North Beach Restaurant — Restaurant in San Francisco

STEER CLEAR OF MARIA. I want to start off by saying that I am a bit picky. I know what I like and don’t want to spend my hard earned money on things I’m not going to absolutely love. I have never been so offended by a server that I felt I actually had to argue with them. But Maria, la colombiana, was the first I’ve had to argue with! she was so rude! She raised her voice at me and I want to mention that I am also Latina & can communicate with kitchen and serving staff in Spanish if need be and am not typically intimidated by loud people with strong personalities as I have one too. But she was rude from the beginning. I ordered an espresso martini but asked for a splash of Baileys or heavy cream. She said no. I said what do you mean? She says no, we don’t have that.. I said u guys don’t have cream or baileys in this full service bar/restaurant? I doubted it but ok, fine. I’ll entertain it & take it as it comes. But then I thought about it.. you guys serve creamy desserts, cream based pasta sauce, perhaps coffee?? and u don’t have a tablespoon of cream in this establishment that u can grab for me? I actually don’t believe it & she was also raising her voice at me throughout this interaction. Their espresso martini is great for someone who wants it without cream but for me, it needed the cream. Why was that such a problem? Idk but Every other place I’ve requested that at, not a problem. We ordered the beef carpaccio & melon with prosciutto for apps. The prosciutto was delicious. The carpaccio had no flavor whatsoever. Literally no salt, the balsamic they supposedly add? Nonexistent. No flavoring. The prosciutto itself was delicious. So, so far the server is rude, the drink not made how I want && the food very bland. NEXT, I go to order mains and ask if they can use a white sauce on the frutti di mare rather than a tomato sauce. She says no. Then I explain to her that hey, can u please just use a white sauce from ur other dishes instead? She says no. She says the sauce comes premade for pasta Della casa and I said ok fine, u guys don’t have a different white wine sauce? She says the chef won’t make my dish like that. Why couldn’t she go ask first and then come back and say hey, he refused to make it I’m so sorry what can I get u instead? It made it seem like she didn’t wanna go ask which was unprofessional and so obvious that she couldn’t be bothered to go ask chef about something I wanted. She just didn’t want to help/ serve me. Ok at this point im not sure I want the seafood with red sauce. I typically only like it with a seafood broth, white wine reduction type of sauce and I don’t like tomato sauce typically. So I say ok, we’ll take the red sauce but can I please have it on the side as I’m not sure I’ll enjoy it? She says, so u just want dry noodle with seafood? It’s not going to be good, with an attitude and made a weird face. So insulting!! That’s one of my favorite ways I enjoy pasta. Very presumptuous of her to give her unwanted, rude opinion without considering if it would offend. I said yes, I want that with the sauce on the side. She made a rude face and gesture, so much so, that my fiancé said never mind we won’t get that. So we just got the pasta Della casa. Even then, the veal was just ground beef from the grocery store. Not veal and if it was, it didn’t seem like it which may be worse. But the sauce was pretty good and they cooked the pasta to al dente perfection. I will say the space is gorgeous, I loved where we sat and the table we were at. The busboys and food runners did an amazing job. Maria is an issue and liability. If I felt offended, I can only imagine what some others feel when tended to by her. I’m sure she was surprised to learn I was the one paying for the meal. Shes too abrasive for the service industry, coming from someone who spent 13+ years in food service. I usually take pics of everything but I was so annoyed and unhappy with my food,...

We went there on the reviews online where Zagat gave it high Mark's and WOW, were we disappointed. We live in FL, on the coast and eat fresh seafood every other day. My fiance ordered linguini with clams sauce, like she does about once a week, and the odor from the clams was overpowering. When the waiter, who had a smug annoying attitude from the moment we sat, was informed he got angry and said "clams come from the ocean and smell that way".......seriously? Really? To make matters worse he takes the plate away, doesnt ask if my wife to be would like anything else. And to even further this epic failure, I had veal parmesan that was totally flavorless...how's that even possible?! We wanted total comfort food and were made to be totally uncomfortable.

In the last 3 weeks I have been to CA twice, Minnesota, Austin, Miami and St Petersburg, FL with non stop client entertaining at 4 and 5 star restaurants for every meal and this moron is telling us that clams come from the ocean? Then the topper, he charges us for the dish my now starving love didn't take 2 bites of. Then, when I say something about it, he walks off in a huff and loudly proclaims across the restaurant that we think seafood smells like it comes from the sea and tells the manager sarcastically that we know how to pick seafood better than him. At which point I almost got out of my chair and and fed him the clams through his snooty nose.

Needless to say, make your own choices but there are SO MANY wonderful restaurants in the San Francisco area that avoiding this one would be doing...

While I try to be a very forgiving and understanding person, my experience was incredibly bad!!! It took 40min for our drinks, which I had to ask about after 40min, because the waiter forgot. While I understand and totally feel being understaffed and stressed out, 40min for drinks? As soon as we got our drinks, we asked for sugar for a coffee, which we had to ask for again after over 10min bc our waiter forgot!! Then the food took another 40, because our server forgot to put our order in until I asked, when the food came out it was horrible. My mom and step dad both got pasta, while I got steak. the steak tasted like the garlic aioli(being very tough and hard to chew even though i ordered a medium-rare,) the asparagus being the only decent thing. My parents’ pasta tasted like canned-sauce, and my mom’s pasta being cold!! I ordered another of the same drink I had, which took awhile but when it came out, it was a totally different drink and we’re pretty sure it was alcoholic even though we asked multiple times if it was a mocktail. At the end, they gave us a free dessert as an apology, which my parents absolutely hated. (im not too familiar with how tiramisu is supposed to taste like, but they said it was something not even a store would sell). I appreciate the waiter being so apologetic, however it still wasnt the best experience and the reviews are the complete opposite of our time with them. 130+ for a gross...