A Loyal Customer Since Day One -- Never Again!
I rarely write reviews. But after tonight, I felt I had no choice.
My husband and I were among the first customers when Sotto Le Stelle opened in Sunnyside. We fell in love with the place -- the Fritto Misto, the Angel and Devil pizza, the Crema di Funghi e Tartufo, and especially the Pasta Tiella, which was unlike anything else in the neighborhood. Over the years we introduced more than a dozen friends and family members here, people who became regulars themselves. We were genuinely proud to share it with everyone we knew.
But over time things changed. Burnt pizzas. Inconsistent flavors. The Fritto Misto started showing up with soggy zucchini. Reading through other customers' reviews we began seeing complaints about dishes that tasted nothing like what we remembered. We gave them the benefit of the doubt and kept going back. That was our mistake.
Tonight was our last visit.
We arrived on a Wednesday around 7PM, surprisingly packed for a weeknight. The place has shifted into more of a neighborhood bar scene and the dining experience feels like it has taken a back seat to that. Our server was pleasant enough -- he set us up, explained the specials, and took our order. I ordered our usuals -- the Fritto Misto, Crema di Funghi e Tartufo, and the Pasta Tiella. He asked whether we wanted everything together or one by one. I said it didn't matter, whichever was faster. He only caught the first part and put the order in as all together. For those who don't know, the Pasta Tiella alone takes 15 to 20 minutes as it is baked in the brick oven, so serving everything together was always going to mean a longer wait.
The couple next to us, who ordered after us, had their pizzas within minutes. We sat with a bread basket. Ten minutes passed. Then twenty. Then twenty-five. At around the 25 minute mark I asked our server about the status of our order. He said the kitchen was busy. I asked if it was too late to cancel and leave. He went to check with the manager.
This is where the evening went from frustrating to something else entirely.
The manager came over already visibly annoyed before I said a word. When I calmly explained the miscommunication he cut me off and said -- and I quote -- "This is not a McDonald's." He then snippily offered to bring out the pizza. I told him to cancel the order. We waited for our bill to pay for our drinks, barely touched as they were. After a few minutes he noticed we were waiting and gestured that it was not necessary.
The comped drinks did not soften what had just happened. It felt more like a way to end the interaction quickly than any genuine goodwill.
Here is what strikes me most. He had no idea who we were. He didn't know we had been coming since day one, that we had sent dozens of people his way, or that I used to feel comfortable enough to stop in alone for lunch. To him we were just another table causing a problem on a busy night. And that is exactly the point -- if this is how he treats any customer who raises a perfectly reasonable concern, the problem runs deeper than one bad night.
We will not be returning.
And because SoleLuna and Arcobaleno Gelateria next door are owned by the same people, we won't be visiting those either. There is a real sadness in writing this. But the moment a manager talks down to a customer who simply asked a reasonable question after a long wait, he is not just losing one table. He is losing everyone that table ever brought through the door. read more