Harry's Italian — Restaurant in New York

I first encountered Harry's last year during a brief dalliance with MealPal (a pre-paid subscription plan where you can order specific lunches throughout the week at certain establishments - definitely worth a look if you're working in the city consistently). They had a Penne Vodka lunch option that I grabbed one or two times for pickup. It looked like a decent Italian place, a bit hidden in the depths of the Financial District, and yesterday seemed like a good opportunity for a sit-down visit. If it hadn't been close to 100 degrees, I would have taken advantage of the pleasant outdoor seating section, which would have provided viewpoints of a pretty gentrified neighborhood. This is an area that's typically a bit congested with narrower streets than other parts of the islands, but this block actually has some space to work with.

I stopped by around 1:30PM for a solo meal. If you're one of those people who is reluctant to go to a restaurant in the city by yourself, the chances are EXCELLENT that you will get amazing, primo service. I literally am batting close to 1.000 with this. I'm positive the restaurants are super nervous because by definition you have no one to talk to while you wait for your food. Their worry is your gain. It's a nice-looking place; you're probably a five-minute walk or so from the Seaport so there IS a bit of a touristy vibe here but nothing over the top - and for what it's worth, the vast majority of patrons I saw were clearly there on their lunch break like me.

I perused the menu beforehand and settled on the lunch portion of the Gnocchi w/ Tomato & Basil ($16). I was provided with a free bread/oil combo to munch on while I waited, but the entrée showed up literally in less than five minutes. The bread was just okay - it's room temperature and honestly a little stale. I still had a pretty significant portion to consume once I finished the gnocchi, and I dipped it in the sauce rather than the oil, which tells you something. But it was still nice to have.

The Gnocchi was solid - it WAS the lunch serving but it was a perfect portion for someone who accidentally had a cookie earlier. Have I had better versions of this? Yes; my all-time favorite is probably at E&V in Paterson, NJ, which has a melted cheese component that would have spiffed this up a bit, in my opinion. But it was good. I have a texture-based palate so I was a little suspicious at the thickness of the sauce, but it didn't cross the line for me - no giant chunks of tomato or onions to get me riled up. And the gnocchi itself was exactly the right consistency.

I'd describe this as "mainstream" Italian - it doesn't have a homey, old school tablecloth feel but it delivers an above average pasta dish at least. And if you're a solo diner on a schedule, you can easily be out of here in less than...

I gave this place one star because one star is the lowest score possible. I want to give a negative score if I can. I normally don't comment online unless it is really truly beyond my expectations, for better or worse. My family picked this restaurant and wanted to try something new. It turned out to be a real disaster.

We found out that the food was pricey so we did not order much. We ordered a full pizza, pasta, and two other dishes. I thought these might not be enough when ordering because it was late and we were hungry.. At the end, we left almost half of the food. The pizza was burnt. It was too hard to chow. The pasta was raw. It sticked on my teeth. Other two items were very salty. That is not all yet. We were thirsty because the pizza was too hard and other dishes were salty. I asked for water several times . But the waitress totally ignored me. I had to get water myself. There was only another table of customers besides us. So she was not busy at all. Also she never came to us to ask if we needed anything. The more outrageous scene happened at the end. I asked them if they have a discount if I pay cash. They said yes, they have a 4% discount if I pay cash. So I paid cash. Just as you imagined, there was no discount at all. The explanation was that they charge 4% more if I pay by credit card. And they did not charge me 4% surcharge since I paid cash. So they called it a 4% discount. More over, they kept 20% gratuity without permission from customer. When they gave me back my change, they kept 20% themselves. And that 20% was calculated base on the total bill after tax. I asked them why they kept 20% tips when there was no service at all. I precisely pointed out that I asked for water several times and had to got water twice myself. The waitress kept saying they just charge 20% tips repeatedly. I said I will remember your restaurant next time I come to New York. Surprisingly she said " I will remember you ". So that is the story. We got charged 20% tips with no service at all and left hungry.

I think the waitress got that attitude because she knew she would get 20%tips no matter what.

For these who are reading, turn around and go somewhere else or same thing will happen to you. You don't have to...

Summary: if you want to waste your money and get sick buy the very noticeable microwaved lasagna and the spaghetti shrimp marinara.

Don’t usually leave reviews but… here we are :) We chose this restaurant because it was very close from where we were heading to, and who doesn’t love good Italian food, we read the reviews and thought the place was good.

We got there, there were few people, so good sign right? Waiter was nice, asked if we had any questions about the menu etc. We got two dishes the lagsana and spaghetti shrimp marinara.

Both dishes when they came looked alright, but we ended up no eating the whole dish. The shrimp spaghetti dish: the shrimp noticeably came out of the frozen bag, plain spaghetti, and seemed like they just put the tomato sauce from a can. 0/10, flavorless. The lasagna was the worst one, meat tasted old, and looked like just came from the freezer and was put on the microwave. -100/10, same as the spaghetti, the tomato sauce was like out of the can, the only fresh thing was the parsley and cheese on top but the whole thing tasted terrible. Even college food tastes better.

We then got the check and we didn’t read the bad reviews so we found out about the magic 4% if you use credit card. Lucky we had cash, the bill ended up being about 54 ish plus tax, for two dishes and 2 sodas. We didn’t send the food back, we took the L today but…

Never again, but good luck! :)

PS: Our waiter was nice and service was acceptable but the food was so bad our experience was overall one star. Negative if we...