JC's Ristorante — Restaurant in Lyons Township

I think this is the 1st bad review I've ever made, and I'm sorry it's a small business as I like to support local businesses, but my experience today was so poor and absurd, I actually found it necessary to spread the word. 1st I'd like to compliment the place by saying the staff seemed nice and was very quick and polite. Also the salad I ordered was good. All the food I ordered was to go. I was ordering food to bring to my grandma's house so we could eat together. She lives close to the restaurant. In my order was 3 slices of tiramisu, and I'm glad out of the 3 people I brought tiramisu for I ate some 1st because it was SPOILED. Even after realizing it was sour I still tried another bite and smashed it around a bit to smell it to make absolute sure it had gone bad before I called the restaurant. They asked me to bring it back. Even after getting spoiled food and being asked to drive it back, I'm still understanding. It was the owner that was the issue. He said "the tiramisu might be spoiled now but it wasn't when it left his restaurant" I told him I was just there. He said "it must have been in the car to long" I told him I didn't go far at all. He then said that I was there at 11am I told him I was there past 4pm and I couldn't have been there any earlier because I had just got out of work. This conversation went on for a long time as he argued, luckily I had my receipt to prove that I was just there. I then after heard him ask the bartender when I left with food. She said "about a half hour ago" after this he asks me if I wanted new tiramisu from the same batch and yes he actually said that part "the same batch"(no of course I don't want more spoiled food) I told him I wasn't there because I wanted something from him, that I just wanted to inform the restaurant that there tiramisu was spoiled so they wouldn't get any one sick. He then told me they won't get sick and that the tiramisu was not spoiled, even though he was just arguing that it had spoiled within the time I picked it up. (Not that that was possible.) He then started eating the spoiled desert and said it was fine. He then after all of this offered to give me back the money I spent on the tiramisu. I accepted. Considering everything it was the least he could do. Even after he came back to tell me the funny taste could be from the bitter Chocolate its topped with. Even though the tiramisu' s cream layer was noticeably sour by taste and smell. I actually stayed very calm while the owner acted insane. Yelling at me and calling me a liar oh and somewhere in this encounter he actually did apologize to me but then persisted to argue and yell. As I was walking out he yelled something, I'm not sure what,but with how crazy he was acting I wouldn't doubt it was something towards me. So to summarize my review. I ordered food that was spoiled, and when in attempt to help out the restaurant, by letting them know without a fuss I got disrespected and Yelled at by the owner. And I'm sure if he responds to this review it'll be something nuts to validate the insanity I'm stating I experienced. And if by chance he is sound of mind, then he must of been drunk, because something was really not right with him. ( of course I won't be returning, and I encourage others not to as well) if I got spoiled food and the owners solution is to give me more of the same exact spoiled food from the same bin, I'd say eating there is probley a gamble as far as food...

This is a nice restaurant with huge plates of food. It was my first time here, but the people I came with have eaten at this location as well as the previous location in Crestwood for a few decades. They all love the food here and have their own favorites.

My rating is 3.5/5. This is mostly based on the food.

I ordered: French onion soup ($7) 4+/5 This was good. It's one of the better ones I've had and it came with a ton of cheese melted on top. That was the best part. The broth was flavorful as well. A lot of French onion soup can turn out too salty, and this was not that. This had a good balance of salt and sweet and savory. I will definitely order this again. Be warned: It is very filling because of all the cheese.

pasta & asparagus ($14) 3/5 I love veggies with pasta. My favorite has asparagus, tomatoes, onions with penne in a white wine, garlic, lemon sauce topped with parm. I tried to make that happen, by adding sun dried tomatoes to this dish. I usually love agliolio (garlic olive oil sauce, sometimes with red peppers), but this sauce tasted more like oil and black pepper. I was not expecting the black pepper. Red pepper is common, but I've only had black pepper in Cacio e Pepe. In any case, I took some extra Alfredo cream from my boyfriends dish and started dunking my linguini in it, and that was tasty. I probably won't order this again.

Of the other dishes I tasted: The Alfredo was the best. $13. 5/5. It's my boyfriends favorite Alfredo of any restaurant. His mom also ordered it, but added chicken. Both are huge dishes and well worth the price.

Regarding the wait staff: The lady who greeted and seated us was nice. Our waitress was also nice. The restaurant got slammed and you could see her running all over the place. I hope she was tipped well by other tables, because waitressing is a lot of work. It was nice to see the owner, Joe, walking around and greeting tables. I love when people take pride in their work/the restaurants they own.

This place has two bars with seating areas and then large spaces filled with tables.

Of note, the restrooms do not have a changing table, just in case you have little ones.

Will I be back? Yes. Will I get the same pasta, no. I want to try their tiramisu, get my own dish with Alfredo, and that...

I have to say I was bummed by our experience. First of all the restaurant is definitely not kid friendly we brought our toddler and there is not a kids menu which I found odd. There were also no crayons or coloring pages which can be helpful when dinning with a toddler. Our waitress gave recommendations for our toddler and one of the things she mentioned was chicken fingers. I was thinking a small order for my 2 year old... No it was a whole meal for $11.25. We got the bruschetta and mozzarella sticks for appetizers. The mozzarella sticks were cold but tasty. The bruschetta had flavorful bread but the cut of the tomatoes was huge. Which was a turn off My daughter loved the minestrone soup but again the vegetables inside were huge so I was mostly giving her broth and noodles. From then on it felt like our entrees took forever. We finally get our entrees and my husband got a fried shrimp basket. For $15 there were 5 pieces of shrimp. I got mine and what I what wanted was ailooilo with cut up chicken and the plate they gave me tasted spicy. It was my idea to go and it was what I had been craving. It took awhile for our server to come check on us and when she finally did my husband was already done eating along with my daughter. I told her about not liking the dish for being spicy and she got me a new one plain one but by that time I got it I could not eat it and had to box it up to go. It took her awhile to bring the remake and then it took her awhile to bring the check and boxes. When we got our bill it was $77 and we honestly felt the price did not match the experience. I had to leave early to take my two year old to the car and said bye thank you to the waitress and she never responded. We tipped her 15% but definitely felt like service could have been better. We would have understood if she had apologized for the wait or even if it was busy and it was happening but the restaurant was not packed. We had our daughter's birthday party here and really enjoyed it but this time definitely made us rethink choosing J.Cs for lunch. We would give it another chance in the future but for now we were not happy with the...