francescasforno

One of the more than a dozen restaurants in the Mia Francesca family, this latest version has a few problems to overcome to meet the standards of the others. Located in Wicker Park at the intersection of Damen, North and Milwaukee, the restaurant has lots of windows, wooden floors and high ceilings. The large dining room is open and noisy with nothing to absorb any sound. The bar is large and the wine list leans mostly toward Italian wines and offers a variety of half bottles. Service was a major problem. After finally catching a waiter after our wine order, we waited an unusually long time for our antipasto assortment. Our entrees arrived only minutes after the appetizers and were piled on the table before we could even taste all the antipasti. We sampled the white sardines, the beet salad with goat cheese and hazelnuts, balsamic roasted onions and the tuna sardinia. My entree of the veal saltimboca was ice cold by the time I got to it and after sending it back, the replacement was tough. The pennette with shrimp and shiitake was good but bland. The manager did come over to apologize for the problems with the kitchen and sent over a dessert platter for the table. The desserts were good but nothing we would have ordered.