Sistina — Restaurant in New York

I rarely write reviews, but I feel compelled to considering the experience my girlfriend and I had at Sistina in December. Before I get into the details in full, while the dishes were quite good, the service and demeanor of the restaurant is one of the worst I’ve experienced. We will not be returning to Sistina again.

We had a reservation here to celebrate an anniversary and early Christmas. On the day of the reservation (8pm reservation) we received a call informing us not to arrive early because there would be no place for us to stand or sit as the restaurant would be packed. Upon our arrival, they were nice to say happy anniversary, but we were surprised to notice the restaurant was not completely full and actually had many spots at the bar and numerous tables open in the dining room. Once escorted to the dining room, we were shown our table… the absolute worst table in the entire restaurant tucked away against a corner wall and between a large table as if they had whipped this table together at the last minute. Once seated, the aggressive table service began. Before seeing a menu or ordering drinks, our waiter asked us if we’d like a particular dish for an appetizer, but he did not explain that this was a special or read us the specials. He just kept asking if we would like a specific fish appetizer dish. We declined as we wanted to look at all the options they had to offer. Once we had looked over the menu and started ordering our appetizers, we asked if we should order everything at once or wait, and they seemed very eager to take the full order where at the end the waiter seemed to give a look as if we hadn’t order enough… 2 rounds of drinks, two appetizers, two pasta dishes and a meat dish, as well as two desserts we ordered later.

While eating our appetizers, the chef came and sat at the table next and was served by 2-3 waiters, eating a full dinner, and watching YouTube videos on his phone… what a romantic setting. Once we finished the appetizers our main courses were immediately placed on the table, literally they took our appetizer plates away and in the same move put our main courses on the table, the fastest turnaround I’ve ever seen…they were rushing us. We were hoping to order a bottle of wine with dinner but yet our main course we out so quickly, and while looking over the wine selection a waitress or sommelier – which they did not identify who they were – asked to help which was nice, however I suggested I like Brunello’s and next thing you know a Brunello showed up and didn’t even ask if I wanted to try. I had to accept the glass because she poured it without offering me to try it (not to mention the extreme mark up in wine prices)

We ordered dessert and to our surprise they did not do anything special, they did not write happy anniversary or do anything special that ANY other restaurant would do. It really put a damper on our celebration, especially after they said happy anniversary on the phone and when we walked in.

After paying the check and practically about to leave the restaurant, a waiter came over to ask if they did anything special for us, which I said no, and he did kindly offered us a dessert or another round of drinks, but I declined because the moment had really passed, we were very full, had already paid and were ready to leave. I shouldn’t have to ask for something special at a restaurant of this caliber. They should know to do this.

To top this all off, once we got home that evening, we received an email from OpenTable saying our reservation was cancelled, which means they cancelled our reservation so we could not leave a review of the meal we had. This is the most pretentious thing a restaurant has ever done. Again, I would recommend any of the other great restaurant this city has to offer and will not return to Sistina! Your money can be spent on much better food, experience...

Today I received a call from someone from the restaurant who I don't even know his name or job title as was only identified as from Sistina. I didn't answer so went to voicemail and somehow I honestly think it just made a forgettable dining experience even more forgettable. This person called to say that they were disappointed with my review and thought was unfair. At no point that was a real concern with the quality of the food or the excessive "promotional pampering" during dinner. He sounded abrupt and unpleasant so I am just updating my review. I like to give business a chance to reply but clearly, this place has missed some points.

Here’s mine original review.

Nice staff but...... We had a reservation for 8:30 to celebrate our Wedding anniversary. When I book via email I've explained the occasion. We’ve arrived about 10 minutes before and the place was rather quiet but hey it's Thursday night. The staff was super polite and nice. Our table was nice and comfortable. We had loads of people coming around our table and checking on us and for this, we were pleased but let's get to the point. We had some fried olives with bread and butter to start with and two glasses of wine. We were then, told the specials but there were so many that we've got lost after the first 3 minutes as it was way too long. After choosing the veal chop with mushrooms and wife went for the artichoke ravioli with sun-dried tomato sauce. We were asked for any starter in between but honestly; we didn't feel like eating anything else in between but I was warned that my veal would take longer to cook. That was the first turn off point as I feel like he was up-selling my starter because I've said no. Anyway, the wine was cheaper by the glass than the bottle so we had this $20 glass Chianti. The food arrived and was a bit of a disappointment. Don’t get me wrong, the veal was super tasty and I enjoyed, however, the mushroom was awful and had a horrible aftertaste. I love mushrooms and I also cook a lot at home so not like I don't know food as much. Anyway, I felt like the mushrooms ruined the dish. That was some nice spicy peppers on it but because of the mushroom, I just could not taste anything else. I wish it had some creative beets or carrots. Wife's ravioli was good but nothing special plus the 8 little pieces were not worth the money. We proceed to order the desserts and this guy helped us and it was nice telling us about all the specials dessert menu and all the best sellers, all great. We order a tiramisu and the wife a bush noel tart/cake/similar sort of. Suddenly, he started talking about the restaurant and the new location (well, over one year ago) and teaching us how to rate the food as requested by the chef via open table etc.... We didn’t enjoy that as not just we still in the middle of our dining experience but we didn’t need to be explained how to rate a restaurant online. Well, that was not over. My wife's dessert arrived and for our surprise, it came on a nice plate with the words Happy Anniversary written on it and it was a nice touch.... until my dessert came in with a happy birthday written on it followed by two people loudly singing happy birthday to you and embarrassing us. I have no idea where the happy birthday came from as this occasion was not mine or the wife's birthday. The dessert was average to bad and we couldn't even eat the whole thing and for my wife to place dessert on the side it is because it wasn't great. $260 later I feel that it was not worth and I wouldn't go back. Can't blame the staff for being polite but the food, the price and the mess with this birthday stuff...

We came here on Christmas Eve, based on a reservation we made a week in advance and not a walk in. This is important for the coming context.

We were greeted by the fact that the lobster spaghetti and filet mignon were both not on the menu tonight, 2 dishes we were actually coming in for, but we kept an open mind and settled for other options, and generously I would say (we ordered 2 starters, 4 main courses, and an impressive bottle). To this, the service was doing ok despite the slightly opportunistic approach in advising us with more expensive items off the menu. We didn’t let this get to us, we just wanted to have a nice evening.

Our main Turkish waiter greeted us goodnight as his shift had come to an end, and we were greeted with Frankie for the remaining duration of our seating. However when dessert time came, someone other than Frankie came to take our order. This was around 10:15pm, other tables were still dining around us. I opened my mouth to say we would like the tiramisu and was abruptly interrupted by this man interrupting me to conclude my order (while I was still speaking to continue the tables order), snapping my dessert menu shut, and going around the table to snap shut the other two diners’ menus in the most disgraceful unwelcoming, unprofessional manner and announcing that the kitchen is shutting down (to justify his behavior). I of course continued the order nevertheless, explaining that we would also like the soufflé. He once again abruptly repeated both orders like there was some kind of transparent countdown to hell. It must be stated that this man looked at us and noticed our shock, and did nothing to adjust his attitude or ease our reaction. We sat in silence trying to take in his behavior, when he came back to arrange our dessert plates. We took this chance to attempt to explain to him that we were still ordering and he had rudely interrupted us to wrap up our evening, and he stood there fighting back!! He did not apologize nor did he take the time to listen to our perspective. He simply said, in the same rude tone, that the kitchen was closing and started using his fingers to gesture kitchen doors closing while mouthing “FINITO”, thinking that this would justify his behavior. Mind you, he does understand English and speaks it well too. Yet he was 100% convinced of his filthy attitude and expected us to accept our evening dinner to end like this. Despite crossing the line like this with customers, he was still ready to continue the fight and when we asked him what his name is, he replied saying “I don’t know” and WALKED AWAY!!! We of course found out that his name is Gianni and would urge the manager at Sistina to rethink Gianni’s role, if they would like to see Sistina flourish as a respectable restaurant.

As previously noted, we came in as per our reservation and we were not last minute guests nor were we the last table at Sistina which was still in operation at the time of our dessert course. The minimum expectation was for us to be treated respectfully upon ordering our dessert and I cannot fathom how Gianni was ever hired to work in hospitality, as this scene will never allow us to think of dining at Sistina again or telling anyone else about it.

To top it all off, I came home to receive an email that the restaurant had cancelled our reservation through OpenTable (the portal we used to make the reservation) and I assume that this is for them to avoid receiving this bad review on there - one more...