The Italian Village Restaurants: User Reviews

After reading several reviews, I decided to try Italian Village for myself. Its a landmark in Chicago, and had always wanted to go.

We were seated promptly, in a cute little booth. There are murals lining the walls of italian vineyards and there are lights on the ceiling, to give off the presence of stars. It was very charming.
Upon being seated, our waiter greeted us, and gave us a run down on the specials and some of his favorite dishes. He also helped us pick out a bottle of wine, as the wine list is very extensive. We started with the antipasto, and the beef carpaccio. Both fantastic. We then ordered salads, which were made at our table. It was a very nice touch. For our main course I ordered the Ossobucco, which fell off the bone and was in a scrumptious tomato sauce. My date had the chicken vesuvio, we were told it would take 30 minutes, and were pleasantly surprised that it came out just after we had finished our salads.
Highly recommend this restaurant!!

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Very cute place. Loved the private booths. Service was okay - a little slow so plan on taking your time. If the food was better, the prices would be reasonable, but it wasn't all that great. My shrimp scampi came with CANNED mushrooms. The salad wasn't very good - fancy leaf salad that tasted bitter. Honestly, the best part of the meal was the bread and olive oil. Wine is ridiculously overpriced. Brands that you could buy at Jewel for 9.00 a bottle were 10.00 a glass. Might go back and try a different dish and just drink a coke.

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If Rissoto is any gauge of an Italian restaurant's worth, then save your money and avoid this tourist trap. The "dinner special" risotto was like glue with hunks of canned chicken thrown in. The place is gloomy, service is slow. Really disappointed in this restaurant, which was written up in Chicago travel books as a great place to eat. We felt cheated and will never go back.

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We reserved this location for serveral dinners over a 3 month time period for company events. Unfortunetaly we were under contract because we had to keeep going back until the contact was up. The food was horrible every time. Even after we complained. We had a room reserved at 6:30 p.m When we arrived at 6:15 to set up,there was a huge party in our area just receiving drinks. I had 50 clients waiting in the lobby for at least 45 minutes. The Event manager was unapologetic and rude. After spending thousand of dollars there the still treated us poorly. Needless to say I had our company take them off ou our preferred vendor list

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If I wanted bad food I would have gone to buca di beppo, where at the very least the salad isn't terrible. While are server was pleasant not only was the wine, Sauvignon Blanc so sweet it was undrinkable, the pizza was so low in quality its remarkable that any restaurant in the city would serve such a thing before 4am when drunks just don't care what the food tastes like. Perhaps what is most outrageous is that the bill for two people was 70 dollars, for that one can eat at a nice restaurant.

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TWO OF US ARRIVED AT 5:41 ON FRIDAY NIGHT. WE WAITED UNTIL 7:15 TO SIT DOWN AFTER TELLING THEM THAT THE SHOW WAS AT 8:00. THE FOOD ARRIVED QUICKLY BUT WAS BLAND, UNDERCOOKED, AND POORLY PRESENTED. AFTER 80 YEARS I COULDN'T BELIEVE THAT THEY ALLOWED THE AMOUNT OF DINERS TO GET SO FAR OUT OF HAND. SOMETIMES THE OLD NEED A REFRESHER COURSE. I WOULD TELL PEOPLE TO LEAVE THE ITALIAN VILLAGE OFF OF THEIR LONG LIST OF PLACES TO GO.

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I ate at the Italian Village in the La Cantina room and it was so charming!
The food was outstanding and we had the pleasure of having the chef personally bring us our meal! He was very personable and it was a delight to meet the him. Our food was delicious! The service was great. Everyone there made us feel welcome and the door staff was helpful in giving us directions to the theater. It was just a wonderful evening. Thank you!

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The Italian Village is as close as it gets to real old world Italian. It reminds me of my Mother's cooking who is from Rome. What a veal dish they have called Veal Saltimbocca. The quality of the food and service were very good. A Captain mixed our caesar salad tableside and they picked out a great wine at a reasonable price. I will come back to this place soon and try the pasta or chicken.
The decor reminds me of the Godfather movie with real private booths and waiter buttons.

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The food was magnificent, it was really worth the trip from the suburbs on my birthday. The prices were somewhat reasonable and the service was quick and very friendly, the server also made many suggestions to help make my decision easier. Ask for any and all suggestions depending on your taste and there are even some nice things that aren't on the menu.

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This place is beautiful, great atmosphere from every seat. The service was fine, nothing special. The food left a lot to be desired. My girlfriend's shrimp scampi had no sauce on it & my rolled chicken dish was pretty bad.

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