Maggiano's Little Italy — Restaurant in Chicago

This place has ruined my 2nd year anniversary. I booked a reservation here on Sunday September 1st 2024 around 2pm for a 6pm seating on my anniversary of the 2nd. I come to arrive at the restaurant 10 mins before my reservation like a good customer. Greeted by the host at the front who seemed to be judging me and my wife's age and stature. I tell the host that i have our dinner anniversary for 6pm. She tells us to wait for our table to be ready and i see her go over to a table and set it up for us by herself. The location was not packed at 5:50pm. I watched her for 10 mins go and fix our table while taking her sweet time and throw some very unnecessary confetti on the table as you can see in the picture before seating us. All of the silver wear and glasses were smudged and had water marks as if they were still dirty or barley clean and left in the sun. As seen in the photo. There were not that many customers other than us so we assumed we'd be served quicker on a non packed day. Multiple servers passed by us without acknowledging us or even being our main waiter or waitress for our dinner. Not even stop to serve us water while we wait. 3 parties come in after us around 6:10-6:17 and we have still been waiting in our seats for any waiter or waitress for almost 30 mins to take our order. Each of these parties are met with a waitress that take their orders and give them water. The last party was sat by the host who gave me a rude smirk as if we shouldn't be eating here. The table next to us was being served by an African American woman named which i heard by ear, (so i can be wrong), was tyna or tina and we were definitely in her section because she was serving all the tables around us. After she took the couples order next to our table she didn't even acknowledge us and walked away after seeing us sitting there for almost 30 mins. This ruined our dinner plans and we imminently got up to leave and the host saw us leave and said absolutely nothing to us as we left. She came with this attitude as if she was looking down at us because we are young and assumed we were not going to be able to pay the bill. Even though i most likely make more than she ever will be being a terrible host. Truly this places service is very ageist and needs to fire or teach their staff some manners for customers of all ages. Do not come here for any anniversaries if you want to have your time wasted and be embarrassed like a child. go to Il Porcellino down the street, trust...

Not worth the money.

We went on a monday evening last week, not crowded.

Initial service was slow. Drinks came out wrong. They tried to deliver our mains before apetizers, these orders were mixed.

When still eating the starters, waiter comes and insist to scoop the remaining part to smaller plates, so they can bring on the main courses. We were 6 people, 4 still eating. This was quite insulting in my opinion.

Of course, the main courses were the original one's, one can guess what pasta is when it's been on a plate for good period of time.

As a special low service quality example: We did not get the main course wine delivered, that we had ordered when placing orders. We specifically asked also it to be placed on a decanter when placing orders

My friend asked if they forget it? Prompt "no" was answer. Anyone who drinks wine, knows that expensive bottles are opened and tested on the table, then poured to decanter. Here waiter came back in 5 minutes, with half of wine in decanter, half still in the bottle, cork tapped back in. Wine was obviously just poured, halfway. If she told how it really was, we would have cancelled that wine, because now we got it half way of main course, without it having time to breathe.

Finally we tried to order some espressos, some as single, some double and with sambuca for some of us. Even this didn't go right but we just could only laugh about it.

I don't understand the 4-5 stars reviews, this place is...

This was indeed a wonderful experience on my very first visit. Coincidentally that was the first day of our server too. We were lucky to have her on our table because she was extra helpful, always smiling and totally exited about her first day.

Ambiance: we were almost 10 guys on our table, so most of the time we were the one who made chaos the most. Smooth background music, matching lights and interior decoration were the first thing to notice when you enter here.

Service: as I mentioned earlier, the service was the best, she checked with us several times if we are good, describing the food, helping choosing the menu and special beer. Even we got some free dishes that came with the item we ordered. She also bought some lemon cookies as desert. Ohh I loved it and gosh, I wish I remembered her name.

Food: least but the most important part. We ordered Lighter Take Baked Ziti and omg, it was delicious, it was so tasty, the Pomodoro sauce was so much inside the pasta, that you have come out to find yourself again and of course worth the money. We got Chicken and Spinach Manicotti as free to go.

Drink: they have nice collection of wine which I absolutely have no idea about. But I tasted to new beers as a part of my beer adventure.

Desert: the deserts did come from heaven I guess. We tasted Chocolate Zuccotto Cake, Double Chocolate Brownie and Vera's Lemon Cookies. The cake was the best desert I have ever had.

Total 5...