Cafe Alaia — Restaurant in Town of Eastchester

I was looking for a special restaurant to celebrate my wife’s birthday and I had read about how Cafe Alana had earned the Michelin vote of excellence, which was very unusual for a relatively new restaurant that opened on Garth Road in Scarsdale. I reserved a table a week in advance and while we normally do not go out to eat during the week, we were both looking forward to what we envisioned would be an exceptional dinner. Our waiter, Juan, was welcoming and made us feel very comfortable, bringing us delicious breads and a berry sauce that was both surprising and very tasty. We both ordered glasses of red wine. I had a Nebbiolo and my wife had a Pinot Nero. Juan listed the specials and we shared an order of Zucchini Flowers stuffed with ricotta and served in a marinara sauce. While I think of zucchini flowers as a summer specially, I was surprised at how exceptional our appetizer tasted. Our dinner only got better and better! I ordered Cafe Alaia’s special fish, sautéed trout served over a bed of broccoli rabe and served with the most delicious potatoes and my wife had their wild salmon that was prepared in a mist sauce. She never tasted wild salmon that tasted so wonderful! She let me sample her fish and I happily agreed. We really didn’t leave room for dessert, but since we were celebrating her birthday, we splurged on their warm lava soufflé cake served with vanilla ice cream. To my wife’s delight, Juan and the other waiters brought out her cake with a lit candle and sang a very beautiful and heart felt “ Happy Birthday”! Juan introduced us to Vincenzo Alana, the owner and chef who was thrilled that we had enjoyed our dinner and when we told him it was our first time and how much we loved his restaurant, he insisted on having Juan bring out his homemade biscottis which he insisted that we try. We had never tasted such exceptional biscotti! As we were getting ready to leave, Vincenzo returned to thank us for choosing his restaurant and wishing my wife a very happy birthday. Cafe Alaia is truly a phenomenal gem of a restaurant with the warmest staff and a truly gracious and classy owner. I’m not planning on waiting to celebrate another birthday since there were many dishes I’m looking forward to tasting and I’d urge anyone reading my review to make your reservation for what promises to be a wonderful...

the oldest saying in business is, “The customer is always right”. However, I do believe that customers can also be wrong. Nonetheless, NO matter what the complain is, a restaurant owner should be able to react calmly, professionally, respectfully, and validate the customers experience. Vincenzo Alaia, owner of Cafe Alaia on Garth Road is not able to do this. On Sunday at 6:15pm, my son and I sat at the bar for dinner. We were both very hungry so we asked the bartender to place our order, which he did in front of us. At 7pm the bartender told us that the food would be out in 5 minutes. At 7:26 pm (1hr 10minutes later) my son told the bartender that he wanted the check. The bartender went to the kitchen to follow up and at 7:30pm a waiter arrived with our plates. My son told him to take it back that we wanted the check. I explained that we had waited for one hour and noticed that families that had arrived after us had been served and given their checks while we were still waiting. As we were waiting for the check the owner, Vincenzo, walked up to me frustrated, annoyed, and with an attitude. He began to tell me that I am not a restaurant owner and I did not know anything about restaurants and if I saw others being served before me it was because they had ordered pasta, which takes 5 minutes to cook. I was mortified at how he was speaking to me. I responded that I had only ordered 4 fried Prawns and that should not take1 hour to cook. He then began to complain that he had a “hard day” and that we had to take the food because it was cooked. My son then intervened and told him that we were not staying and to give us the check. Vincenzo then began to lie and say that the bartender never placed the order. My son replied that it’s not our fault if the order wasn’t place and to give us the check. Vincenzo stormed into the kitchen and 5 minutes later the bartender gave us a bill of $88 for two Dirty Martinis and two bourbon drinks. 28 years I have been living on Garth Road and have met many restaurant owner, but never someone as unprofessional and without any patience to deal with a customer complaint like Vincenzo. WE WILL NEVER RETURN AND WILL NOT REFER THIS RESTAURANT TO ANYONE. FYI We had ordered four Prawns, which take about 7-8 minutes to cook and a pan fried chicken cutlet dish, that takes less than 30...

I hate leaving this and I hope he learns from it. We attended the restaurant as a party of 4 for lunch, me my wife and our two kids. We spent a ton of money on wine, food and desert and things were going great. We ordered another drink and told the waiter we will be leaving soon. Out of no where the owner personally appeared and suddenly demanded that we leave the restaurant immediately because we had overstayed. I asked him if he was serious and he responded that yes, he was serious and wanted us all out immediately because he had others waiting for tables. He told us we can take our kids, drinks and sit at the bar. I told him how about just giving us 5 minutes to finish up and we did not want the kids sitting at the bar. I never ever were spoken like this at a restaurant, if they needed the table they could have given us a warning shot and we would have surely left. The food was quite good but the owner ruined the occasion, he did not even give us a chance to get an uber. We had to leave and find another place on garth to hunker down and grab an uber. I would advise avoiding this place like the plague. He needs people skills and does not deserve to be in business. In addition if you search some more reviews this is pretty common for him. No idea how he got into the hospitality business. It's a shame we really liked the place up until this moment. we were literally talking about going back, but I will not be going back again. I also want to bring attention to our waiter that afternoon, he was excellent, and he apologized to us when his boss...