La Strada — Restaurant in Town of Hempstead

Yesterday was Mother's Day. Since my mom and dad are both elderly and unable to get around, I decided to order dinner-to-go from a nice local restaurant. I noticed that La Strada had a take-out menu online, so I called them the day before, on Saturday afternoon, and asked if I could place an order for pick-up the next day. The man who answered the phone told me they weren't taking early orders, and that I should call on Mother's Day at around 2:30pm-3pm for a 4pm pick-up. I did exactly that, and was told by the man who answered the phone (sounded like the same guy) that the kitchen was too busy and they weren't taking any take-out orders! I was pretty upset. Had he told me that the day before, I'd have made other arrangements, but he stuck me one hour before my parents expected me to show up with dinner. Fortunately, I found La Piazza on Merrick Road in Merrick. They were super busy, but they accommodated my last-minute order by 4pm, and they were all super pleasant and the food was plentiful, hot, fresh and delicious! Dinner for 3 people was enough for at least 6 people. La Piazza is now my go-to place, so La Strada's poor customer service and lack of concern was truly a blessing...

So went here for the first time last week with my boyfriend. The wood fired pizza is incredible, we had that as an app with a house salad. I had linguini with shrimp in a cream sauce, it was on the specials. It was ok needed some kind of kick.. just very creamy and bland, the shrimp tho were roasted perfectly. My boyfriend had eggplant parm, I loved that it was an egg batter and not fried, tomato sauce was really nice. Veggies that came with it were cooked perfectly. So I was reading the other reviews… some of the negative ones. I can see their point in saying that if you are not a regular face they kind of stick you in a corner by the bar. Service was ok for the most part, but kind of neglectful if your not one of regulars. I probably would go back but as one of the other reviewers wrote there are other good restaurants out there that are friendlier. I’m not looking for new best friends when I go out to eat…it’s mostly about the food for me, but it’s nice to feel welcomed. I also don’t like that the owners don’t acknowledge these reviews with a response.....

This is my second time coming here. Friday night, the restaurant was very busy, as it should be. The hostess was very nice and accommodated us (a large group). Waitress tried her best to keep up with her workload but she was falling behind. While taking our order (after three of us ordered pizzas) she said “just to let you know it my take a bit longer for pizzas because it is Lent and a lot of people are ordering pizza.” About 10 minutes later she comes back and says “it will be an hour until your pizzas are made, the guy has a lot of pizza orders.” Three of us change our orders. 25 minutes go by and still no food. I had to leave with my kids who understandably done with their food and bored of sitting there after 45 minutes. Our food still did not arrive. The rest of my group stayed and said they enjoyed the food (when it finally came) but were shocked that management did not comp anything or just apologize for the issues.

I understand things can get crazy in the food business. The solution is to be ready or have a good backup plan. They weren’t and...