La Parra Restaurant & Bar — Restaurant in Berwyn

After just one visit, this is easily my favorite Italian restaurant.

We had octopus, mussels, a pizza, a poblano pepper soup, and a side of linguini Alfredo with shrimp.

The octopus came first and blew us away. Octopus is always overcooked in the US. This is the first time I've every had really good octopus in the US. Perfectly cooked. Hot inside but not rubbery, just a bit crispy on the outside. Flavored fantastically. Served with a very good diced potato concoction which was just a little spicy.

The soup was really, really good. My daughter hadn't had a pepper-flavored soup before, and you know how young people take time to warm up to new foods. She just inhaled it. We had to rush to steal a taste from her.

The Alfredo linguini ordered for my daughter showed me what Alfredo should actually taste like. Ever have really good mac and cheese? (See my review for Chef Daddy's on Lake st.) It's just categorically better than run-of-the-mill mac and cheese. This is a similar situation. I never care for Alfredo -- It's tedious food. This was NOT tedious. I really liked it.

The mussels, like the octopus, were cooked such that they were not rubbery. They were not the best flavored mussels I have ever had, but they were really nicely done in terms of cooking.

The pizza was not US pizza. It's a lot closer to how you'd get one in Italy. Crust was thin, flat, and crispy/flaky. I generally prefer US pizza, but this was really, really good. I can tell you from eating leftovers this morning that it doesn't bear reheating at all, so eat every piece at the table when it's fresh.

Desert was a walnut(?) ice cream with a very alcoholic sauce. The ice cream was cut as a slab and icier than modern, standard US ice cream. I wonder if they make it themselves? Anyhow, it's not bob-standard US heavy-on-the-guar-gum/carrageenan ice cream. The sauce was poured at the table and set alight. There was still a huge amount of unburned alcohol in the sauce, which my daughter avoided and my wife enjoyed. I cleaned the plate.

Every single thing was cooked perfectly. The place was almost empty when we were there -- Friday around 5pm. Google shows it gets much busier later. They were very well-staffed at 5pm, and so I'd suggest going early. They have an outside dining area in back, though we ate in the inside area in front. The back was clearly the more popular space...

This is my first time leaving a review on a restaurant because that’s how terrible my experience was here last night for Mother’s Day. We have celebrated here every year for the last 3 years and unfortunately we will not be returning. I am recently pregnant again and we thought this would be a great way to celebrate. We had a reservation for 5 including my 3 year old at 730 pm. We were not seated until 8, which we understood it was busy. We sat down, our server Octavio was very nice. We ordered drinks and appetizers and received 2 out of 3 within 10 min. They forgot our 3rd appetizer and we didn’t receive that one until about 30 min after. At this point we had already ordered dinner. Three tables sat after us and they all received their entrees and we were still waiting. At this point it was around 940 pm and my son was tired. We brought it to our servers attention to which he knew there was something wrong. He went to the kitchen and came back and said 2 min. My husband and I have both been servers before. We knew either the kitchen missed it or it was never put in. The 2 min turned into about 10 more. We were all very upset and didn’t want the food anymore. A person who says they were manager came up to us, didn’t introduce himself and immediately aggressively blamed the delay on how busy Mothers Day was. He specifically stated you have to understand how busy Mother’s Day is. I told him absolutely not, explain why 3 tables who sat after us have already received their entrees before us. I have never experienced such an unpleasant and unprofessional person in a restaurant. He didn’t go ask the kitchen what had happened. I mean our server was more apologetic than he was. We stated we would not pay for the entrees but we would pay for our appetizers and drinks and he said you can’t have the entrees I can give you 50% off. I said no just give us our bill. He said no you’re done go. All in front of my child. I hope you can view your cameras and maybe give him a class on how to treat people because that was ridiculous. Instead of owning up to the error he denied it and blamed the occasion, as if we weren’t sitting there observing how everyone else around us is eating except us. We left without eating or food and our server came up to me and was so apologetic. He was more accepting...

My boyfriend and I often visit Chicago and when we were in town in July I spotted this place and added it to my list of places to try. Bad idea because when we were back in town in November we decided to try it out simply because the cocktails got my attention. A reservation was made for a weekday and I will start of by saying they have a very poor reservation system/management. We had a reservation for 7:30pm during for a party of 5. We ran a little late and good thing because our table wasn't even ready and we had to wait an additional 40 minutes in the outside seating area that was fill of others waiting for a table including people that had reservations. The cocktail and wine menus were brought out to us and it took a while for the server to take our order which we didn't even get until we were actually sitting at our indoor table. The Cooks/chefs had no mask or head wear such as net or hat. The furniture is was obviously bought used and is beat up with dirty upholstery. One of cooks was on Instagram and I know because I was able to see the Instagram posts he was showing some of the other staff. This restaurant and it clientele is obnoxiously loud and we couldn't even hear the server. The food itself was mediocre. I ordered the Chile relleno and beef tenderloin medallions which I asked to be cooked medium and each of the three pieces ended up cooked at different doneness. The plating was horrible and the chille relleno was coming apart before I cut into it. My boyfriend ordered the chicken saltimbocca and it was rubbery in texture and even looked like it wasn't fully cooked and lacked seasoning. Even then we didn't bother complaining about the chicken because we were just fed up with the entire experience. Unfortunately we will not be dining at this restaurant again and honestly the only thing that was worth going for was the cocktails, hence...