sienna on the square

so disappointed. my friend and i had tickets to a 7:30 show at the benedum on a monday night, and came for dinner at 5:45 with a reservation. we thought an hour and a half for dinner would be fine. what a mistake! we were seated by a bad attitude young girl in an almost empty restaurant, maybe ten tables with people. we immediately ordered a drink and when it arrived ordered an app and main courses. we did say we had to be out for our show. our flatbread app showed up at 6:30. 45 minutes after seating and while it was tasty it was also extremely salty. by now we are worried and tell 2 more people that we have to leave at 7:15. by 7:05 we're realizing we may not havetimeto eat. when our waiter arrives at 7:12 we just ask for our check as we still do not have our meals. he brings our check which includes the food and a glass of wine we still did not have. we can't even believe it! he gets a manager which seems to take forever and they still don't take all the food we didn't receive off of our check! and to add insult to injury, they try to serve our entrees to us as we are leaving. i have eaten many places, lived in la and traveled a lot, but have never had such a rude experience in a restaurant in my life. i really can't speak for the food other than the salty app but we had to sit through an entire show, hungry and dying of thirst from the salt. this place needs an attitude makeover!

what a wonderful experience!. from thetimewe walked in to thetimewe left, the staff was attentive to our needs. our waitress, who said it was her first day, was knowledgeble, friendly and accommodating. the food was sensational and not the usual items on a menu which i found to be a refreshing change. this was my firsttimeat sienna but definitely not my last!

always a great experience. the chopped salad is delicious! the staff is so accommodating to mytimeas i’m mostly there on lunch hour. the flatbreads are also a favorite!

we walked from the hyatt place on the north shore over the fort duquesne bridge to point state park, then to sienna sulla piazza in market square for dinner with friends. i can’t remember the lasttimei visited market square. it’s changed quite a bit... unfortunately, i had partied a little too hard at liz’s bachelorette party on the south side the night before. sienna had an excellent wine menu, but i had to pass on that. i wasn’t sure if i could handle real food, especially rich italian food, but sienna’s housemade ricotta wild mushroom gnocchi ($19), surprisingly, helped cure my hangover. i asked them not to include the pancetta. fantastic gnocchi dish with gorgeous mushrooms.

delicious meal great value. i've been here twice before, once with a friend for happy hour drinks and anothertimeto meet up with my son and daughter-in-law for dinner before a show. i had excellent experiences both times. today i stopped in for a bite for lunch and the excellence continues.

the ambience at sienna is contemporary with low lighting and caribbean infused jazz playing just loud enough in the background to create a cozy, inviting and, dare i say, romantic atmosphere. the bar is fully stocked and they carry a modest selection of craft beers. it’s finally getting warm enough now outside that they were able to open the front wall (garage door style) of the restaurant exposing the place to the sights and sounds of market square. they even offer sidewalk seating for those early enough to snatch up a table there. i, however, wasn’t so fortunate and took a seat at the bar.

after taking a stool i was promptly and cheerfully greeted by the bar keep with a glass of ice water. i glanced at the menu and hesitantly decided on the open face chicken parmesan sandwich with a side of pasta salad. i say hesitantly because i haven’t had a good chix parm in the downtown-cbd yet.

it took less than ten minutes for my meal to come out and i was oh so pleasantly surprised. in front of me was a juicy plump chicken breast covered in delicious italian inspired marinara sauce (that was obviously in-house made) topped with a generous coating of provonello all sitting on top of a lone slice of focaccia. a pinch of basil sat capped off to the side on the provonello as if to say, “we believe in attention to detail”. it’s been a longtimesince i had chix parm that simply looked this good. if the presentation gets an “a”, the taste of this here dish gets an “a++”! the side pasta salad was a nice touch. it was dressed lightly and paired perfectly with the parmesan.

my total bill came to $11.77 plus tip. if you’ve dined enough in the downtown-cbd you know you can spend a lot more for a meal of this quality. i really can’t say enough good things about sienna sulla piazza.... excellent service, comfortable atmosphere, delicious meal all for a more than reasonable price.

finally! we finally found an amazing italian restaurant. i've been disappointed with every new restaurant we've tried in the past six months or so, until now. we ordered greens and beans, mozzarella stuffed meatballs, pan roasted duck, and gnocchi. everything was super flavorful, and fresh. i could tell that 100% of the dishes were fresh, fresh, fresh. the gnocchi are tender and fluffy. every sauce was unique and savory. the only negative thing would have to be our waiter. he did an ok job, but seemed a bit forgetful. he gave us dessert menus, and by thetimehe returned to check on us, my fiancé just wanted the check. i would highly recommend this place!

mobile review first i'd li.... mobile review
first i'd like to know if i ate at the same place the other reviewers are at? i have nothing but negative comments from my experience the other day. first off the ice tea was brewed so strong it just felt like your whole mouth was full of bitters. second the flatbread was so soggy and so full of garlic. not enjoyable at all. the most disturbing of all is when the waitress sent the manager out to our table to discuss our request. he spent moretimeexplaining to us why they could not change the type of cheese on our flatbread than trying to accommodate the customer. the request was not ridiculous or complex it was a simple change. it would have taken lesstimeto simply make a change and work with the kitchen and accommodate the customer than go through the song and dance he displayed at our table. we will never ever go back to the restaurant again.


-----23 sep, 2012-----

company slogan " no we can't ". chef of the year or not we will never be back.this was 2nd bad experience. we had a party of 8 and every small request was greeted with no , no & no. server was good and tried to accommodate our large party but struggled to keep up with drink refills. he candidly told us the bartender only moved at his pace and takes orders from noone. well thats a great way to start our dinner. so from there it went downhill fast . we could tell the chef had lectured his servers well on "no changes on the menu" instead of getting our drinks from the slow
bartender , our server told us there could be no changes and the menu "is what is."great customer service there buddy! we received our food , salmon 4 oz portion at best . the pasta portions where ok. one of us asked for more bread on the meat cheese platter , we where told it would be a small charge.....really i mean really....! give it one year at best, the chef is too arrogant , those types don't last for long. that jerky i'm always right atitude doesnt translate to customer service. when you go out to dinner, what makes you want t go back to a place is great customer service and great food...and sadly this establishment does not deliver either.

rabbit gnocchi lacked flavor as did the other entrees that our table ordered. service was satisfactory, took awhile to get drinks unless you were at the bar. this is the thirdtimehere and the last

great food great atmosphere!. a colleague of mine recommended that we try the restaurant. i went online and was able to easily set a reservation, upon arrival we were greeted immediately even tough they were very busy. the hostess guided us to the bar where the service was very pleasant and responsive. our table was ready ontimeand the waiter was excellent. his knowledge of the menu and the food preparation was fabulous. everything we ordered was exactly as he stated and the food was excellent! the atmosphere was very relaxing and was the perfect to fit the mood. this is definitely on our list of restaurants to return to.

amazing food and cocktails!!!. my boyfriend and i headed down to market square this past friday, december 20. with the unseasonably warm weather, and it being so close to christmas, it was naturally crowded. my boyfriend loves jazz and we originally had tried to go to nola but could not even get through the front door. we had gone to sienna previously-just for drinks- and had looked at their menu then and had wanted to come back so this was the perfect opportunity. we grabbed two seats at the bar and perused the menu. my boyfriend ordered a sangria (he was not impressed) however i drank the rosemary lemon drop (he loved that though) and the first one i had was good but the second one (made by a different bartender) was hands-down 100% the best cocktail i have had in a very long time! my boyfriend ordered the braised rabbit,which is actually what i wanted, however i decided upon the prosciutto &arugula flatbread. that way i could taste his rabbit and he could try the flat bread.the braised rabbit was one of the best tasting entrees i have ever had at a restaurant! it was cooked very tender and was not "gamey", the sauce tasted as if it had wine in it, was creamy but not overly so-it was just amazing! the flatbread was surprisingly very good as well. it was a little overly salted, however, not so much so that it distracted from the other flavors.and it was very evident that all ingredients in both dishes were very fresh and authentic. the bill was a little higher than we would have liked. in particular the rosemary lemon drops were $10 each which is steep, however, the second one i drank (and i don't believe i have said this in a long time) truly was worth $10 based on taste and presentation. overall, i am excited to go back and try another entree besides the flatbread.i think nexttimei will order a rabbit entree for myself, even if my boyfriend gets it again, because it was just.that.good.

this place was rated so highly i had to give it a try. disappointed is putting it nicely. my appetizer took forever to arrive. ok looking past that i was still anticipating my pasta papperdelle bolognese with these world famous meatballs i have heard so much about. well it was far from what i expected. ate a little asked for a box. left beyond disappointed i just paid 22 plus dollars for the worst pasta of my life. nexttimei am in market square i will stick to la cucina flegrea for i know personally that place has great pasta for a better price. or il pizzaiolo for awesome pizza.

arrogant chef, mediocre food. i normally don't write reviews but this one deserves it. i think the other reviewers who have complained about the attitude of the chef, managers, wait staff have pretty much nailed it.

first -- this is the most unfriendliest place to go if you have a child. every other restaurant in town will substitute items for kids but not this one. no, no and no, as some one else put it, is the motto of the chef. could you leave one item out from the entree? "no". i wish they put it up front on the front desk so that we could have gone elsewhere but i imagine that would be bad for business. my enthusiastic nomination for the "most unfriendliest restaurant in pittsburgh" goes to this place.

second -- the amount oftimeyou have to wait to get your drinks or appetizer is so long that by thetimethey serve you, you are ready to eat stuff uncooked. and, oh, its not like they serve bread while you wait.

third -- the food is mediocre at best. the open eggplant parm sandwich was soggy by thetimethey served it, the spaghetti was way too al dente. wild mushroom bruschetta was the only item that seemed to be decent but i still had to wonder why it took so long to be served.

overall it was a disappointing experience. i have gone to the nearby il pizzaiolo and la cucina before and they serve better food (without attitude).

eating in the dark???. i understand trying to set mood and ambience with dim lighting, but this place went overboard. it was literally dark almost pitch black. i needed a pocket flashlight to read the menu. food was okay, but portions are small and we had to ask the waiter for bread service. add to this that our party of 8 sat at a picnic table and i would say i was very underwhelmed by sienna sulla piazza. not likely to return anytimesoon.

customer service = 1/2 star at best. we cannot review the food because the restaurant failed to honor our 6:00 reservation made over a week in advance--sienna did not have our table ready. the hostess told us we could wait at the bar, but with only one seat for the 2 of us (i'm not used to sitting on my hubby's lap in public), we respectfully declined.

instead of apologizing or offering us an appetizer or drink or a kind word (as we told them we had to be somewhere by 8:00), they were unconcerned and unapologetic. the hostess was obviously too inexperienced to make amends, and the manager was surly, confrontational, and unprofessional. by 6:35 we were forced to improvise (la cucina next door, which was fabulous) so that we could make our 8:00 concert.

lastly, who's with me that a manager should at least have his shirt tucked in?

no need to take thetimeto thank us for feedback--use thetimeinstead to train your staff and manager that "customer service" is not an oxymoron, and that seating customers is actually a necessary first-step. mytimeis valuable too.

went for firsttimelast week. the woman manning the desk could not have been less friendly. other than that the waiter was top notch as was the food.