Il Vicolo — Restaurant in Agrigento

We have been traveling all around Sicily and have had some great food and not so great but this restaurant stands out as Poor to us. I would not say the food was awful, however, my wife (a vegetarian) ordered the Linguini with shrimp and asparagus and when it arrived we were surprised to see micro shrimp not regular shrimp...but okay, it gave it a shrimp flavor, there was no asparagus. She thought perhaps they misunderstood or there was a language barrier. We were the first patrons of the evening to be seated by, who we believed to be the Manager or owner...he's the one that yells out "Prego!" on the street in front of the place, attempting to draw in customers. He is also the person that took our order.

After my wife and I sifted through the linguini looking for the asparagus, to no avail, we got his attention and told him my wife had ordered the meal with asparagus. He said there is asparagus in it...with her fork, my wife moved the noodles around asking where it was. He pointed out a green speck and said here it is. We believed he was trying to say it was somehow blended into the sauce. He asked (we think) if she wanted to add some meat, to which my wife explained she is a vegetarian and would like some vegetables in it. He removed the plate from the table (only one fork-full gone) and returned to the kitchen only to not return with a "veggied" up version but to then walk back to the street to drum up more business. A few minutes later he returned to the table, as I had finished my meal and asked if we wanted anything else. I said No and he handed me the check.

Dummy me, I paid the check. My wife asked if her meal was on the check, as we were getting up to leave. I said it looked like it was (€12.00) so she walked back up to him and asked if he charged us for her meal, he said yes. She asked why because she didn't like it and didn't eat it. He just shrugged his shoulders. He handed the check and money, still in his hands, to her, she removed €10 and gave it back. He rolled his eyes and walked away. Amazing how a business owner will sacrafice a bad review for €10!

Now that I looked up their Review rating I see 2.7 stars is their average - NO CUSTOMER SERVICE WHAT-SO-EVER! Stay away from this place. There are too many great little street-side restaurants and cafés than to waste your time here!

Best of luck and...

The food we ordered was enjoyable, but unfortunately the service from the waiter we go was pretty bad, which adversely affected our meal/experience. He was fixated on choosing our wine for us and when we asked to choose our own he became seemingly insulted, so became rude and pouty the rest of the night. We basically had to fight him to order a wine we wanted to try...he even tried to bring out a different wine AFTER we were pretty clear on which one we wanted (stating it was better than the one we wanted), and when we said no, he became even more rude and obnoxious. Maybe he was having a bad night, or maybe he is just a terrible waiter - we don't know. We would recommend that the restaurant not have a wine list, if they aren't going to let customers choose wine! We would not go back, as there are many other great restaurants in the immediate area that are...

Honestly shocked how bad the reviews here are. Just ate there and it was great. Antipasti where tasty and something different then the same cheese sausage combos you get everywhere. Main courses where nothing but delicious. The meat was masterfully grilled, the pasta with mussels just too good. Service was fast, friendly and good. We never waited for anything but the main course more than five minutes, those came within in less than a minute to each other. Only strange thing was that the Tiramisu was shop bought and also frozen, which is not inherently bad, and fits the Charme of a family business which this place Certainly has. But 6€ for it.. Still - great experience, best food we had here. I don't know if our perception differs so much from other people's or if we were just lucky but I would definitely go...