Piccola Cucina Uptown — Restaurant in New York

I have one word to describe my experience at Piccola Cucina… salty. The food was delicious, don’t get me wrong, but everything I ate would end in a very salty note. They don’t give you a bottle of water at the table, so I was constantly waiting for the waiter to swing by to refill my water. This is not me exaggerating, but I left the restaurant really thirsty, and the first thing I did when I got back to my apartment was get a glass of water. As for the service, it was alright. The waiters were really nice, but they kept… dropping things. They spilled my water on the table, spilled pasta sauce on another guest’s jacket, and we just kept hearing cups or silverware dropping throughout our dinner. The food speed was a little mixed, our appetizers came out in about 10 minutes, but our entrees took about 40-50 minutes to come out.

Let’s talk about the food!

Polpette di carne con porcini e tartufo (Truffle meat balls)

The Polpette was pretty good, they were meatballs cooked in a creamy sauce topped with black truffles. They definitely did not skimp out on the truffles, you could really taste it throughout the dish, but it was not overpowering at all. The sauce was creamy and thick, but was a little too salty. Same thing with the meatballs, had an amazing taste, but very salty.

Polpo Caprese (Octopus Caprese)

The Polpo Caprese was good as well. The octopus was chewy, and tasted very good paired with the burrata cheese. The highlight of the dish was definitely the tomato confit; the acidity helped brighten the heavy dish a lot, and the acidity helped cut through all the fattiness in the cheese.

Insalata Marzamemi (salad)

This was one of the standout dishes in my opinion. (Primarily because it was the only dish we ordered that wasn’t too salty). The salad was crunchy, peppery, acidic, and overall very delicious. The seared tuna was amazing, it tasted very fresh I really enjoyed the natural sea-flavor of the raw fish.

Tagliatelle Verdi con ragu di cinghiale alle erbe e tartufo nero (Truffle Pasta)

I had high hopes for this dish because of how delicious the Truffle Meatballs tasted, but I was a little disappointed. The dish had two flavor profiles: salty and truffle. The dish did not taste interesting to me, it was a basic tomato ragu sauce that was overpowered by the truffle flavor. I believe that a little truffle goes a long way, and they definitely put a little too much in this dish. After taking a few bites, I was already starting to get sick of the repetitive flavor.

Fusilloni Scampi (shrimp dish)

This dish was also incredible salty as well, but was much better than the Truffle Pasta. At first, I thought there was only one piece of shrimp in the entire dish, but there were actually little chunks of diced shrimp scattered throughout the dish. Those little diced shrimped packed a lot of shrimp flavor, and it was quite a delight every time I bit into one. The sauce was tomato based and very acidic, so the burrata cheese was a nice fatty component that mellowed out that acidity very nicely.

Ravioli Ossobuco (ravioli)

My friends ordered this dish and I didn’t try it at all. The only thing they said about it was that it was very salty.

Overall, I think that for the price point, you are getting very delicious Italian food. If I go back, I will definitely tell them to hold back a little bit on the salt, so the individual flavors of the high quality ingredients can...

NEVER had I imagined a manager/supervisor would make a RACIST remark TWICE directly towards us. Undoubtedly the WORST dining experience in all my four years living in NYC. This happened last night 4/17 Sunday at 9PM.

If you're going to eat at a nice Italian restaurant, there are plenty of others with better, NON-RACIST service. More details about incident below.

(여기 절대 오지 마세요. 뉴욕 생활 4년간 이런 황당한 경우는 처음입니다. 매니저 같은 사람한테 인종차별 겪었습니다 - 여기보다 서비스 제대로 되어있고 맛있고 인종차별 안하는 이태리 식당 가세요.)

Our server was busy so I made eye-contact with a male staff and smiled to him. He was dressed in more formal attire and seemed like a supervsior/manager. When he came over, he said "ni hao shi ma" to me and my friend.

We are not of Chinese ethnicity, and we don't know how to speak Mandarin. We were speaking in fluent native English. When he first said it, I did not realize at all this was in Mandarin. I just thought he had a strong Italian accent so I said "sorry, I didn't hear what you said," and he said "ni hao shi ma" AGAIN. This was the LAST thing I thought I would ever hear from a supervisor at a restaurant on Park Ave near Central Park area. This is EXTREMELY inappropriate and upsetting.

And it did not end there. I was just so shocked, so I said "I'm sorry, I didn't understand at first because I'm not Chinese." BUT instead of an apology, he shyed away and explained "it was a joke" and left to pack our leftovers.

I tried to think of all the possible reasons for this manager/supervisor's actions. He could have said to be friendly. However, there is simply no acceptable excuse for this lack of awareness. You don't need an intent to offend someone for it to be racism.

This event has really ruined my whole weekend evening. It makes me sick thinking about even eating the food I to-goed which I was excited about before. It is extremely upsetting this happened to one of the restaurants I used to enjoy going and taking my special guests.

This isn't a matter where staff can be reprimanded and trained. This happened with someone that was a manager/supervisor position. Well if the people above are like this, I can only imagine what the rest could be learning.

I urge the staff to be more mindful in the future if you are going to continue service in Manhattan, and anywhere else. This is very inappropriate and not acceptable...

IT SHOULD SAY EVERYTHING THAT THIS ESTABLISHMENT ONLY RESPONDS TO POSITIVE REVIEWS. THIS IS A TERRIBLE RESTAURANT GROUP. Restaurant is clearly a vanity project. Wouldn’t be surprised if the entire restaurant entity is being used to throw some thing$ through the wash. And launder them.

have been frequenting their soho location for years. Decided to go to the uptown location because I had an event in the area. Made a reservation, realized I was running a bit late. Called the restaurant, told them I was running late - they said no problem. Then when i got to the restaurant they told me I cancelled my reservation. Then they got mad at me for telling them I did not cancel my reservation. Had proof I didn’t cancel - phone records & the opentable confirmation email. Clearly an error on the restaurant’s side. They tried to tell me I was more than 15 minutes late for my reservation and that’s why it was canceled - res was at 915 and I checked in at 925 so I was not 15 minutes late. Clearly within the 15 min window THAT THEY DETERMINED. when I proved I was in that window they got mad at me I was shocked at how rude the staff was. When we finally got seated we had an entire meal. The server came up to us 3 times telling us the kitchen was closing and we needed to place the dessert order immediately. We did. Then we waited 25+ minutes. The dessert never came. Then the “manager” came and told us they would never serve dessert while entrees were on the table. We were not told that. We were pressured into ordering dessert. We did. The dessert never came. Then the “manager” told us they would never bring a dessert out while food was on the table. The “manager” said in her culture they would never bring dessert out while mains were on the table. That’s valid but how would I know what’s acceptable in their culture, especially since we were pressured to order dessert asap? Did not realize I was having dinner at her home, in her home country, celebrating her home culture and abiding by the rules of her culture. Next time I’ll book the Airbnb experience 🙄

I have worked in hospitality for years. The way this “manager” acted was so out of pocket. Clearly a nepo hire. Literally the worst...