Buca di Beppo Italian Restaurant

And so ends our 5-year Christmas Eve tradition. We tried....we really did. But tonight was the last straw. We won't be back.

It started from the git go....we walk in, approach the hostess desk, and four females all managed to avoid making eye contact with us, while the apparent head hostess, wearing her oh-so-cheery blinking Christmas lights around her neck, says "We'll be with you in a moment" after we announced we had reservations. No, "Hi! Welcome to Buca!" or "Merry Christmas!"

After a brief 5-minute wait, we were escorted through the bar to our table in the section near the kitchen. Seven minutes elapses without so much as a "hello" from ANY server or any one. Finally, we stop an employee and ask him to get our server. Three more minutes pass until finally "Jose" shows up. He apologized for the delay and takes our beverage order. After a 10-minute wait for 2 glasses of wine, we sat for another 10 minutes before we could order our salad.

This is how the whole evening went. Wait for someone, anyone, who looks like an employee,, make a request, and wait. We ordered the stuffed chicken with one meatball and our joiner relative ordered the mini meatballs. Although the food was tasty, it wasn't hot when served.

We stacked our dishes at the edge of the table to show we were done with them, but they went ignored far too long. Apparently, Jose wasn't assigned a station or pre-determined tables, so he appeared to be working in different areas. We had to remind him to get the beverage our joiner ordered. He approached the table across from us, who also waited about 10 minutes, and asked them "Have you been helped yet?". Station assignments might help, management.

The ultimate kicker was there were no toothpicks (at all) as we were leaving nor did ONE person at the hostess desk say "thank you" or "Merry Christmas." Bah humbug!

Sure, they were busy, but no busier than the previous four Christmas Eves we had been there before. Next Christmas Eve they'll be a little less busy, since we won't bother coming back.

Last nights take out dinner concluded to me that this place either wasn't great before, or may have once been great, but is not great these days.

The good: my order of Shrimp Fra Diavolo was good and indeed spicy. Shrimps were the tiny variety, and some were great, others overcooked.


The Spaghetti & Meatballs was acceptable to a child's palate, but not mine. Aside from the meatball, tender and seasoned well. The pasta was +2min beyond al dente.

The cellentani Mac and cheese was perfect. My daughter enjoyed it and the carefully snuck tastes I managed made me want more. Excellent pasta bite.

The not too bad: the salads; a Caesar Salad and Apple Gorgonzola Salad were large.
The Caesar wasn't all that. Being a take out thing was likely the issue, not being able to correctly toss it was noted. The dressing was gritty.
The Gorgonzola was better, and it certainly was attractive. As well as tastier. The crisp green apples were nice.

The BAD. The crappy bread.
If butter had been provided that meant something. Needing some olive oil and perhaps balsamic certainly would've been nice.

But this crust wasn't something made in house, and probably not something baked recently I'd gamble.
An Italian place outsourcing bread is a cardinal sin. Particularly when it's supposed to be thought authentic to Italy, at least having the silly Popes Table suggests intent.

I don't know.
Italian, like French, these cuisines demand a bread that isn't outsourced from factory.

Went here for an early Mother's Day dinner with my family and overall we had a great time! We ordered:
- appetizer sampler platter: 3/5 (some elements of this were a bit soggy but overall fine)
- lasagna: 4/5 (basic but good!)
- Margherita pizza: 2/5 (soggy crust)
- penne with white sauce, veggies, and prosciutto: 5/5 (I don't actually remember what this was called but it was really good! Was recommended by our server)
- tiramisu: 4/5 (needed way more coffee flavor)

Our server was great but clearly super busy and forgot my wine until I reminded him in the middle of the meal. We had a great time overall! Just know what to expect when you go - not always for the food but more so for the experience!

We had so much fun here with our family. We ate here with 15 of us and our waiter was Logan and he was AMAZING. large groups can be tough but he was so attentive to our table and was such a great waiter, we'd definitely go back.

Thank you Cheyanne for being so witty and patient with my family of 11 that came in on Friday dec 22nd. We enjoyed everything and was a good experience. My family can be a little demanding and embarrassing so
I appreciate that. Food was great !

Excellent spaghetti and meatballs. Very good service. They also have good coupons if you sign up.

We order to go food from here a few times a year. They have an easy to use online ordering system. This is better than calling in the order from years past. Fyi: your order normally takes a little longer than the estimated timing.

We recently ordered and found a 4 for $40 deal (we picked Spaghetti w/ marinara, Cesar salad, garlic bread). We added a large eggplant parmigiana, because it's our favorite. We asked for them to make it crispy and they did well! We order a ton of food, due to the fact we want leftovers and they always taste good reheated.

Overall, we crave these items from time to time and get them! Other items I like: Penne Rosso and the Brussel sprouts. The white sauce pastas never seem to have enough salt or garlic (shockingly!). We had a mushroom tortellini that was amazing and also a shrimp pasta with some veggie ribbon noodles in the past. I believe they were seasonal.

We ordered for pickup and we're very disappointed. We ordered a kids spaghetti without a meatball and told them multiple times it needs to be vegetarian. Well it was not and came with a big meatball on it and due to allergies it was thrown out. When we called about it they were blaming us for the mistake. The rest of the food was fine, but the pizza was a small pizza and for $24 is crazy! I would never have paid that much for such a small pizza!

Third time coming here and to tell you the truth the food quality keeps getting worse and worse as well as the service. The server forgot about my drink 2 twice and my children's chocolate milks. Buca is a nice place for date night or family dinners.. The only thing good is that the portion sizes are generous. Besides that it's a overall 5/10. Family got got an appetizer and this is how it went:

Fried Mozzarella
served with homemade marinara sauce (crispy) 8/10

Lasagna
towering layers of meat sauce, ricotta, mozzarella, provolone & Parmesan (missing some Italian spices and very acidic sauce) 6/10

Fettuccine Alfredo (with chicken)
classic favorite featuring fettuccine tossed with creamy homemade Alfredo sauce (very bland sauce) 5/10

Kids menu

Cheese Pizza
classic thin crust pizza (burnt bottom) 6/10

Chicken Parmigiana
Chicken topped with marinara & mozzarella, served with spaghetti marinara (sauce needs a-little flavor) 5/10

Dessert

Tiramisu
homemade ladyfingers soaked in dark rum & espresso, layered with sweetened mascarpone cheese & topped with cocoa & crumbled hazelnut biscotti 7/10

I'm glad Buca is in Maple Grove, it's cool to have them as an option. They provide a fun dine in experience for date night, special occasions or large groups. Feels like the more you eat here the better you get at ordering when thinking about the family style menu, although I did notice there are single options now, not sure if that's new or not.

I like some things a lot and others not very much. Chopped Antipasti Salad is awesome, prob my favorite thing on the menu. Very satisfying and great flavor. The Caesar Salad is kind of disappointing, really just romaine with some croutons and their packaged Parmesan cheese.
Chicken Parmesan is really good, chicken is juicy and works well as left overs. Spaghetti with meat sauce is boring and all noodles, maybe I should try the meatballs instead. Chicken carbonara is Ok, I've had the chicken kind of tough and other times really fresh, hit or miss I guess. Baked Rigatoni is great, one of my faves.

Lots of stuff on this menu, definitely somewhere to visit more than once.

The pastas were basic but good! My favorite was the spicy chicken rigatoni. The portions here are huge and served family style. They bring you bread and olive oil with balsamic which I love! We had a huge party and sat in the pope room which was cool and interesting! Our server did a great job making sure our drinks were always full. I only give it three stars because I was stepping in what seemed like a crushed cheeto the whole time ... there was also a random dirty spoon on the floor right next to me. (I'm assuming a child sat in my spot right before me) overall a fun time!