Food wasn't as good as our last visit.

The food was so so. It was very loud in the restaurant, due to a table of guys next to us. Had a weird smell in the place and the menu was super predictable and capers salad plate was funny tasting. Lasagna I had was fair. Sausage in it was really grainy, and almost seemed like it wasn’t fully cooked. Would not recommend this place. Go somewhere else- so many choices!

Terrible service, it was sweltering hot in the restaurant with only 1 or 2 fans and AC units that didn’t work, the food is descent but super expensive and small portions.

Saraceno is a personal favorite and always provides exceptional service, including whipping up a little bruschetta when they’re not too busy...reminds me of my family’s cooking. The staff is amazing!

Visiting with family and friends in Boston. Sergio and the staff were excellent and extremely accommodating throughout the evening. The appetizers, entrees, and wine were top shelf! We look forward to a return visit in the future.

We stopped in for lunch with out-of-town visitors and all of us agreed this place is a gem. Great food, great service with Luigi, great ambiance. We will be back.

The food and service are always fantadtic. Franco makes you feel right at home. I love this place!

Great if you like cold, soupy pasta. We waited 40 minutes and got lukewarm noodles and clams. It took at least another 10 minutes to get hot food. Waste of our time.

Visiting Boston North End and decided to try Saraceno's. A great choice! Service was great and the food was over the top delicious! Will definitely eat there again our next time visiting the North End.

Excellent pasta & lasagna!

Having made reservations assumed we'd be sitting in the cute little restaurant front area you see from Hanover street. But no...we were taken downstairs through one weirdly lit basement room, through the kitchen, past another dining room, into another dark room with low ceiling where the men had to duck in some places. Smelled funky, and during dinner 2 different cockroaches climbed past the wall behind us under the tacky fake vines. All in all, one of my most dismal dining experiences ever while wanting to give my friends from out of town a fun North End dining treat. The service was average at best. The food, nothing to write home about. Again. Average at best. But even if those two things had been exceptional the ambiance (coupled with the crawling bugs) was gross.

Horrible experience. Everything was astronomically priced for the quality and the amount received. The prices were also different online than on the real menu. The ambiance in the room we were seated in was awkward (there was a TV playing a very creepy film), the service was disorganized and rushed, and there was no music playing so we could hear the other customers and they could hear us. 10/10 would NOT recommend.

Did not like much the antipasto but the entrees were very good! Cozy little place with a very nice ambiance and great service! Very good wine selection for good prices.

Great food and service

Simple, yummy old school Italian food. One of our favorite North End restaurants. This time had sea bass over white beans, spinach and a puttanesca sauce.

Service staff were attentive and food delicious however the owner was a grumpy old man who made the wrong assumption that his patrons did not peak Italian (which I am fluent in) and he continually belittled and cursed in Italian his staff in public which I found extremely offensive and disrespectful. I will never dine there again.

This place was amazing! Definitely recommend!

Favorite North End Restaurant! Never disappoints!

Very slow service. Food was good, not great. Veal saltimboca very salty and overcooked. Sirloin was perfect. Seafood pasta very good. It seems hit or miss with the menu. Prices were reasonable.

Excellent food in a warm environment. Service was excellent. We will definitely return.

Where do I start. First of all, we showed up having reservations with a huge line outside. The hostess immediately took us inside ...but we were taken to the top floor where only one other table was occupied. (Passed first floor as well as well open 2nd floor and not sure why we were put in the attic). Still tried to make the best of it. Couldn't find wines by the glass but they showed us a section of wines (choice of 5 or 6) that only showed by the bottle prices. 12 dollars per glass.....poor wine and way too expensive for that quality and pour.

To top it off, had a plate of pasta ($28) arrive with huge hair on it. So what to they do...get another dish....10 minutes after. No apologies from mgmt and even charged us for the meal.
NOTHING.. from mgmt.

So upon leaving, we went to the hostess to ask why in the world we were taken up 2 flights of stairs, while there were open tables all over the restaurant. At first, she stated that I'd asked for it on my reservation. When I told her she didn't even ask my name when we arrived and therefore that excuse was not true, she then said the owner told her to put us up there. Note: the owner was no where around when we arrived. Complete lies to cover up pitiful customer service and frankly, they could care less.

I wouldn't waste your time here. Low class and poor quality. Many other options.

Good food and value. Traditional Italian fare. A bit small so if it gets crowded, could be a bit noisy (so keep that in mind for business or romance).

But conveniently located and enjoyed the meal. Very well portioned.

This is my go-to place every time I travel to Boston, at least a couple times per year. I love sitting in the window and watching the people go by, but the real draw is the great food and sweet staff. I've loved everything I've eaten here, especially the pasta carbonara. The staff is always very friendly, Tony particularly. Love this place!

We were sat next to the busing station and paired with drills they gave the new bus boys to rearrange the dinning area it was very unpleasant.

Hostess did not care about having an open table rsvp and immediately had us follow a her up two flights of very narrow and winding stairs to third floor. Had to wait to go upstairs as others were coming down and there was insufficient width on the staircase to get by. On third floor the crowd was packed in tight and the noise level was excessive. We were seated at a small freestanding table less than six inches from an adjoining table with two other people. The noise from people trying to talk with each other was so loud that we could not hear each other talk across the small table without shouting. We got up and left at that point. Nobody seemed to care, including the hostess who had seated us.

Excellent food and service. Really enjoyed not being hurried along! Made for a great night out with friends.

Excellent evening overall. Great food, service, and ambience!

Great service! Great food!

The restaurant was very crowded and on the smaller side until you get downstairs. The food was good but not great. Prob wont be back

Very good food
Very good service
A little noisy but it comes with a small restaurant
I will go again

The Spaghetti all'Amatriciana at Ristorante Saraceno was indescribably delectable. I'm confident the other pasta dishes are just as authentic and cannot wait to go back and try them! Highly reccomend.

Perfect setting. Perfect meals. Never a bad time at Saraceno's. I highly recommend it.

Very tasty food, well prepared and fresh. I had heard a lot about the North End and had been looking forward to visiting. It was better than I had expected.

I made a reservation months ago at this restaurant to celebrate my graduation this past weekend. My party of 8 arrived on time, but we were still greeted rudely and forced to wait in the rain for over 45 minutes. The restaurant was clearly overbooked or took too many walk in tables, because three parties of 8 were booked for 8:00 pm. Even though my party arrived first, the other two were seated and my party was left outside without even a clue of when we would be seated. When we inquired about the status of our table, the hostess gave us no information and quite frankly hid inside the restaurant. We wound up leaving to eat elsewhere. Frankly, I’m disappointed that I chose this restaurant to celebrate something special and was treated so rudely. It is ridiculous for this restaurant to even use OpenTable if they cannot accommodate or honor the reservations.

The reservation we made did not matter. We were not seated until over 30 minutes after our reservation. The food was great, but service was not.

Been there many times. Always a great experience.

I found this restaurant on OpenTable ( I always check the site to find good restaurants). We are in Boston for my son’s graduation from Boston University and wanted to find good restaurants to eat at while in the area. Saracena was AMAZING. Everything we ordered was absolutely delicious. I had the spaghetti carbonara... life changing :)
The staff couldn’t have been nicer....from the woman that met us at the door and seated us , to the busboys that kept refilling our water-glasses and breadbasket . There are three levels to the restaurant , we were seated in the basement level...it was clean and lit by hundreds of little white lights...it felt / looked magical. If you ever find yourself in Boston and are looking for really great Italian food in a beautiful, cozy, warm setting make a reservation at Saracena. You will leave with a happy heart and a smile on your face.

I took my niece and family to Ristorante Saraceno to celebrate her MSW on Friday. We were seated immediately in a corner in the basement. It was a beautiful day and evening and I was sorry to miss the daylight, however this spot was really perfect on a busy evening - we were tucked out of the way and so could hear each other and enjoy a lovely meal. I found the past all' arrabbiata to be the perfect spiciness. The fettuccine all' alfredo was more buttery than creamy, but tasty. The chicken piccata was deemed to be well prepared but a little light on the lemon. The clam pasta was also good. We shared a Cesare salad - some might consider it over-dressed but I thought it was perfection. We also polished off multiple baskets of bread and glasses of wine. The service was wonderfully attentive and helpful. This place remains one of my favorite, although as an introvert, I like it a little better on a quiet night in the dead of winter. They did a fabulous job creating a relaxing atmosphere on a ridiculously busy day.

Mother’s Day

Hello,
My husband and I took our 3 kids 17, 15, 12 to dinner at your restaurant tonight. We ate upstairs. We left frustrated and disappointed with our entire experience.

The service was horrendously slow. Our water wasn’t refilled, our drink orders were slow or never came. Other tables that sat after us were served long before us. Our meals were served to us in big, actually outrageous gaps. Therefore some in our party’s food got very cold. With all these issues we were never given an update as to why we weren’t being served or why it was so slow and we were not offered an apology.
My son had plain pasta and a side of meatballs. His pasta was swimming in oil. Honestly it looked like soup. It was disgusting. We didn’t return it as he was so hungry and we just wanted to eat and leave.
My husband wants to leave a negative review on Yelp. I told him not to and instead I’d contact the restaurant itself. We were given a complementary limoncello because the wine my husband ordered was never brought to him.
We came to your restaurant for a birthday celebration and for Mother’s Day from the north shore; we paid $25 in parking and left so very disappointed and frustrated.
I thought you’d like to know.