Ciccio Trattoria — Restaurant in McKinney

The first time we went to this restaurant we hit the jackpot! It was 5 star - Great service, great food, great ambiance, great musician with a great choice in songs and not too loud you couldn't talk. It was fantastic. Because we had such a great experience we went back last night and it was a 3 star experience at best. I booked online and requested a booth/couch table. When we got to the restaurant the place was packed. A table of 4 walked in at the same time but they did not make a reservation, where as I had. They were taken to a booth/couch seat 18 minutes before we were seated. (YET THEY HAD NO RESERVATION) We then got seated at a table that was not a booth/couch seat as requested and right by the busy front door, and was crammed in the walk way with waiters and patrons constantly bumping into us and apologising. It was super annoying. If I take the time to make a reservation and a walk in doesn't have a reservation, you would expect the table with a reservation to get priority over a table that didn't bother to make a reservation. Our waiter was nice but never cleared our table after our appetiser. When our main meal came I had to ask the server that bought our food, to please remove the appetiser dishes to make space for our entrees. As we had used our cutlery for the appetiser and the dishes were eventually cleared, we had no clean cutlery for our main meal so we had to wait for clean cutlery before we could start eating. Mine and my daughters meal came way before my husband and other daughters meal. So two of us sat with our food getting cold while we waited for the other two dishes. We were not offered parmesan cheese and no one checked on us during our meal. After unsuccessfully trying to flag our waiter for 5 minutes, I asked another waitress that walked past us for parmesan cheese, and she disappeared and came back after I was almost done with my meal (to be fair she was not our waitress and it was super busy). The toast/crostini that was served with the capriccio appetiser was inedible. Even though it was toasted it tasted stale - like it was last nights leftovers served today. It was very chewy and hard to bite into. The rest of the food was excellent. Very tasty and we all enjoyed our meals. The waiter bought us the check without offering us dessert. Who does that? I said to him "what if we wanted dessert?" He said he could always just add it to the check after the fact. By that stage I was over it so we paid and left. I am 50/50 about this restaurant. If I hadn't had such a great experience the first time, after last nights experience, I probably would...

Came around 6:30pm on a Sunday night, it was half full at that time but got quite full as time went on. The interior is actually quite spacious and absolutely beautiful, very pleasant environment to be in.

We ordered: Beef Bolognese with tagliatelle: flavor is very good, the bone marrow we got was quite small, about 3 inches, so not as large as the other guests, but it was delicious. I would recommend that this dish does not need bechamel, but instead cook the Bolognese for longer and develop a deeper profile. I REALLY appreciate that there is no pork in this, so us non pork eaters can have this dish. Lamb ragu with Pappardelle - this one in my opinion needs a total revision. It was far too mild, and I really don't think this was a ragu recipe. Chef used cinnamon or another sweet aromatic which made the dish fall completely flat on top of the mild flavors. I understand that you can't have two dishes that are similar but I do invite chef to revisit this one. foccacia - took over 30 minutes to get this, and it really had no flavor at all, neither did the ricotta. The other food came timed perfectly well. Tiramisu - not sure if this is made in house or outsourced, as the coffee used was quite bitter. It softened on the 2nd day but overall a good tiramisu

Service was good with just the right amount of attentiveness, and the live music was an absolute BLAST! the Sunday guy does the owners other restaurant on wednesdays and he had the crowd going, clapping and singing along. and it was definitely still easy to hear and talk to each other, and I was sitting right up front.

Overall, I think this restaurant has fantastic, fantastic potential. They can really stand out if they developed their dishes further, and I can almost certainly bet people would be willing to drive from far for a meal here if word got around the flavors are like NYC. I could also easily justify the price with an improved flavor profile. I know this is Texas, but some of us are DESPERATE for a proper Italian meal here and not 30 versions of Olive Garden with cheese and tomato slapped on pasta.

and lastly, thanks to the owner for putting this in McKinney so we have somewhere good to go right...

The server, Ava, was very good. We would have rated her as excellent had she moved my wife and I to another (dry) table. We were seated within 5 minutes and I thought the server splashed water on me from a wine glass as she picked it up to remove it. I was wrong. Apparently the the air conditioner returns were dripping from above. I made Ava, the server, aware of it and she apologized, saying they were having some issues with the AC and suggested that I move to the opposite side of the table. I moved, but continued to get dripped on until I moved to the corner closest to my wife. This is not only annoying. It is completely unsanitary. Continuing…… We asked for bread and it was warm and delicious. The rigatoni was cooked perfectly but the sauce was thin with a strange taste. The amount of chicken was minimal. I ate about half. I almost always eat the entire portion. My wife’s chicken parmigiana was better, but the cheese on top of the chicken was barely melted. Not at all appetizing. During our meal, I was, more than once, bumped into from behind by the server attending to the table next to us. There was very little room between the tables and it was inappropriate for him to be be squeezing in between the tight space when there was much more room on the opposite side of their table. Completely inappropriate. The positive? The drinks from the bar were very good. This was our second visit to this restaurant. The first time was very good and we vowed that we would return. This second visit was a HUGE disappointment and we will not return. Management- Did you hear that? I believe we witnessed managers on the floor yet neither of them were interacting with the customers. There are many, many other Italian restaurants in the area that are superior to this one. Pass this one up. The ratings seem a little too...