Carmine's - Time Square — Restaurant in New York

This was the ONE restaurant I wanted to try during our recent weekend trip to NYC. I saw amazing things on TikTok and was very excited to try it. Our reservation was for 6:45 PM. We showed up at 6:25 PM, which we knew was a bit early. We were prepared to wait until our reservation time.

What we weren’t prepared for was 1. The condition of our wait time and 2. The length of our wait time. When you have a reservation, one person goes straight into the restaurant and checks in at a hostess stand. The rest of your party goes in to the right, into the building, passing another hostess, and then joining a mob of groups waiting for tables. This area is a free for all. Stand where you can fit, squeeze by when it’s your time, and don’t hope to hear the person next to you speak. There’s also no where to sit, so a disabled veteran in our group was forced to sit on the floor. When we finally got called, 25 minutes after our reservation time, we notified the host that we had a disabled person in our party, as we had witnessed most groups being sat upstairs. We had thought there was an accessible path, as we had watched other groups notify the host of the same thing, and they were led straight past the stairs instead of up them. The host instead said it’d be an even longer wait if that was the case. We said no, we’d carry her up the stairs need be, as our group was sore, hot, and hungry at this point.

When we were sat, the atmosphere was rustic Italian-esque. Like eating at your Italian great aunt’s house. The chandeliers were dusty, and the rooms were VERY loud. But we didn’t really mind. The service was our low note for the evening. We almost never had drinks, and often had to wait 15-20 mins for refills/boxes/the check. The server was very nice, but he was waiting on way too many tables.

The food was the high note. Truly, it was the best food I’ve ever eaten. Ever. I’ll never shut up about the food. Everything tasted fresh and homemade and had HUGE portions, as I expected. We had the chicken parm, raviolis, beef tenderloin (the special), and the cheesecake. We absolutely loved every bit and had tons to take home.

Something a bit neutral - ask for prices for specials. We knew all the entrées were about $35-$40 each. Which would have amounted to an extremely affordable meal for our group of 6. However, we were surprised to find out (when we got our bill), that the special we ordered was $175 itself. Now, three things. We should have asked the price, absolutely. Also, the food that came with the special was plentiful, more complex, and truly was worth the price. Finally, even with the $175 entree, 2 more entrees, sodas for 6, dessert, and free bread, AND eating in Times Square, the price per person came out to about $61. We felt this was extremely fair, especially considering the quality of food.

All in all, we would eat here again for the quality. But we’d expect a bit less in terms of wait time and speed of service. I truly don’t think you’ll find a better deal for dinner (cost...

Our party of 10 immediately noticed a lack in service once we were seated. Our server was asked 2x to bring over butter or olive oil so we could enjoy the bread brought to the table, he completely ignored our request. He took almost 20 minutes to take our order. The restaurant was pretty full but there was ample enough staff to take care of every table. We noticed that several table around us was getting stellar service however our experience stuck out like a sore thumb. Numerous times a guy in a black suit was visiting surrounding tables asking about their experience however we were not part of his rounds infact it appeared he dileberately avoided our table. At some point during our dining I had to raise my hand numerous times to get his or anyone else's attention because we needed an extra chair and place setting for an additional guest that came late. Boy was that interesting as they did bring over a chair but never brought over a plate or utensils. I finally flagged down one if the bus boys that was carrying clean plates to a different table and kindly asked if he would bring us a plate, mind you the man in the black suit was standing right next to our table and never acknowledged our need. At some point between our appetizers being cleared from the table and our mains coming out we were blessed with a new server by the name of Erica. Erica really saved the day and completely turned our experience into a positive one. She was so attentive and polite when we expressed how happy we were with her Service compared to our previous server she told us she was just stepping in for now and he would be back soon, we pushed back in the thought of our previous server returning and somehow Erica, remained our server for the balance of our visit. Thank God. The food was average nothing special or memorable. I've had better Italian food served family style at Tony D's and they're service has always been above par. I've visited this particular Carmines in the past I'm familiar with the average food but I never experienced service failures to this magnitude. Finally the man in the black suit did come to our table and asked if everything was OK and as we began to speak he dismissed us and walked away from the table. Carmines my family is so disappointed with our dining experience on the evening of March 22nd 2025 Elijah party of 10 at 8:30pm and I hope you address our concerns with the staff on duty so that none of your patrons have to experience this lack of service in the future. Huge shout out to Erica who definitely understands how important customer experience and satisfaction is paramount to a great dining experience and promotes...

So we had very high expectations of this place and honestly I am a little disappointed in the service especially. We walked in with No Reservations and was told we'd only have like a 15-minute wait we had two options, we could eat at the bar or we could wait at the bar or somewhere else until our seats were ready we decided to sit at the bar and grab some drinks while we waited. So it was explained to us that we would have to settle our table at the bar if we weren't going to eat there before we went to go to our table which whatever that's fine it's a small detail. So the bartender gave us the menus and then never came back to us for our order. All of the bartenders ignored us. This was not a great start but we were still hopeful. Our name was then called and we had no drinks with us. So we went and we were seated in the farthest part of the restaurant which was not a bad thing we actually liked the coziness of it. I knew from looking earlier that there was two different pricings for the a la carte menu. But it wasn't on the menu that we had to scan to look at on our phones. So things were pretty unclear I like having an actual menu to look at so that there's no mistakes. So after asking some questions we still were never offered the half portions. I ordered a Rum Runner which was absolutely delicious we then ordered an order of garlic bread half with cheese half without a Caesar salad and the chicken parm with rigatoni, a side of 2 meatballs and then to finish with a half order of cannolis. notice that the meatballs and cannolis were offered as a half portion. The one complaint I have for the Caesar salad was there wasn't enough croutons to which the runner was kind enough to get us more. And the cannolis were very small. After ordering too much food for us we asked for things to be packaged up to go we never received the Caesar salad and had to ask about it when we were leaving. Then we ordered specifically the cannolis to go and those were never brought out to us. To which as we were leaving we double back cuz my daughter remembered about them and we asked and we're standing in the middle of the restaurant while they searched for our cannolis. For a restaurant who specializes in their motto of family-style eating it didn't feel very family-oriented with the service. The service was really lacking. I think the only good customer service we received was from the gentleman at the podium I believe his name was Logan. And then also the girl that brought us to our seats she was lovely but I didn't catch her name. After that it was...