Buca di Beppo - Universal City

Review summary

1. D

   Damian

   Orange County

   7 reviews

   5.0

   7 reviews

   Dined 2 days ago

   1. Overall 5
   2. Food 5
   3. Service 5
   4. Ambience 5

   As always the food is great. Whole family enjoyed the dinning experience.
   

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2. M

   Michael

   Los Angeles

   5 reviews

   2.0

   5 reviews

   Dined 3 days ago

   1. Overall 2
   2. Food 1
   3. Service 3
   4. Ambience 3

   Short version: It was… edible. Long version: Barely. Buca de Beppo would get booted out of Italy serving what they did. If prison offered Italian for a holiday meal, I would imagine it to be like this. We were less than five minutes late, but waited another 15 to be seated for a very early reservation… and the restaurant was less than half full. We were told that they were still preparing the table for our large party, and putting food on it, (i.e. bread). The bread never arrived until the entrees did half an hour later. We were ushered through a weird, fluorescent-lit ‘hallway’ to see the kitchen on our way up two flights of stairs to our table… that lacked the bread, or any water for that matter. And then waited another fifteen minutes. As we had movie theater reservations, we ordered everything at once, and began with fried calamari and a chopped salad. The calamari was the ‘star’ of the meal, but was served with a cold marinara that tasted like something bought at Albertson’s… and in the refrigerator for over a month. Ugh. Next was an unintentional ‘wilted’ salad drowning in an Italian ‘dressing’ that tasted suspiciously like bottled Kraft, but worse. Next was the chicken parmigian. The crust resembled the skin from a bucket of KFC original recipe, but was disappointingly flavorless and not crispy at all. The chicken itself was just okay. This was followed by what was described on the menu as ‘lasagna.’ Ugh, ugh. This was basically a mush of overcooked pasta formed into a really long loaf to resemble its name, and covered with a warm version of the earlier, aforementioned marinara, but this time with beef. It looked more like a crime scene. And should have been investigated as one with the lack of texture and flavor. I started and finished with their ‘signature’ old-fashioned cocktail. Which was a seemingly pre-made bottled version, but with a ‘fancier’ name and a higher price tag. BdB was basically a poor man’s Olive Garden. And significantly inferior.
   

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3. T

   Torian

   Los Angeles

   2 reviews

   vip
   2.0

   2 reviews

   Dined 5 days ago

   1. Overall 2
   2. Food 2
   3. Service 4
   4. Ambience 3

   Food is not food unfortunately. Waiter was nice however.
   

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4. T

   Thomas

   Los Angeles

   1 review

   4.0

   1 review

   Dined on November 17, 2024

   1. Overall 4
   2. Food 4
   3. Service 4
   4. Ambience 5

   Loved the location, food was okay, and the photographer needs to do a better job.
   

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5. K

   Kendra

   San Francisco

   3 reviews

   vip
   1.0

   3 reviews

   Dined on November 10, 2024

   1. Overall 1
   2. Food 1
   3. Service 2
   4. Ambience 1

   We were extremely disappointed. We got sat downstairs at such a tiny table right near the kitchen. We just ordered a salad and baked ziti. Salad was already soggy when it got to us. Baked ziti was nothing special at all. We decided to check out the upstairs after dinner and it felt like a whole different restaurant. There was music playing, lots of people, laughter. It was like night and day between the two levels. I would’ve brushed past the food part if we enjoyed ourselves and got seated upstairs. But overall, we were extremely disappointed and we will not be going back. Honestly shocked that this chain is still open these days
   

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6. M

   Melissa

   San Francisco

   22 reviews

   vip
   3.0

   22 reviews

   Dined on November 9, 2024

   1. Overall 3
   2. Food 2
   3. Service 4
   4. Ambience 3

   Disjointed Child pizza served after everyone else received meals and were eating and not fully cooked
   

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7. J

   Janet

   Los Angeles

   1 review

   3.0

   1 review

   Dined on November 4, 2024

   1. Overall 3
   2. Food 5
   3. Service 1
   4. Ambience 5

   I was there November 3rd with my family celebrating my 30th birthday, a party of 6. The cocktails and food were delicious. However, before we placed our order, we let our server know we had a carrot allergy. He then proceeded to take our order but later on comes back and tells us that one of our plates contains the allergen. We kindly ask him to switch it to a different plate. He went ahead and did that. Everything was great up until the end. My sister asked him if they did anything for birthdays but then said something in the lines of “since you removed a plate we can’t do anything” and left. The whole table was left confused wondering if he was joking or not. It left us with a bad taste in our mouths. I’m a server as well and would never say something like that to the table. Also, how is it our fault? He could have placed the plate on hold before sending it to the kitchen and verifying about the allergen. At the end he did bring us some ice cream. I don’t know if he was just having a bad day as we also had to keep asking different staff for refills. Everyone else was very kind.
   

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8. E

   Erica

   San Francisco

   2 reviews

   3.0

   2 reviews

   Dined on November 2, 2024

   1. Overall 3
   2. Food 5
   3. Service 3
   4. Ambience 3

   Dropped over $330 for only 3 of us and on the way out, there was a hostess, two other workers that did not bother to acknowledge or thank us. Extremely rude, especially when the restaurant had no other people in the lobby and it was at the end of the night. People have choices to spend their hard earned money and for something so easy to say THANK YOU, makes me wonder why the heck will I ever choose your restaurant again when I can go anywhere and be thanked and acknowledged!
   

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9. OT

   OpenTable Diner

   Palm Springs

   6 reviews

   5.0

   6 reviews

   Dined on November 2, 2024

   1. Overall 5
   2. Food 5
   3. Service 5
   4. Ambience 5

   Best birthday ever and our waiter was fabulous ! A+
   

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10. S

    Saul

    Los Angeles

    13 reviews

    vip
    5.0

    13 reviews

    Dined on November 2, 2024

    1. Overall 5
    2. Food 5
    3. Service 5
    4. Ambience 5

    Service was excellent as always. A little noisy due to the exiting crowd from Universal Studios, but food and service make up for it :-)
    

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