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This was the poorest food I ever tasted, in fact it was inedible. The mussels were dry and about 1/3 of the order did not open. This was followed up with an entree order of 13 calamari breaded with a crust that was mushy when chewed followed by rubbery bands of calamari that were impossible to chew. In fact, I spit them in to the napkin. But the poorest dish was the rigatoni with broccoli; water spilled out of the rigatoni and the broccoli was both bitter and rancid leaving a dry bitter after- taste for the next 2 hours. Couldn't eat more than the initial taste of it. With the exception of the delicious rolls and olive oil served at the beginning of the meal, the rest of the meal was totally sub par and an affront to anyone who loves Italian Food.

We ate here for the first time Sunday September 2, 2007. We picked it out based on "reviews" and got a discount through Restaurant dot com.The place does have that "old world" Italian charm look to it. The "waiter" seems to be the owner also as he was the only person along with the busboy servicing all the tables in the place. They do have great music which is a mix of predominately jazz and adult contemporary. The portions are small to say the least. Do not be in a rush. The bread with the basil, salt, pepper and olive oil dip is outstanding, we went through two baskets - waiting on our dinner order of simple chicken parmigiana and seafood fra di avlo. If you're in the neighborhood and want to have a drink and listen to jazz-good place and maybe their pizza is good-it looked good along with the fried calamari other than that I would be suspect of the entrees as a whole. Don't get me wrong the "waiter/owner" was a nice gentleman but he was doing everything, where are the waiters/waitresses? It took A-W-H-I-L-E for our food to be served...Portions are small compared to the price, it seems like all entrees are served on these oval dishes were everything is portioned to sit in the center of the dish. My wife does not want to go back there again for "dinner"; if we do it would most likely only be to try the pizza and the fried calamari. This really could have been a wonderful find in the West Village if a few changes were made. Pros: Bread and oil dip, ambiance, music Cons: SMALL portions, lack of timely service

Some disclosure first. I have no vested interest in either Italian restaurant - I just happen to live in the area. The food at Gaetana's is sub par. Really. Actually sub par. Perhaps I went on a busy night, perhaps the kitchen was not performing as it should, but the food was down right unappetizing. So unappetizing that for the first time in my life, I sent the food back and did not feel good about paying the check. In fact, this restaurant was so disappointing, I signed up to menupages just to write a negative review. Really. I ordered two dishes - the rigatoni with pesto as a starter and the chicken milanese as a main. Let's start with the pasta, none of which is homemade. I was served overcooked bland pasta - forget ala dente, this was ala mushy. Their pesto sauce is cream based. Seriously. It's actually a green cream sauce without any hint of basil. If there is any basil, it was likely from a can. For my main I ordered chicken milanese. That is breaded, pan fried, chicken. How can it be bad? It managed to be both rubbery and burnt. On the plus side, however, the manager is delightful and was very gracious about the poor quality of the food. He assured us it was a fluke - but I am not sure that was the case. In summary - disappointing food. Skip it. Really. There are many good Italian restaurants in the area, this is not one of them.

Dry chicken... served with with small portion of rice? Where is the pasta? Oh, yeah, that's $3.99 extra... plus you get incredible rudness from the inflexable waitress. What Italian restaurant charges extra for pasta with a main dinner? Stay away from here....

Being a British tourist to New York and recommended this restaurant I was appalled at the service received. My dinner was served in stages and was not value for money at all. My friends portions were tiny whilst other diners had been larger portions served. We were forced to pay 20% service charge on a meal that was well below standard, appalling service. The law in NY is that 20% should only be added to the bill for 6 guests and over and there was only 5 of us. When requesting to see if we could refuse to pay this service charge the Manager was downright rude - I have to say this is one ruling in the UK that shoud be applied in the US - if the service is bad you should be able to refuse to pay this charge and have removed from your bill.

Why this restaurant ever received good reviews is a miracle. The atmosphere is down and out, the waitress was rude and inflexible and the food was unappetizing. Absolutely burnt breaded chicken, which, according the to waitress, "wasn't burnt--it always looks like that." Any question of complaint was met with a smack down.

Good food but over priced for what it its. Portions are fit for children