Francesco's NY Pizzeria & Ristorante — Restaurant in Sarasota

Wednesday, February 28th 6:00pm Order # 8VO-00125 Server: Mike Service for: 2 Frequency: First Time Customers Timer Used: IPhone Stopwatch

Cleanliness: Store was clean.

We went online to find this restaurant. The website seemed out of date, but the prices were decent compared to other places. Went to the facebook page and didn't find anything posted past September 2023. We called to verify if they were still in business.

We read the reviews and found a mixture of good and bad. We read through the 13 Health Violations it gained 3 weeks before (Feb 8th) but didn't find anything that was out of the norm nor did we see any big red flags so we thought we'd try it out.

We were greeted at the door by a tall redhead who opened the door for us but then walked to the back immediately saying nothing else. There was no instruction for seating or inquiry as to why we were there so we had to ask a cook if we can just sit anywhere. He instructed us to take a 2-top table since he had a group of 5 coming in.

In the front section, 3 - 2-top tables out of the 10 total tables were taken, I think there were 3 or 4 - 4-toppers. At 6pm on a Wednesday night, there were a total of 5 people in the front, may have been more in the back section. One left shortly after our arrival.

Within 4 minutes of being seated. Mike introduced himself as our server and we instructed him that we were first-time customers. He took our order which included a shared salad for 2.

He brought complimentary Bread with Oil/Vinegar/Herbs on a plate with our drinks within 1 min.

9 minutes post order, we had to remind Mike about our salad. It was an easy salad to make, mixed-lettuce, Tomatoes, & Croutons. We ordered the Italian Dressing with it. Mike offered to bring more bread out but that never happened.

Shared Salad for 2: Size: Small The shared salad was too small for 2 and was priced at $8.99. Not what I thought it was worth for what we got. Quality: Everything in the salad was fresh. Taste: Salad was fine, but the Italian Dressing was very sweet and looked like gravy. It was missing that Italian twang it should have, we found it to be bland.

6 minutes later our food came out which of course interfered with the late salad delivery but I am glad it wasn't just put under a light until we were ready.

Food Order 1: Lasagna Size: Decent Appearance: 8 out of 10 Quality: 7 out of 10 Taste: 9 out of 10 The lasagna had a lot of watery sauce around it. It was sitting in juices to the top of the elongated dish. It wasn't able to stay together since it was swimming in juices. Would’ve been a lot easier to eat with a spoon. It was very soupy. The ingredients tasted very good though. I missed being able to take a bite of a relatively firm Lasagna with all of the layers combined.

Food Order 2: Tortellini Panna E. Prosciutto Size: Decent Appearance: 9 out of 10 Quality: 8 out of 10 Taste: 8 out of 10 Pasta was spot on. Good texture and proper firmness. Prosciutto seemed like it was just regular ham (and I think it was). Not impressive at all. Taste overall was good but real Prosciutto would have made a huge difference.

Plating and Presentation Issue: Lasagna Dish and plate it sits in aren’t well matched and the top plate rolls around making it hard to cut food, but I didn't need to do much cutting since the Lasagna was so soupy.

Service Issues: Mike forgot about us. 17 minutes into dining with no follow-up/check-up. With almost empty drinks, the tall redhead saved the day and got drink refills for us.

Finals: 22 minutes into dinner our server Mike showed up to ask how things were. Unfortunately, we were not impressed and I could see he was frustrated about that. He apologized and felt bad about it and seemed a bit embarrassed.

Check was brought 2 minutes later and picked up for processing at 26 minutes. All was right on the ticket but $47.05 for what we got wasn't worth it.

Now for the BIG QUESTION: Will we be back? No. Unfortunately, for the price, we cannot. While I don't expect perfection, there were just too many issues for...

This has been a great little restaurant since we first moved here 13 years ago. We have gone for our birthday dinners in the family. My experience tonight was probably the worst customer service I’ve ever experienced at any restaurant. We had to ask for everything from the proper amount of utensils for our party to bread and dipping sauce and drinks, etc. every time we ask for something it was at least 10 to 15 minutes before our server would come back to the table. I couldn’t even eat because I didn’t have utensils. Our server just didn’t seem to understand what the problem was. It’s hard to put into words how bad the service was. I asked at least three times for every one of those items. I was watching her and there were many times she wasn’t doing anything. It’s like we would ask her for something and she was in a fog. We had to ask four times for the check just to pay. We were literally all standing at our table. When the matriarch of our family asked to speak to the owner, the table next to us was leaving and told us to complain on their behalf as well.

The condition of the restaurant is also poor. The ceiling fan with the exposed wires and a hole in the roof over our table. We talked to the owner and he seemed quite defensive. He kept saying how our food came out timely when that wasn’t the issue. It’s everything that happened before the food came out. If the waitress was working in my restaurant, she definitely would not have been keeping her job after last night. She must be related to the owner to stay employed there. I don’t think I’ll...

So I was actually recommended this place by a friend and they were so right!!! Walking up to the place it seemed like a normal New York style pizza place, as soon as I opened the door I immediately knew this place was going to be phenomenal!!! The delicious aroma as soon as you walk in the door is undescribable but you can smell the quality and history before you taste anything! I ordered chicken alfredo which is rare because I've never been to a place ever that could satisfy because I am so extremely picky on my alfredo because it's one of the things I'm known for making. So without a doubt I'm telling you for the first time ever I found a place that could do a proper chicken alfredo in that does not need any salt pepper or any kind of seasoning whatsoever and it's absolutely perfect even done with linguine which I also prefer! The enjoyment I got out of this chicken alfredo is like no other I am so impressed with them I'm telling you please go try them Frank the owner was kind enough to talked with me while I was waiting for food to be completed wonderful guy with a wonderful staff accommodated one small request I asked and knocked this dish out of the park absolutely phenomenal!!!! I will be back time in time...