Serendipity 3 - Upper East Side — Restaurant in New York

I have eaten here on other occasions and it was such an enjoyable experience that I was excited to get a reservation for my family when we came for Christmas this year. We arrived on time for our reservation and were told they were getting our table ready , it would take 3-5 min and asked us to step outside and wait. 30 min later, after standing outside with my kids in 25 degree weather, we walked back in to See what was going on to find and our table had been ready but no one had called / texted. We were sat in a door in the main way so every time the door opened it was cold. We ordered our drink after waiting a few more minutes for someone to come. Once we placed our drink orders (soft drinks were $6.95 each) a table nearby outside of the draft came open that was large enough to set our party and we asked if we could move to get out of the cold since we had been sitting outside in it for 30 min past our reservation. The waitress was beyond rude about it and said we couldn’t move because we had already placed our drink orders and there was a reservation that had to be sat there. I just asked, since we had a reservation too and got pushed well past our time could they not just move us and send our drinks there, since it was literally right across from the aisle but outside of the wind draft from the door. She rudely and loudly said she wound have to get the manager and yelled up the stair case for him that someone wanted to move tables and she immediately leaned back over and yelled, manager said no.

While we ordered our food she was so rude to everyone. Every time someone asked a question she was sarcastic and hateful. When I ordered mine she told me that was a terrible choice. I got it anyway and it was delicious- actually the only enjoyable thing about my experience, truthfully.

We asked for refills because all of our drinks had been empty for a while and it took over 15 min for them.

We finally got one refill and asked for the desert menu, she brought it back and walked away … we waited. When she came back I asked for the hot chocolate menu bc that was it brought to us, and she took the other one away, but some of the group wanted cold and some wanted hot. Again, I asked again for the other menu and again was met with attitude and scolding me because “it was the one she just took away” (never asked her to do that). She finally came back for us to order, and missed one our orders. After someone brought 3 of the 4 of them no one came back. We tried to get her attention twice, and it took me shouting her name the third time she walked by us, still with all empty drinks again because it had been a 30 min window from the time we had asked before and the last time but at this point we had been there almost 2 hours and needed to leave but was still missing one of the desserts - a peppermint hot chocolate. When I said her name and politely asked her about the one we’re missing she argued we had what we ordered and then randomly showed back up frozen hot chocolate and argued with me again that we didn’t order that and it was the peppermint we didn’t have. 15 min later she brought it back.

Our meal was nearly $350 (for a group of 7 - 2 adults, 4 teenagers and one child) They applied automatic 20% gratuity

Food was good - salad, burgers and chicken but was far not worth the expense. Usually I justify the over priced food for the experience, but this was NOT the experience we wanted or would pay that kind of money for. Service was absolutely horrible. Not just as far as attentiveness and even common courtesy but direct and blatant attitude and rude behavior.

I have always enjoyed coming to Serendipity but based on this experience, I’m pretty certain it will not be a top choice...

I booked a table at the Serendipity 3 Upper East Side restaurant for dinner on my wife's actual 60th birthday this evening as we really enjoyed our last visit there 10 years ago for her 50th birthday. Although we arrived 20 minutes earlier than our 5:15pm slot that I'd booked online, we were shown to a table within a few minutes. There's very little space between tables in the very small & cramped restaurant, so don't expect any privacy as we could clearly hear and follow the conversations of the diners on both the tables either side of us. Our super friendly server Randy asked if we were at the restaurant for any special occasion and my wife told him it was her 60th birthday without realising I'd already put all this in the 'what's the occassion?' section of their online booking form. He also asked if we had any allergies, which again I had already said we had none in the 'Any allergies or restrictions?' section of their online booking form. So clearly the servers don't see or don't bother to read the information provided online by their customers, rendering it a complete waste of our time!!! The birthday girl had the American cheeseburger with fries, which was OK. I had the Grandma Holt's fried chicken sandwich with a pot of tea. The fried chicken was a bit dry, the bun was a bit stale and I found the fries to be a bit too salty. My wife was really looking forward to the superb peanut butter cheesecake dessert we enjoyed sooo much on our last visit. However, it was no longer on the menu so she had to settle for the Ultimate Creme Cheesecake, which came with side servings of hot fudge & strawberry sauce. Our fabulous server Randy put a candle on the top of my wife's cheesecake, lit it and encouraged everyone in the restaurant to sing happy birthday, which made her feel special. Whilst we were dining in the restaurant there were 4 other people celebrating their birthdays as well. There's a photographer at the restaurant now, who went around every table taking photographs of customers and returning later trying to sell commemorative prints, which I found a bit tacky and touristy - not something I'd expect at a high end restaurant. The decor in the restaurant looked very tired and we certainly didn't enjoy our meal there this time, compared to our exceptional experience 10 years ago. I feel sadly it's more of a tourist trap now, feeding off the embers of its former glory days, which have long gone. We didn't have any alcoholic drinks with our meal and I left feeling the $100 we spent there could have been better spent in one of the hundreds of exceptional restaurants in NYC for the special occasion of my wife's...

Went here for my goddaughters 12th birthday with her friends. We rescheduled our reservation due to how it was pouring rain that day, from 2pm to 4pm. She. We got there we were soaking wet and we were kept waiting by the door because one of the individuals of our party was parking. A server that past said to another worker “I don’t know why they blocking the way” (sadly this is where they asked us to stand to wait to be seated). We were finally seated and the music was so loud that the server kept asking us to repeat what we were ordering. Half way through the meal is when the server came to check on us. She left and a shift change occurred, so the new server had no clue it was my goddaughters birthday. She was excited seeing how the staff went all out singing for other patrons birthdays. Even though the atmosphere is charming, vibrant, and very colorful, they fell short the service portion. One server came to sing happy birthday after wee reminded him it was my goddaughters birthday (I’m guessing the table turnover was priority). We were asked to help sing the birthday song, so my goddaughter didn’t get the same birthday approach as other patrons. She was so disappointed. The food was pretty good, the portions were very large, I paid close to $50 in picture and asked for an extra print out of the sample image, the picture lady was asked and she never came back to us after saying yes, (I guess making her money was the priority after acquiring ours). The lady that was seating patrons as they walked in was lackluster and so not present. It felt as if she was being forced to seat people. Overall the whole experience was not worth the money spent. In my opinion these types of restaurants should be an experience as a whole, from esthetics, presentation, to service. Sorry Serendipity 3 you have three thumbs down, the esthetics is not just going to cut it. We experienced it and that was...