La Bocca Della Verita
4618 N. Lincoln Ave.
(between Eastwood Ave & Wilson Ave)
Chicago, IL 60625 (773) 784-6222
- Nearest Transit:
Western (Brown)
- Price Range: $$
- Accepts Credit Cards: Yes
- Parking: Street
- Attire: Casual
- Good for Groups: Yes
- Good for Kids: Yes
- Takes Reservations: Yes
- Delivers: No
- Take-out: Yes
- Waiter Service: Yes
- Wheelchair Accessible: Yes
- Outdoor Seating: Yes
- Good for: Dinner
- Alcohol: Full Bar
14 reviews
Neighborhood: The Loop
"Atmosphere: Theatrical Price: Lunch expensive Bathrooms: Very Clean Food: Excellent We went here for lunch after a meeting in the area! No…" read more »
43 Reviews for La Bocca Della Verita
The food was really good. I liked what I ordered a lot and my friends really liked what they got too. Service was also good and very quick. Of course we also went on a Tuesday evening and they weren't busy at all. That may have accounted for the good service and speed of the kitchen.
Still, good food and I like the location. Parking is a bit of a hassle but that's true for most places in the city. It's close to the el though so I'd say take the el if you go. Prices were also ok for what you got.
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Wow, after seeing the reviews -- I guess the Debbie Downer of the Yelp community strikes again! I love Italian food -- and was totally looking forward to eating here. My five friends and I decided to come here after a dismal Fourth of July. Place was pretty empty so we were excited to sit outside.
After looking at the menu, there was not one thing that I absolutely wanted! This is a shocker since every Italian dish makes me drool. Bleh. The waitress was super nice and when we asked her if she recommended the figs with prosciutto and mascarpone cheese, she gave us her real answer. She even went and got us extra figs!!
Since I couldn't find anything I wanted, I opted for the pear salad which was really good! The gorgonzola didn't have a strong taste like it usually did -- so i wasn't turned off. One friend ordered a salmon pasta dish and said it was too fishy to finish. Another ordered mini gnocchis and said it was too bland -- couldn't taste the blue cheese on it.
What was good was the duck ravioli which was really tasty -- as well as the linguine with clams (albeit small clams).
Overall, friendly staff and great atmosphere. Food probably wasn't up to par since it was the holidays...
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Man...I just got home and I am super disappointed. We went out to celebrate our 1 year wedding anniversary tonight.
The food was awesome - the salad appetizer & both our entrees.
The service was complete crap.
I waited tables and managed NY restaurants for 10 years - I am never demanding, I know how hard it can be! This woman SUCKED! She was tall and thin with dark brown hair, pulled up (she looked like Cruella DeVille, and acted like it) - her name? No clue because she didn't tell us. Or bring us bread any time soon, and when she did, she forgot butter or oil, and finally brought some after the bread cooled.
We sat on the patio and could see her attending to her tables inside, we even saw her tidying tables, doing side work, wandering aimlessly, or just possibly avoiding us, while we waited to order our dinner. We considered just leaving. Maybe we should have, it's not like there isn't a slew of amazing restaurants nearby, waiting to seat you on a Thursday evening.
She brought our drinks and as she set them down, asked if we wanted to return them, because they looked like they were wrong....why did you bring them if they looked wrong? Our dinner took 2.5 hours because she neglected the hell out of us! We never had our waters filled once, we had to request the dessert menu TWICE!
I had to shout while she dropped the check on another table to get her attention so I could have the privilege of ordering a second drink!
When she finally brought it, we wanted to order dessert, and she told us to "MAKE IT QUICK", because she was "busy with other tables"!?!!@? What the hell is the matter with this person? We had to shout something at her, as she backed away...to tend to obviously more important customers.
Oh, and it was empty - it was not busy, if it were, I could understand, but it was dead.
We had to flag down other servers to order dinner, for a to-go box, and to request for our check - which came after all the other people left and all the outside tables had been cleared! We wanted to leave, but she wouldn't let us. She kinda ruined our anniversary celebration.
Now, the food was really good, possibly great. Dessert sucked, but everything else was amazing. We would go again, but request another server. You need to have good atmosphere and good food to survive in an economy like this, in a city with so much good options.
I would rather poke out my own eyes than deal with this woman ever again.
After being denied seating at the Fiddlehead on the Sunday before Memorial Day (their last seating was at 9 p.m., we were there around 9:30 p.m.), my sweet boyfriend and I decided we'd spend our date night dining on Italian food at La Bocca.
We were promptly seated, although there were a few employees that made some snide comments (alright, we WERE "those" people trying to eat 20 minutes before closing, but in our defense, it was a constructive Saturday night as Monday was a holiday). Our server came over, told us that the kitchen was closing in 10 minutes, we had to make up our minds soon....so we did.
My boyfriend had the tortellini stuffed with veal, and I had the spinach ravioli, starting with the caprese salad. The pasta was prepared perfectly al dente, the sauces were tomatoey without being over-powered by garlic...the mozzarella was tender and the tomatoes were juicy and ripe. The food was spectacular. I had a less-than-stellar glass of house red wine (can't really remember this varietal)...and we never received the bread our server said she was bringing over.
The food was so good...even though the service was a little off, I cut them some slack because we came in so close to closing. But the food is fantastic...the restaurant did make me feel like I was in one of those little trattorias in which we used to eat during my stay in the Monte Mario neighborhood of Rome. Yum! (I was ready to get my little "wallet Italian cheat sheet" and tell the cab driver "take me to my universidad" like I used to have to do when in Rome.)
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I was expecting not to love the LBDV when I went for lunch with a friend who said she would treat (thanks to tax rebate+stimulus+car break in insurance overestimate) as long as we didn't "go somewhere with 'king' or 'pit' or 'shack' in the name of the restaurant". So we ended up here as it had outdoor seating and it was nice out.
I had a sandwich on a sundried tomato foccacia (extra oily, in a good way) with a huge and unexpected amount of slightly crispy prosciutto, fresh mozzarella, tomato and basil. A hell of a sammich for 8 buckaroos.
My friend ordered a gnocchi with truffle cream sauce and fresh peas. Again, for $8 there were copious truffle shavings in the cream sauce.
I also like the LBDV (hoping that catches on) for the relaxed Euro atmosphere with people whiling the afternoon away with a glass of wine and a book.
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We went here with a medium-sized family group and reservations were made with no problem the Wednesday before that Saturday. When we arrived we were seated promptly with no problem.
At first, I couldn't help but feel that the waitress might have been a phony--she delivered the "Oh, I would recommend everything here." However, upon discussing all of our orders (and seriously, each of us had at least a 30-second "session," amicably of course) I realized that she knew her stuff. I have to say I liked my husband's order more than mine, though I always enjoy linguine and shellfish of any kind. But he ordered a pasta with salmon (yes, and it was better) that was scrumptious. Carbonara lovers, my sister can vouch that her plate went fast and rendered her speechless for about 10 minutes of the meal. And her husband ordered the duck ravioli, sealing them off from the table conversation for a shared 7 minutes (haha).
In all seriousness, we were actually laughing and chatting and enjoying our food for some time, neither disturbed nor neglected by our waitress, and enjoyed each and every one of our recommendations (even the last one of us to order, who ended up getting the whole squid)! I highly recommend La Bocca Della Verita for the atmosphere, the service, and most importantly the food!
the food was really great!! bread, entree, dessert, all very very good. And I'm not that easy to please. My grandma was even happy, and she never is. I liked the atmosphere, I even thought the prices were decent. My only tiny complaint: like someone said previously, my server kind of had the pasted on smile. She was attentive, but I felt like she actually hated her job. Oh well.
This is a really charming restaurant with incredibly friendly staff. I so wanted to like it...but it was just average. Perhaps I didn't order the right items...I was just not very impressed.
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My husband and I came across this place on our everlasting hunt for date spots. We asked the server to pick us a red and were very satisfied with her selection. We started with the Carpaccio which was perfectly cured. I had the Gnochetti ai Fromaggio and my husband had the Spaghetti Carbonara ... excellent! Pasta was cooked to perfection and the Gargonzola cream sauce on my gnochi was amazing.
The atmosphere is great in terms of being authentically Italian. I noticed a few reviews that complained about small tables and being in such close proximity with other diners. This method of "intimate" seating is actually very European and reminded me of some places I ate at while traveling in Italy.
The service is a tad slow but that might also be seen as something of a European tradition, where a meal is meant to last hours, includes many bottles of leisurely sipped wine and the time between courses is purposely long to allow a sense of requiescence (its how I chose to take it, at any rate).
THE ONE PROBLEM:
The only reason I didn't award this place five stars was due to the fact that half-way through our meal an enormous singing bar crawl burst in (no joke ... their schtik was to stumble from one establishment to the next and sing drunken x-mas carols until complimentary libations were provided). I am all for the holiday spirit (this was around x-mas) but I think the bar crawls should stick to the bars and restaurant managers/owners should help enforce this!!! This obnoxious group didn't belong in such an intimate setting and ruined an otherwise extremely pleasant night out!! A very disapointing choice on their part but I'll still be back for the delicious food and authentic setting.
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You ever get that feeling that the smile your server has pasted on her face masks an inward sneer? Well, you may get it here.
My girlfriend and I went to La Bocca Etc. last night after the BYOB joint we'd intended to eat at was packed with a 45-minute wait. Our server was immediately put off by the fact that I had a contraband bottle in my hand. "We don't normally allow outside wine here; the owner really doesn't like it. But we'll make an exception tonight. However, the corkage fee is $15."
I tried to tell the woman that we weren't there to break their stupid wine rule, but she scampered off before I had the chance. We didn't see her again for about five minutes, even though the bar with the glasses and corkscrew was three feet from our table. When she came back, I told her we'd save our bottle and have a couple glasses of one of their fancy chiantis. She took our full order, brought back some warm bread and we waited for our wine.
But first came our entrees. Seriously. We got our entrees right before she came back with our wine (which, for $7.50/glass, I really expected something more substantial than the shallow pours we got). I was hungry, so I bit my lip and ate.
I had the Spaghetti alla Carbonara, and it was effin delicious, rife with tasty bits of homemade guanciale (Italian bacon). My girlfriend had the Pappardelle ai Funghi Porcini, which was hopelessly bland. As hungry as she was, she could barely eat it.
We're not high-maintenance diners, but this place put us off from the get go and, aside from my carbonara and snappy water service, it did little to acquit itself. Even the decor was a depressing, dated mishmash of pastoral prints and family portraits.
Many of the diners that came in seemed like neighborhood folks who knew the staff and enjoyed being there, but we certainly didn't feel that this was a restaurant that ever wanted us back.
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Perfectly cooked pasta, delicious homemade sauces.... I really liked it.
This is a totally traditional Roman Trattoria plunked down in the middle of Chicago. Go and enjoy!
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There's not much to complain about at La Bocca. Chicago features many great, authentic Italian restaurants. This place might just be the closest thing to the restaurants I went while I was in Italy. It's unpretentious, quiet (more on that later,) and the food compares with any I've had stateside.
La Bocca della Verita features a extensive list of daily specials. On this particular visit I had two: an arugula and pear salad with gorgonzola and a veal tortellini with tomato cream sauce. The portions weren't gigantic but just big enough to take some pasta home for tomorrow's lunch. The whole menu was extensive but not overwhelmingly so.
It's the atmosphere that I really like about this place though. It really feels cozy and family run (it is, I think.) It's laid out in 3 separate rooms so the noise never gets too loud. That's huge when you are out to dinner with people you actually want to talk to.
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I had the "Ravioli Anatra" Duck Ravioli. Sumptuous does not begin to describe the marriage in flavor of the creamy sauce, the melted Parmesan, hommeade pasta and the fragrant duck meat..... no leftovers here! I'll just have to go back!
And to all those present- yes, I was making out with my boyfriend at the table. (Yes, Gentlemen, a bottle of wine and the Transcendent Mozzarella Di Bufala with crisp green apples is all you will need for a romantic fall evening...)
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La Bocca Della Verita is a great Italian restaurant. Try one of the following, they are excellent: Linquine Vongole, Spaghetti Carbonara, Carpaccio, Gnochetti ai Fromaggio, and Saltimbocca. You will not be dissappointed!
I'm not very picky about the food in restaurants so take it for what its worth. Way more important to me is the atmosphere, the friendliness, just the general vibe. To me, the food at La Bocca doesn't stand out - it's fine, certainly nothing bad, but just your garden variety Italian restaurant that doesn't screw anything up.
It has a nice, laid-back, pleasant feel to it, though, from the unassuming storefront, to the electic decor and the somewhat strange setup across three separate rooms. It doesn't blow you away but if you're in the area and looking for something nice and low-key, it's not a bad choice.
(I swear, though, last time I was there we must have had the same server as Sara B. because that's exactly how I would have described her: amiable but just a bit scatterbrained with a distant expression on her face. Although when we were getting ready to leave my aunt did errantly flick the wine cork at me hitting three of the people eating at the table next to us, so I'm not sure anyone thought we were such great shakes either. Good times.)
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Pretty empty at 7 on a Tuesday night. Strange decor, fumblejumbo mismatch ARENA! Or maybe that's what brought it all together. Extremely neutral attitude from waiter, sat us in the back. Two guys from another table walking out, to us: "Go somewhere else. Seriously. Don't stay here." Curiousity! Well, oh my, how bad can it be? Fresh bread! Oohhh. Only olive oil on the table, though. No offer of balsamic from neutralman. Perhaps the other two guys had the same problem but verbalized their desire and luckily had left a jar of vinegar on their table. Just sneak that over here... much better. No wine tonight, thank you, on the wagon for a few, only some sodas and some food.
Average time later, food arrives as do unsolicited soda refills. So far so good. No offer for fresh cheese or pepper on pastas.
Just slow down sliding from there. Our food was ... well... I had a salmon pasta thing and my buddy had some... I dunno, some pasta. He said his was okay. Mine was not very good, and had obviously been reheated as the middle was cold and the outside was hothothot. A bit flavorless, but that coulda been average for whatever I ordered.
Some other people had arrived in the interum and had requested some tasty water. When the waiter spotted a waitress with the aquajug he promised she would fulfill their wishes. She did not, and they had to re-ask when the waiter sauntered back.
More refills of our soda and eventually the bill, which was a bit high.
I don't honestly see the appeal of this place, with mediocre service, mediocre food and a bit on the upper pricey side, but whatever gets ya goin.
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Looking for a nice dinner and a movie date in the city with some character? Go to La Bocca and then head right next door to Davis Theater.
In the summer, you can sit outside surrounded by flower pots and people watch. Or, you can sit inside in a homey atmosphere, with fresh flowers in old wine bottles and old photos on the walls. Either way, you are treated to friendly service.
The food is solid. My rigatoni with eggplant in a tomato sauce was fantastic, with just a tiny edge of heat. The eggplant is baked, not fried, which I greatly appreciated. Rafe's lemon sole was also tasty, although the sauce was a little creamy for my taste. The house wines by the glass were delicious, especially the Montepulciano I ordered, although a little pricey.
This would be a good restaurant to go with a bigger group, because they have the space and they take reservations.
Quality for the Cost: 7
Service: 8
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I don't know, I was just entirely underwhelmed by this place. I was really excited about going because I had read excellent reviews of the duck ravioli, which is essentially mashing together my two favorite things in the world.
We went on a Wednesday evening and - upon discovering we had no reservations - were led through two empty (and nicer, I might add) dining areas into a relatively full daycare. Did I say daycare? I meant multi-tabled area with TONS OF CHILDREN. The decor was crappier, there was less room per table, and the two of us (obviously on a date) were seated next to a litter of children.
The appetizer was ridiculously small. I don't mean quaint small, but just...small. Good, though. The duck ravioli was pretty good, but definitely not the best ravioli I've had. It had moments where I started to "ohmigod" it, but the awesomeness just became...meaty-ish.
Service was unremarkable. It kind of took awhile. It wasn't cheap but also not expensive. See what I mean? Underwhelmed. I'm considering giving it another chance.
I'm surprised that there are so many unpleasant reviews. This is, IMO, a great Italian place. A little pricey, perhaps, and parking is a pain, but great food certainly.
What can I say? Great food. Great Service. Great environment.
This is not Italian-American. This is Italian, and amazing.
Their hand cut raviolis stuffed with duck and sage was the best thing I've eaten in months.
That's all. Go. You should go.
One of my girlfriends and I met here for dinner last night to catch up on gossip. It's been years since I've been to this little Italian joint, and this place is still as quaint and charming as ever. It's in the heart of Lincoln Square near Chicago Brauhaus. This place is casual - don't wear a suit, fancy dress or heels or you might feel a little outta place. Okay, so it's not the place you propose to your girlfriend or announce that you are retiring. But it is a great place to hang out with your pals, reconnect with old friends, and even have a nice casual date with someone you want to get to know better. It is a very good choice.
The waitstaff was very good, kinda quirky, but attentive and prompt. The bread...oh my...the warm bread...well if you're on that South Beach diet, you might as well kick that diet to the curb for awhile because the smell of that yeasty bread (okay, maybe yeasty does not sound like a very delicious word) will cause you to have a nervous carb breakdown. What is it about warm, fresh-out-of-the-oven bread? I ate the Ravioli Valles (kind of a spicy ravioli with jalapenos, and it really was not that spicy, but it was tasty), and my friend ate the chicken scaloppine, i believe. We both enjoyed our dinners along with our house salad, which has a very light Italian dressing. (The dressing could use a little more flavor, I think, as it was a bit bland of a house salad).
We didn't drink since the next day (today) was a 'school' night, but they had a nice little wine menu, too.
Note -- while it is true that this place gets supercrowded on the weekends, it's "just right" on a Wednesday night. Still, it's a good idea to make reservations...just in case.
Parking might be a little tough in this area, but be faithful, something will open up.
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I'd give it 3.5, if I could.
We went there for the first time a few weeks ago to carbo-load for the marathon. It wasn't very busy, which was great. We did make reservations, though.
Service was a bit slow, and our server seemed kind of spacey. She was nice enough, just a little flaked-out.
We had the bruschetta to start, and it was quite good. Very garlicky and peppery. I liked that. Our main courses were also tasty--maybe not the best Italian I've ever had, but I'd go back.
Our table had the ravioli, pesto special and the spaghetti. The sauces were full of flavor, though pretty simple. The pesto could have used something more, but I'm not sure what.
It has a great vibe, and if you're okay with laid-back service, I'd definitely try it out. Great value for good food.
La Bocca della Verita (the Mouth of Truth) is my favorite Italian restaurant in the city. They're real [authentic] and they're spectacular. Whenever I want to impress a girl I'm seeing I take her to LBDV. I went there last weekend and the girl I'm seeing ordered the Spaghetti alla Carbonara while I ordered the Ravioli Anatra. Both dishes were excellent as usual. La Bocca also serves Moretti beer which is a nice touch.
The restaurant has a pretty big space right next to the Davis Theater but is broken up into three rooms which helps to make it feel smaller and gives it a comfortable and intimate vibe. The rooms have big windows that face Lincoln Avenue. The restaurant also has outdoor seating in front of the restaurant when weather permits.
If you want a really great authentic Italian meal (sorry, no pizza) then La Bocca della Verita is definitely worth consideration.
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I wanted to like this place. I read the great reviews on Yelp and talked to some people who all raved about how great the food is.
I made a reservation for 10 people at 6pm on a Wednesday. We were seated in the back room, which smelled like Grandma's basement when I walked in. I think the busboy was trying to air the place out when he opened the front door, but all he succeeded in doing was letting bugs in and hot humid air. We requested they shut the door, but the damage was already done. One of the women in my group commented it was like eating dinner in the jungle with all the flies and humidity.
The food was decent. I had the lasagna, which had incredibly thin noodles and a great taste but was a little dry. The gnocci was light and melted in your mouth. The chicken marsala was also good.
Interestingly, my boss was at the other end of the table and had a great experience. I don't know what was at our end of the table to attract all the flies, but she didn't notice any at her end. She's a tough one to please, so I would be willing to give this place another shot since she really enjoyed it.
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Considering the close locale to my apartment I was really excited to try this place, but I was fairly dissapointed!
My group sat outside and it took about 30 minutes to get a menu. It took an additional 15 minutes to get drinks and we ended up not receiving our food until we had been sitting there for 1 1/2 hour. During our incredibly long wait, we were never given bread (our waitress never came out after she took our food orders).
When they finally came with the food, my lasagna was overcooked (and a corner piece) - so crusty with hardly any cheese! One of the other people in the party recieved something entirely different from what he ordered, but by this point we were so hungry he just ate it. While they were serving us our food, I asked if we could have some bread and the waitress said she'd get us some more in a fairly snotty way (we NEVER got any bread in the first place).
I won't return.
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I LOVE this place. I have never had a bad meal here, and each time I go I try something different. My favorite dish is probably the Gnocchetti ai Formaggi, because I love blue cheese. The sauce is just crazy good.
It's also great, because I've never had to wait for a table. The inside is really large, and definitely a date spot. Just perfect.
Mismatched tablecloths, waiter with a funny accent, random rooms behind rooms...I thought: "am I in Italy? I can't be," I answered myself, "the bread's too good"
Seriously, though, it's weird. Lot's of stuff in actual italy is delicious. The bread? Not so much. Plus, you get charged to sit at the table. I am happy to report, there is no "coperto" at La Bocca Della Verita.
This is all a long way of saying that the bread at La Bocca is yummy. But it is not just the bread that delights, the pasta is amazing! My husband and I shared a pasta puttenesca and a mushroom cream sauce pasta. One was spicy, the other was savory and they were both piping hot and delicious.
I do not know much about italian wines (the only one I recognized on the list was Chianti) so we just pointed at 2 of the reds and tried them. They were pretty good, though their prices for by the glass were a bit steep as I recall.
La Bocca is a great place to go on a date or with friends and the pasta is an authentic Italian dining experience right in Chicago (suck it, Alpana -- I can come up with those trite summaries too!)
Also -- thanks to yelp, without whom I would never have ended up at this place :) smooch
Oh -- PPS -- I just rated a n italian place in Boston that I waited 1.5 hours to get in to. La Bocca is better!
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I went back and had the pasta with salmon in some sort of creme sauce. It was amazing!!! This is one of the few places to order pasta.
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La Bocca Della Verita was a favourite eatery when I was a local. Five years after moving away, I came here on a whim ... and was delighted to see that nothing had changed. The service was impeccable. The kitchen and waitstaff both stayed late to accommodate our untimely arrival. As just as I remembered, the food was superb. While I've never been to Italy, this hidden gem invokes daydreams.
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I didn't like it! ;_;
First of all, our salad (arugula w/ anchovies) was fucking great! It was simple, and full of flavor. I could have made it at home (but I would probably have added some salt & pepper...). The Bocca Bruschetta was okay - the portabella was small and had a weird texture, like it had sat out for a while.
In fact, everything seemed pre-made and not fresh at all, which is my biggest dining turnoff, especially at small mom&pop places. The duck ravioli was bland, and while the pasta seemed fresh, the filling popped out in one lump. It was chewy, like pre-packaged ravioli you can get at the grocery store, yuck! For $16, what is that!? I did not detect any sage, either.
Also, it's nothing special to look at. I hate to sound stuck-up--it is quaint and full of regulars--but the flowered tablecloths were an eyesore, and the random vintage deco just really didn't do it for me. I didn't even notice it, though, until I got my food and was like, "What is this?!" ...and then I started to look around.
Finally, the desserts all sounded great and I was excited to try them. However, the gelato "sundae" was missing the amaretto cookie, and the texture of the gelato was unappealing. It tasted like it had been melted and then re-frozen (you know, like when you forget to put your groceries away, and your Haagen-Das melts, but you stick it in the freezer anyway, and try to eat it later but it's all icky). Also, the mascarpone-caramel-brittle thing was too cold and hard, it only softened by the last two bites.
I really wanted to like this place, you guys. After I read all these wonderful reviews, I was really excited to bring my girlfriend here for dinner. But it was kind of yucky.
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In a city where Italian restaurants are more places than there should be, La Bocca gets much less attention than it deserves.
LBDV offers fresh pasta and wonderful sauce. Great Antipasti and creative desserts abound.
I am a big fan of the 2 gnocchi dishes and the veal scallopine. Additionally, never leave without ordering the Kiku (chantilly cream, cinnamon sauted apples, topped with sliced almonds and fresh berries served warm).
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This is one of my favorite restaurants in the area. I can't think of any complaints. Great food, atmosphere, and service. Reasonable prices. The desserts have been absolutely amazing every time I've been there.
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yesssir.
I am a huge fan of any cream sauce and homemade pasta cooked perfectly! I love to sit outside when it's warm. Neighborhoody. Order a pasta!
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First off, can I just say I think this restaurant was having an off night, but nonetheless, I am not returning.
We had reservations and were seated quickly, they seated us with bread and promptly took our drink orders and appetizer orders. All of these came out very quickly, I was impressed. We had the calamari, which was VERY good.
But
After our waitress brought us our appetizers and drinks, she never returned. In fact, she was kind of snotty. That's something that can really put me off quickly. Anyway, it took over an hour to get our food. From what I understand were not hard dishes to prepare (my friends had pasta dishes...without meat...and mine was a chicken dish with roasted potatoes). The dishes looked great when they came out, but sadly it was Less then desirable. My chicken was great, but you could tell all the dishes had been sitting for a while. My potatoes were hard and stuck together, and my friends pasta was sticking to the bottom of the plate, like it had been sitting under a heat lamp for too long.
I have heard such amazing things about this place, it makes me sad to say I will never ever return.
We went here on a day of pure unadulterated gluttonous bliss. Drank a ton of wine, ate a lot of food, and loved every second of it. The only thing I regret was the bill... : ) But it was way worth it.
My friend and I randomly stumbled upon this Italian delight one night when we decided to venture north to Lincoln Square. We couldn't have been happier to discover this amazing restaurant. It was packed on a Friday night but we had no trouble getting seated right away inside. I felt like it was very authentic (both the menu and even the staff). We had an incredible salad w/ apples and fresh mozzarella and we shared the rigatoni with eggplant which was done Al Dente style (my favorite). We didn't have room for dessert but when I go back next time I definitely want to try!
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I found this restaurant on Yelp and decided to check it out. It was on a weekday night, so we didn't have to wait for our table or anything. While the food was great, I found the service somewhat slow. And the restaurant was rather empty. We had calamari for an appetizer, which was excellent and not heavy at all. I had veal stuffed tortellini in chicken broth, which was something different than what I usually get in Italian restaurants. I usually get something with seafood. This restaurant has a good selection of seafood dishes. I would have ordered sea bass or Dover sole, but they were over 32-34 dollars. This restaurant isn't overdone- comfortable atmosphere, simple recipes, yet great food. I just wish our waiter had been more attentive.
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So, so delicious. Definitely call for a reservation though, because this place is always packed. It's very family-friendly, there were a lot of kids when we went.
After a fantastic meal, we ordered coffee and after tasting it my husband and I were both like, "oh this is delicious, and so familiar!" so we asked the server and she disclosed that the coffee they serve is Kirkland, Costco's house brand. We've been drinking Kirkland coffee at home ever since.
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I went there for the first time last Saturday night. The food was excellent, the service was mediocre. i had the Gnocchetti al Formaggi which I agree with others is excellent. I also split the bruschetta with a friend, and it was very fresh. The others got the starter salad and it didn't look all that exciting. We also tried to order two desserts, but they were out of several things. I loved the atmosphere and food was amazing.
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I wanted to like this place so much. It is right next to one of my favorite places in Chicago (Davis Theater), so it would have been amazing to find a gem of an Italian restaurant right there as well, but no. We sat outside (it's summer), It took our waitress 10 minutes to take our drink and bruschetta orders. Then took another 40 minutes to actually get our Bruschetta. The people that sat next to us not only were seated after us, but also got their entire meal before we got our Bruschetta!!!! The server was not apologetic at all about the problems with our order (she forgot to turn our ticket in). She told us the machine must have lost it, and she didn't check on our food.
When our Bruscetta finally came, the tomatoes looked like they had seen better days- they were dry and completely tasteless. When we finally got our main course