F&D Woodfired Italian Kitchen — Restaurant in Winter Park

Short reason for bad review: a cockroach and manager who wouldn’t bother to take my call.

I ate here today with my partner for our date night. We wanted to give this place a shot out of the dozens of restaurants for the Bite30 prix fixe menu. We thought it was going pretty well, we got sangrias which were nice. Ordered the meatball and beef carpaccio appetizers, both were good. The entrees came out super fast though, we didn’t even have a chance to really eat our appetizers before they brought them out, so it feels like there’s a timing issue there. I wouldn’t want our food just sitting and waiting under a heat lamp either, but our table just ended up crowded and awkward.

We ordered the Italian trio and shrimp scampi entrees. The shrimp scampi was actually pretty good. The Italian trio was alright, the chicken parmigiana was pretty overcooked and dry, and the lasagna was distastefully salty. But we were having a good time and didn’t want to fuss.

The creme brûlée cheesecake was a nice dessert to finish the meal. We ordered some cannolis to go, and our waitress brought out a to go bag for our entrees. Before we paid, I noticed a cockroach climbing on our to-go bag. It went inside the bag after we put our food in. I’m not really one to make a scene in public, so once our waitress came back, I told her right away. I took out all of our leftovers from the bag and she could clearly see the roach crawling inside of it. She apologized quietly and said she would get us a new bag.

Now, I’m no stranger to customer service. I’ve been in their shoes before. You would think a manger would visit the table and apologize for a literal bug crawling on their packaging. But no, the waitress returned and gave us our check and just didn’t really acknowledge it further. I wasn’t expecting a comped meal or anything, just a more professional response at least.

We paid and left. It was a little busier by that time and trying to be a kind person, I figured I would just call them when we got home and explain the situation. But I was told the manager was busy and they’d call me back. Ok, fine. I called an hour later and was told the manager would call me the next day. Hm, that feels even more unprofessional now. You would think if a customer called you twice after they just ate there that something was genuinely wrong. I wasn’t mean over the phone to the employee who took my call. I just calmly asked for a manager with my Ps and Qs. I didn’t want to explain the situation to them because I believed this to be a manager and customer conversation.

So I decided to write this review instead to let paying customers know where they are dining. We all work hard for our money and I thought F&D would be a good place to spend it. I hate regretting things like this, but I do regret eating here and will not be back. And I will be letting my friends and family know of...

We typically dine at the Curry Ford area location but the parking is difficult and my elderly parents were I. Town so I wanted to be able to get in and out earlier. Our server I think just might’ve had a bad day and was short and just rude. I’m not going to include his name and will just chalk it up to a bad day. But the food was surprisingly not a good experience at this location. My parents wanted veal piccata but the server said and I quote… “you should try the veal parm, it’s not on the menu but we have it tonight and it’s so tender” so that’s what they ordered. It came out and they couldn’t even cut it. It was like a well done steak. They tried but couldn’t even chew it. I told the server and was shocked at his response. He said… “well you wanted the picatta and chose the parm, veal parm is fried and will always be more dense and I’m surprised you wouldn’t know that” we all just stared at each other in amazement and I asked him to please give us a minute. He was raising my BP. So after a pause we decided on the Chicken Picatta instead. It took a really long time, and I had finished my meal, and our salads and sat and sat. So I got up and very politely said to our server…would you mind putting the chicken picatta to go so we can just have it at home…he copped an attitude again and said… “ you know we are doing the best we can but we are busy” I said, look I understand that, I thought by getting it to go it would help free up the booth for you, and also I would like a tiramisu to go… response I got? Uggh. Like I said maybe he was just having a bad day. We order delivery from here because we live in the area but we will dine in at the other location. I still tipped 20%, again I’m going with…Guy...

My wife and I ended up here after making reservations for another Italian restaurant in downtown Winter Park. Parking downtown was horrible so we left and I ended up in the parking lot of F&D Woodfired Italian Kitchen without even realizing it. The intention was to find another Italian restaurant and by fate ended up here.

We were warmly greeted as we entered. I ordered a beer and my wife opted for the bottomless Sangria. We had the Mozzarella for the appetizer and it was delicious. For the main meal, my wife ordered the pasta trio sampler and I ordered the woodfired salmon. It was taking some time for the meals to arrive, but we were relaxing and enjoying great conversation. We watched as they prepared garlic bread in the woodfired oven. It looked very appealing and was surprised when our server approached our table with the garlic bread which we hadn't ordered.

Dre, our server, explained the salmon was delaying our meal so they gave us complimentary garlic bread and was taking the price of the salmon off the bill as well. During this entire time Dre made sure my wife always had Sangria. By the time we had finished the garlic bread, which was a very generous portion, our main meals arrived. They were just as tasty as the appetizer and garlic bread. We finished with Tiramisu for my wife and chocolate souffle cake for me. The deserts were great as well. The chocolate was perfect. Not too sweet or rich.

Portions were ample. The atmosphere was great. Staff as friendly, especially Dre. Customer service was outstanding. We hadn't complained about the time it was taking for our meals, yet they chose to give us garlic bread and comp my salmon recognizing the delay. One of the best dining...