Basta Pasta

09/10/2008 Posted by gaiamcraft

Where do I begin? Service was great, very attentive without being over-bearing. The waiters are super-polite and helpful. The ambience is very nice and romantic. I would recommend reservations because this place does get filled up quickly. The food was, well small, especailly for the price. But once you bite into it, you're willing to fork over twice as much. Fresh and delicious! The seafood pasta was done just right without being smothered in sauce, the mussels were some of the best I have ever tasted, and you can't beat the giant wheel of cheese that your pasta arrives in. I wish I could eat here every day of the week beause I doubt I'll get tired of it.

Pros: Food, Service, Ambience

05/04/2008 Posted by madmax64

You have to be a bit adventurous even to consider an Italian-Japanese fusion, but I'm Italian, and I like Japanese creations, so I gave it a try. I was not disappointed. The spaghetti with sea urchin sauce were delicious, and with a friend we tried different appetizers, all inventive, all good. And the pasta was really al dente.

03/06/2008 Posted by marcusltl5

I would like to start with a bit about myself: I am a 40+ year old male, native New Yorker of Italian decent whos family has been in the restaurant/food business for over 90+ years and consider myself well traveled. I have been going to Basta Pasta weekly now for about 5 or so years and the food just gets better ever time. The casual dinning room is very reminiscent of an eatery in Milano or Bologna, where the showcase is the food. The food is everything but casual: the foie gras is exceptional, Chilean Sea Bass sublime, rib eye is always done to perfection, one of the BEST Caesar salads in town and lets not forget the pastas. Each and every one is unique never bland and full of depth, my favorite is one with uni in a pink sauce over spaghetti, YUM!!!!! The chef has the foresight to rotate many ingredients of the dishes so there is always a pleasant surprise to your favorites. You will NOT get bored with his menu. I have also ALL WAYS found that these masterpieces on a plate to be delivered by a staff of well trained servers that are eager to please. I have never had to wait for a cocktail, pepper or more cheese. At times I may have to wait for a table to become available but with the expertise of the bartender it's never too much to ask. He makes an awesome Negroni! I LOVE this place and am going back tomorrow night which will make it the second time this week! Enjoy!

Pros: FOOD FOOD & the FOOD!!!

Cons: the secret got out of this hidden gem....dammm!

02/28/2008 Posted by lovenyc987

We were a party of four, but two of them came in late, by 20 - 30 min., I understand that the manager must rotate tables and need to accommodate later reservations, but he made a couple of nasty and sarcastic comments! It was totally un-necessary! I worked in a restaurant business for over 7 years, so I know how stressful it is, and I was a manager once, but I never made that kind of rude comments to my customers! Although food is good, his comments made a bad taste in our mouth. Specially, those were friends from Paris, so it was a special reunion dinner...!

Pros: Great food

Cons: Prepare for a rude comments by a manager!

02/22/2008 Posted by nd2write

You really can tell how good / bad a service is when something goes wrong... My friend (who had the same dish before) took one bite of his clam pasta and stopped, saying the clams were bad, pungent odor right up his nose. But when he gave the plate back to the waitress explaining about the clams - her response was 'having not eaten this, I cannot say anything, but I'll check with the kitchen.' After a minute she returned with the same plate, placed it in front of my friend and said, 'There's nothing wrong with it'. Of course he refused to take it back. When she asked 'would you like something else?' - he was so upset he just said no. Did they do anything about this? Nothing. An empty plate arrived in front of him as if to suggest sharing the rest of the food with us. When the bill arrived the clam pasta was still included. We called the manager, who knew nothing of the incident....he agreed to take it off the bill, but did nothing more. Come to think of it he was rather stubborn about it -- all he said was that he gets fresh clams every day. I had always associated Japanese with good service, so this was a huge disappointment.

02/16/2008 Posted by mslovely99

We had made reservations for 9:30pm, went earlier cause we were in the neighborhood around 8:30pm. They couldn't accommodate us earlier, although it was obvious there were empty tables. But we were easy going so we just ate at the bar. I agree with the other reviews, the food was nice, but nothing special. You can't order wine by the glass, you have to buy a bottle. We weren't paid any special attention until we started spending money, and after spending $100 on just two people, we finally got a goodbye from staff as we were leaving. While eating, I saw the bartender hound a patron cause he was gonna leave after drinking one Heineken from the bottle without leaving a tip. The bartender actually made the patron leave a tip. Poor form! Doesn't matter if you're Japanese trying to play fusion, but failing miserably and just making overrated Italian food, show some common decency and humanity. They act like they are a One and Only, so they can afford to be snooty, expensive, and exclusive. Too bad I can think of 20 other restaurants just like them.

Pros: Nothing

Cons: Expensive, bad service, nothing fusion about it.

01/24/2008 Posted by foxnyc110

I rarelly write review for restaurants. Either it's fantastic or either it's really not worth trying. Plus I usually give it a second chance. However, this particular restaurant just make ppl disappointed. The service is really bad, even though food is not bad. Agree with previous review writers, the owner/maneger is rude and make ppl feel uncomfortable. Really a shame.

01/13/2008 Posted by larsheat

I went with my wife during the week, we were really early and could get a table, the place was full within 1 hour. The food was excellent, Service was one of the best i had in NYC yet. I can recommend the Spaghetti Parmegiana with Procioutto, you will see :)

11/19/2007 Posted by mr_meursault

We came here for dinner. We had a large group and had made a reservation. We were seated quickly. I have to say that the service at this restaurant is odd at best, and perhaps just a step above incompetent. They are extremely careful about their menus and kept warning us not to break them and not to get them dirty. Whenever they wanted to get our attention, they would come up behind us and tap us on our shoulders. It was odd. The wine list is miserable and quite overpriced. All that said, the food is fairly good. The mushroom, mussel, duck and squid appetizers were tasty, as was the pasta made at the tableside. The spaghetti with flying fish roe and the spaghetti with shrimp were not remarkable, and I am told the steak wasn't memorable either. However, the lamb chops were quite good. Overall, I would not come back here, but I might recommend it for an interesting experience, particularly as the pastas are reasonably priced.

Pros: Decent food

Cons: Odd Service

09/10/2007 Posted by kmg1970

Went with my brothers for a rare get together meal. The food was excellent and the service was attentive and polite. But the evening was ruined by the owner/manager who asked us to leave because there were people waiting for tables. I'm sorry, my brothers and I dropped over $300 to dine there for the rare occassion for us to get together and enjoy each others company. This is more important than anything. We didn't need to be told to leave just because we were spending an extra 1/2 hour after the meal talking at the table. This is enough for me to never return there. My brothers shared my sentiment as well. Left a very bad taste. What sort of people run this restaurant? This is the sort that looks at the almighty dollar before everything else. Not a place I would want to patronize. Goes to show you that great food is never enough. Good relationships with customers is very important.

Pros: Great Food

Cons: Rude, Greedy Management

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