Coco Pazzo — Restaurant in Chicago

"Wonderful Wedding Held Here!!"

My daughter had her wedding here with 110 people on a Saturday in October. We didn't anticipate people arriving an hour early to the restaurant. We were so impressed with Coco Pazzo that instead of having the door locked, people were welcomed inside and served drinks by the staff. There was valet parking and the restaurant even took care of having a dance floor installed for the evening. A string quartet performed during the cocktail hour and through dinner and after dinner there was a DJ tucked away in a little corner.

From the very beginning we worked with Christina at Coco Pazzo and she made the planning and the whole process easy. She ended up being like a wedding planner and took so much of the stress off of myself and the bride. She was on top of things and put together the most perfect wedding for us. We could not have been happier with the outcome. A local florist from Indiana decorated the restaurant with flowers and my daughter's decorations were put around beautifully.

The food and wine tasting at Coco Pazzo was a wonderful experience and Chef Federico came up with a fabulous menu. Unfortunately the groom was not able to attend the tasting so the bride brought mom and dad along. The Chef overwhelmed us with appetizers, antipasti, main courses and desserts. Everything was absolutely delicious and we were full before the main courses arrived. The quality of the food and service here was impeccable and the staff went out of their way to make sure everything was as the bride and groom expected.

Guests were served mouth watering appetizers and drinks during the cocktail hour. After the beautiful ceremony in the restaurant guests took their seats to enjoy a wonderful multi course meal.

Roberto, the General Manager, was very accommodating and helped to make sure that everything ran smoothly along with Christina. He was also instrumental in the excellent selection of wines for the evening. The waiters, waitresses and bartenders all did a fantastic job the entire evening. There was nothing we would do differently. Guests bragged for weeks afterwards about the fabulous meal and time they had at the wedding! I had guests tell me the wait staff made them feel "special." The evening was spectacular!

Wonderful Chef, wonderful staff, wonderful food, wonderful...

Torchio -our haven for reliably sublime fresh pasta- was closed on Mondays so we looked for a decent Italian restaurant nearby, and found Coco Pazzo. It was on almost all 'top 3 Italian restaurants in Chicago' lists, and the food looked excellent, so we thought we'd give it a try. Service was excellent and timely, with our meals being prepared and delivered with perfect timing. Starting with the appetizers, my chicken liver pate was excellent. Super smooth and endulging, and came with sweet pickled and soft grilled onions which complemented it nicely. I only wish it had more crostini. Even if I very very generously spread the pate onto the 4 provided crostinis, I had more than half the jar left. They need to double the number of crostini it comes with. As for my wife's grilled octopus appetizer, wow. My mind was blown. Octopus is very tricky to cook, and even in Portugal some smaller places will fail to get rid of all the chewiness, but here, the Octopus was crisp on the outside, melt in your mouth soft on the inside. Just perfectly cooked. For the main dish, I went for the squid ink seafood pasta, which tasted very fresh and subtle, with no extra favors diluting the taste of seafood it came with. It was very relaxing to eat, and I only wish the fresh pasta was a little thicker to have a little more bite to it. My wife went for the Branzino Al Forno. Again, very subtle, fresh, with a pure taste of fish but without the fishiness, with soft melt-in-your-mouth bites. Just perfect. We only felt bad that they took out a big chunk of meat off of it because they didn't want us picking out bones even though we were happy to do that if given the choice. Finally, my Pistachio Gelato was the only disappointment of the night. Artificially 'radioactive' green, with almost no real pistachio, heavy on the sugar, and not as creamy or endulging as Gelato is supposed to be, this homespun Gelato was a clear tier below any other pistachio Gelato we've had elsewhere e.g. Spacca Napoli or even Eataly. My wife loved her flourless chocolate cage and the cinnamon Gelato it came with. Stick to that if you're getting dessert. Overall, a lovely place and we can't wait to come back on a special occasion and have some properly made...

We had a party of 8 and let me preface by saying we should have dress a little nicer as we had a few people in t shirts and we also were waiting on two people.

The food was excellent which I hate it to take away from the review. The helpers with water, bread, etc were fantastic. Our waiter however was another story.

This is my first review on here as I usually don’t find the need but for this one I thought it was appropriate.

He comes and greets us as we tell him we are waiting for two more. The first 5 ordered drinks to start as I ordered a water and got a eye roll from him.

As we waited a little while for our guests to arrive we were trying to look over the menu and specials which he did not go over at all. He asked us and then when we said yes he literally just read them off the list with a bit of attitude. Not explaining but just reading word for word off the list.

When we agree on some appetizers he tells us that if we do not order something soon we will lose our table and we won’t get any food. Again I understand we were waiting on two people for 15-20 minutes but we weren’t just getting water and bread. We ordered appetizers and drinks. And it was such an attitude that we started to feel uncomfortable.

When the time came to order I ordered the ravioli but then saw the parpadelle and switched it literally the next second after I said ravioli. Upset that he had to scratch his order, he shook his head and rolled his eyes again.

He never came over and asked if how everything was tasting or if we needed anything.

For dessert he said you guys want the bill or dessert and took a big sign of relief when we said Bill.

I had money under my arms on the table waiting and without saying anything he proceeds to grab it from under my arm, count it in front of everyone, and says I will be back with change.

When he came to pick up the tip I did stop him and tell him how uncomfortable and unwelcome he made us feel. He got defensive and...