our checks, when we told her we were double charged for one entree she took our credit cards and was gone for another 15-20 minutes while we sat there uncomfortably. She came back and we found that the double charged entree was still charged. When we mentioned it she angrily grabbed the check and disappears again for another 10 minutes. She comes back hands us the check and doesn’t say anything about there being a possible pending charge or anything. It was my Birthday dinner and she muttered to one of my friends “sing happy Birthday for him” and walks away.

A majority of us are in our party are servers as well and it pains me to leave a bad review because I know some nights it’s just a bad night and this particular server seemed to have a lot of good reviews so I don’t know what happened but it seems like we upset her somehow even though I don’t know what we did besides her just assuming we wanted separate checks. But as a server that’s up to us to keep track of what everyone ordered. And it was my Birthday celebration and she literally took the air out of the room every-time she got to the table. It was really an incredibly disappointing and uncomfortable meal and I’ve been a huge fan of Buca for most of my life, spending a lot of birthdays over the...