Fiamma Osteria

I'll never forget this restaurant or the bad date I went to this place. Newly single and finally getting back into the life of a bachelor in New York City, I met a girl and we decided to go out for dinner one night. So I wrenched my brain to find a place and came across Fiamma Osteria. I read that the chef of Fiamma was named one of the best new chefs in 2002 by Food and Wine Magazine. Food and Wine Magazine never steers me wrong. The plans were set and reservations were made for 9:30 pm on a Saturday night.

We arrived at Fiamma about 5 minutes earlier then out reservation. I walk over to the host, gave my name and was told it would be a few minutes. "Please enjoy a drink at our bar". Another lady comes over to us and escorts us to an elevator to take us to the second floor bar. I grab a drink for my date and I and we nestled ourselves into a corner and wait for our table. After 30 mind numbing minutes of sheer boredom a gentleman walks over and tells us our table it ready and to follow him back to the elevator. Is this place serious? 30 damn minutes? As I walked over to the elevator I was thinking to myself, "this date is going really bad; hopefully the food will make up for it".

We make our way back downstairs and are shown our table. The place was nicely decorated and low lit. A nice place for a first date. A small menu dated for the week of. A good sign: showing the menu always changes and the food is fresh and seasonal. I should be in for a real treat. For some odd reason my date and I did not order appetizers. I don't know if it was the tension between us or I just didn't want to eat because I kept thinking in the back of my mind this date sucks and the less I order the quicker this will be over and I could be on my couch watching Fight Club with a nice bottle of wine and a pie from Tottono's. So I went straight for the main course. Seared Tuna over risotto. My date had the goat cheese ravioli's.


Fiamma was packed that night. Not an empty seat in the house. Over dinner I was telling my date about the chef and how he was picked one of the best new chef's by Food and Wine Magazine. I could have honestly been telling this information to a wall because I would have gotten a better response out of it. Our Food had arrived. I like my Tuna rare. I am known to go to my local fish market get a pound of Tuna and bring it home and slice it up into sashimi. I am more than sure I told our server rare but my Tuna was medium almost well done. I don't like sending food back so I sucked it up and tried it. How bad could it be right? Awful, tasteless, fishy, crap. The risotto was dry, over salted crap! I asked my date what she thought about her ravioli. She said it was pretty good. I tried a piece and the ravioli was drier then my date’s personality. What can I expect from a girl who lives in Jersey? To her, modern Italian food is stuffed crust pizza from Pizza Hut.

Growing up I was always told to finish my food, starving children in China and all. But I could not do it. Who eats well done tuna? It's like eating a well done piece of red meat. My date was sinking like the Titanic and I could not wait to get out of there. I asked for the check and our dishes were taken away. As my date and I waited for the check she brought up a good point "It's funny the waitress didn't ask you what's wrong with your food considering you left so much. Even in Applebee's when I don't finish my meal I'm asked if there was something wrong with my food". I explained to my date, "I take this as a loss, the food sucked, I will never come back here or recommended it to anyone". The check comes, and it was $145. This couldn't be. I went over the check and a bottle of wine was added to my bill which we didn't even order. With this girl I needed the hard liquor only. Was this waitress trying to get over on me? Knowing I'm on a date and not to look cheap in front of my date she adds things to my bill? Ha, in your face waitress! This girl is boring and not even worth the mental anguish to try and sleep with her. I called over the waitress, told her we didn't order the $55 bottle of wine and can she please take it off my bill.

Fiamma Osteria, one of the worst places to eat in New York City. I wouldn't recommended this place to a soup kitchen.

Edited by a.j