Ristorante Denicola — Restaurant in Northampton Township

Incredibly disappointing meal from a restaurant that was highly recommended to us. We are very frequent diners at many restaurants across our area and love Italian food. Ristorante Denicola was, far and away, the worst meal we've eaten in quite some time. Allow me to be more specific:

Bread was crumbly and dry and fell apart in your hands when you tried to butter it. It had the same consistency as frozen bread that has been defrosted and allowed to go stale. Server claimed that the bread was fresh and hot but got crumbly because he used a "cold knife to cut it."

We ordered two Prix-fix plans that included soup or salad, pasta, and entree. Salads were swimming in dressing. Soggy and containing only spring mix, a few chopped carrots, and two small pieces of tomato. My wife's minestrone was like water. Overly full of cabbage and thinner than a can of Campbell's.

My penne alla vodka was flavorless and served with an overabundance of cheese. The chicken parmigiana was a brown, mushy, flavorless slab of chicken so devoid of flavor it MUST have been frozen before as well. Easily the worst I've ever had.

The server was pleasant and even offered us a small complementary pizza while we waited for our food, but his good service couldn't make up for the horrible food we were served.I asked him at the end of the meal where the real chef was because our food was inedible. He told us the regular chef was off that night but did nothing for our bill to make up for this really unpleasant...

Service was fine. Atmosphere was great. Nice little Italian restaurant. Looked clean and classy. Waitress was very nice and accommodating. Have a few free plates of appetizers while we waited.

But the food was just… extremely bland? Every dish left much to be desired as far as flavor or seasonings. I honestly don’t know how the food has so many 5* reviews unless the chef was off when we went? Hesitant to give it another chance because the food was just that “meh”.

Prices were great for the portions you received. Unfortunately I didn’t want more. Salad was drenched in dressing. Pizza, especially the sauce was tv dinner-esque. Carbonara was basically big soupy mac and cheese with pancetta added. I’m not even sure how it had the little flavor it had. Could barely taste the pancetta and/or egg flavoring. Wife got the linguine and clams and she said the same about her dish.

Disappointing after reading all of the great reviews but I’m wondering if we caught an off night as it was a Friday around 630 and only two other tables were there? Wondering whether or not I should give it...

Would absolutely come back ... everything was fantastic. Everything tasted fresh and made to order. I appreciate the fact that someone made my pasta by hand. I appreciate the fact that real fresh peas were used rather then canned. The fresh garlic bread and brushetta was awesome!! I liked the fact that this place wasn't so big. I liked the fact that when I took my son there tonight, it wasn't crowded. I could see, though, there could be some disappointed people. Especially, when there was only one chef this evening. I am hard to impress. I put every single Italian restaurant to my mom test. If they cook similar to her, I'm happy. And again, the freshness of everything also made it that much better. So what if bread was crumbly when you buttered it. It's bread...it's butter... eh But, the amount of food and for the price, is a definite positive for me. And tonight, we had the best waitress. A total mom & pop restaurant. Everything had an extra...