Del Rio Restaurant — Restaurant in Highwood

I was a huge fan of this place, for years. Did the owners change? I took a friend from out of town. We arrived about 8:30 PM. The place was about 30% full. I have never been there when it wasn't full. It was a Friday night. Manager sat at the bar and continued to drink his cocktail, a server took us to a table all the way to the back next to the bathroom. It took 10 minutes to get someone to take our drink order. I ordered the servers favorite wine, she didn't bring it, after 15 minutes my guest asked her about it, Ha Ha she said. Our salads were a few leafs of spinach, no blue cheese like normal, and very little dressing. The busser tried to take our salads 5 times! Finally my guest, who speaks Spanish said to him in Spanish, no thank you I am still eating it, which got a rather strange stare from the young man. So he asked him, do you speak Spanish, and the young man said yes he is Mexican, and then again reached for my friends salad plate! Sprimp Scampi is always great, and we odered it. The bread was stale, and we pointed that out to the waitress she said yes she knew that, it had been sitting out for hours! She offered to get us garlic bread. When she brought the garlic bread, she grabbed the scampi, and ran off with it! I am not kidding you, I had a piece of garlic bread in my hand and ready to dip into the goodness and it was gone! She ate it I know! She didnt return for about 15 minutes with our entrees eggplant parm and chicken catcatori. Eggplant tasted like it was fried yesterday, and the sauce was burnt on it, Chicken was mush and disgusting to be nice! We politely told her to ask the manager to come to the table to view our dishes after she agreed they were not eatable. He never showed up, but he did remove them from the bill. She blamed the chef who left early, this was a friday night people! We ordered a pizza from Italian Kitchen in Deerfield. THis place used to be great, it isn't anymore, it is horrible, and judging by the crowd on a Friday night the regulars have had the same bad experiences...

My good friend was very excited to try this place. She had been there years before and had a wonderful experience. We got there and we're seated immediately. It definitely has a 70s vibe to it, wood paneling and bathrooms that say "boys" and "girls:. We were Seated on the patio which was lovely. I was a little surprised to see that most of the wines were at least $60 which was fine, but sometimes you need to have other options. The owner immediately came out and started talking even though we hadn't seen each other and we're trying to have our own conversation. We finally decided on a bottle of wine, when the server brought it had already been opened and they just poured for us. I eat out a lot and have never had a situation where the wine wasn't opened at the table. We ordered muscles which were billed as without garlic, interesting for an Italian restaurant it was served with some pasta and the dish basically tasted like buttered noodles there were not a lot of muscles and they were overcooked. The ravioli four ways was good, but the dish was only room temperature when it came out. We then split the gnocchi which was very good and had the shrimp scampi which basically was shrimp that were over cooked swimming in a lot of butter and cheese. There was no other flavor except for that. Needless to say I will not be going back. With so many less expensive and better quality Italian restaurants there is simply no need. Some advice to the owner, it's probably a good idea to get the feel for your table before you start discussing politics and the problem with labor...

My parents and I came here to celebrate my dad's birthday. Plus it is one if our favorite restaurants in Highwood. A jazz band was playing various old cover songs and soundtracks that night. The decor is old fashioned, but it felt like I was visiting my great grandmother and great grandfather's home.

We each started off with a glass of wine and share two appetizers. You must check out their wine selection. Some date back to the 1800's and most bottles cost less than retail.

Appetizer: We had the butternut squash ravioli and the characterie board (grapes, cantaloupe, 3 types of cheese, 3 types of meats, mini toasts, and 2 spicy spreads).

The waitress was very nice and gave us extra portions, so it would feed three people. Normally the board feeds one to two people. She also kept checking in on us, filling our wine glasses, and even surprised my dad with a delicious flourless chocolate cake.

For dinner: I had the seafood rotini, which was excellent. The rotini pasta was in a light cream sauce with shrimp and scallops.

I will...