Gino's — Restaurant in New York

You can tell the business is solely ran on greed. Used to be a favorite & over the years the place has really lost its touch. Sadly picked up an order yesterday, mostly all staff + front girls, all really nice, except for the manager/higher up. Would not have made a big deal (even though it is one) but the way manager/owner runs business, really left my experience distasteful. Unfortunately, not one person wears a mask or a hair net. Drove 40 minutes home, to open my calamari tray to not ONE freshly fallen out hair on my lemon wedges, but also another tossed along the edge of the tray.

When I called the establishment for a refund, they told me to come back with my order for a new meal.., as if hair in my food is not an inconvenience enough, when I explained I could not, they tried to sell me on store credit…..

Why would a business owner ever think a customer would want to come back after just finding hair in their food….??

no one wants to spend $40 on a Friday night meal for there family, only to find hair(s) in the meal. The manager refused to get on the phone and had the poor girls frantically try to diffuse the situation with me by telling me to come back for a new made order. After 15 minutes of back and forth with the girls and them literally telling me “The manager only wants to give store credit” Sadly, the second I mentioned my friends over at the health department, my refund was quickly returned, currently still pending, so I am giving the restaurant a few days to make sure it goes back into my account.

Will never return & have gotten a lot of feedback from my friends in HB who have also said the restaurant has long gone lost their business.

Shout out to Paris, the young girl who handled the situation and kindly returned my money. I appreciated her calm demeanor and her thorough execution to make sure I got my refund.

ANY excuse regarding COVID and the establishment being busy and/or understaffed in my opinion is false considering no protocols are taken inside of the restaurant & the high volume of orders are because they simply refuse to turn an order away to actually accommodate the ones they already have.

SERIOUSLY makes me worry that during COVID they are asking for food back that was already in someone else’s possession, really makes me wonder if they are re-serving to other...

I am currently in the Queens area doing work and at my motel, I asked a couple NYPD officers if they had a recommendation for a good local restaurant. Both immediately said "Gino's". They gave directions and a quick, but rave review. It wasn't until around 9 hours later that I was able to find time to go, but I wanted to get a "second opinion" from some internet reviews. Most agreed with my NYPD guys. I thought since it was nearly 10:30pm, I should call about maybe picking up a pizza, and making sure they would still be cooking at this hour. On the phone, was possibly one of the nicest, and courteous people I have spoke with. The girl assured me they were open until 2am, and almost as though a friend was inviting me over to their house, she suggested instead of having a few slices in my room, why not come out and dine at a table? A quick drive to Cross Bay and WOW, wide open streets, and easy to find! Do not go by the exterior photo posted online here, this place is NICE! After entering, there is a fantastic, open cooking area for pizza to the right and a very open and high ceiling that you just feel almost home here. The hostess was equally pleasant and asked where we were from and had we been to Gino's before. I tried to just say I was going to order for take out, but she smiled, and said "come in, sit down, have a nice sit down meal" and I just couldn't say no to her smile. We were seated at a 1/2 round table area with a nice view of the dining area. Our waiter was fast to greet and offer drinks, a menu, and a smile. There is an ample offering on the menu, but not so much you bore of reading so many options. After glancing at a few pages, I suddenly lost interest in a pizza and opted for the Veal Rollatini (Veal stuffed with procutto, mozzarella, in a very nice white wine red sauce with mushrooms and basil). The portions were more than enough even as hungry as I was this evening. The flavor is excellent, the service was superb. I will definately find time to dine at Gino's again before my work week is over. I cannot wait to try another choice from there...

Arrived at 4:40p on a Tuesday afternoon so the place was quiet. Waiters were in a rush. Within 3 minutes of sitting down we were approached twice by two different waiters to ask if we were ready to order.

I ordered chicken parm with spaghetti, my date ordered two slices of pizza, we both ordered sodas. The sodas came out within 2 minutes, then the chicken parm maybe 4-5 minutes later. The two slices of pizza came out 5 minutes later for some reason.

I took one bite of the chicken parm and could tell it was a good 2-3 days old. The chicken was tough, tasted sour-y, and the bread crumbs were stale. I wanted to return it immediately but didn’t want to make a fuss in front of my date.

Get this, they didn’t have fresh black pepper and before I took my first bite, the waiter asked how the food was. I told him I didn’t taste it yet. He gave a small giggle and walked away. He came back two minutes later to ask if we wanted more soda, we said yes. He returned 2 minutes later with 2 sodas.

I ate as much of the chicken as I could muster up while my date and I discussed another Italian restaurant that we both knew and I confessed and told her, “we should have went there”.

Anyway, another waiter came over to us to ask if we wanted a 3rd round of sodas. We declined. He asked if I wanted to take the leftovers home, I also declined and requested the check.

I paid, left a tip doubling the tax and vowed to never eat there again. This was my second time here. The first time I was alone and had two slices of pizza which were average.

There are other pizza places on Crossbay Blvd to eat at so I would encourage you to visit those... and I’m sure they won’t be out of black pepper! Seriously Ginos?

[Edit: This is a note to the owner... I edited my original review because you accused me of endorsing another local restaurant so I removed it. I`m not interested in tearing down your business while "endorsing" another. I am only interested in good food and helping my fellow travelers find it.

I stand 100% behind everything I wrote in my...