Nick's Italian Restaurant — Restaurant in Pilot Point

We were SO excited to try Nick’s on New Year’s Eve since our friends had done nothing but rave about the place for quite a while. The place was cozy looking, and the staff was very friendly.

We start off with lovely-looking bread. I am a total bread-aholic, so I was eager to dive in….only to find it was very dry and tasteless. No problem!—there’s butter and butter makes everything taste good!—except this “butter” was either ancient, some type of wanna-be margarine spread or Crisco—whatever it was, it was plain AWFUL.

No worries---we’ll order some appetizers. We ordered the calamari (one of my favorites), and tried the stuffed mushrooms. We could not taste the crab or clams that were stuffed inside the mushrooms because there was so much of this “aristocrat” sauce slopped on the plate. And I mean, SLOPPED—it covered the entire plate and not just the small handful of mushroom caps. Well, there was also a lot of cheese—which is always good, so we finished it mainly because of that, no problem. The calamari—again, dry and tasteless and rather rubbery. Thankfully there was enough marinara sauce so we could finish that. Our friends had ordered fried mozzarella sticks and shared with us….AGAIN, dry, tasteless and rubbery.

Well, let’s get to the main course—my husband ordered the rib eye steak. OUR FRIENDS WARNED US TO CUT INTO OUR STEAK FIRST BECUASE MANY TIMES IN THE PAST THEY'VE BEEN THERE AND IT WASN"T COOKED. What? Spending $20 on a steak and you’re taking your chances that it’s even cooked right? All 4 people in our group who ordered the rib eye were cutting into their meat to check it first before eating it. Well, my husband cut into part of it and it seemed fine, so he ate it. (well, part of it.) My daughter had the kids pepperoni pizza—and I took a bite, and it seemed good--she was ok. I had the caprese salad as my main course—and the tomato was OLD. No worries—the mozzarella was definitely fresh, and the oil/vinegar was good so I dunked everything in there and ate my entire plate.

The restaurant wasn’t too crowded or empty—it was in the middle—but service was SLOW…so, we finally able to pay and left. Getting into the car, my husband was ticked. He didn’t want to say anything in front of our friends who love this place, but half his steak wasn’t cooked—but he wasn’t going to say anything because service was so slow, he didn’t know when his food would come back, and he was hungry. And he had the same feelings that I had about the rest of the meal but like me, didn’t want to say anything since our friends really enjoy the place. We weren’t looking for a 5 star “dining experience”—just something decent or better.

Maybe we came on a bad night….clearly people love this place, but unfortunately...

I wish I had taken photos of the food! We had the Italian Sampler, Lasagna, and Chicken Festival which all came with a salad. The salad was swimming in a bland balsamic vinegar and did not seem like there were any spices or olive oil to bind it to the lettuce. It would have been much better if a more hearty and healthy lettuce had been used but I still ate half of it! The sampler was for my husband , who was having a very happy birthday, and he loved the tortellini most of all. Nick's has a pink sauce, which is a white sauce and a red sauce mixed, that is called the Aristocrat Sauce. The lasagna has a whole lot of ricotta cheese and could use more pasta layers, but that it purely my opinion. I have a need for strong herbs and complex sauces but even though the flavors are mild, it tasted good. My husband cleaned his plate! The Chicken Festival was also mild on flavor but the chicken was super tender, the penne pasta was cooked perfectly, and the sauce had perfect form and texture. It all came with spinwheel bread rolls and a garlic butter that when melted on the roll was delightful. The atmosphere at Nick's is a wonderful reminder of life before COVID and the laughter and family and people smiling was a warm hug to my heart. It is what stood out for me at Nick's. We sat right next to Mr. And Mrs Clause who volunteer their services in Tioga for charities, met a Methodist minister who also serves as an equine dentist, and met and chatted with a famous singer/songwriter and his enterouge. The wait staff was awesome! The staff seemed to be collective in not only serving the public, but also one another in order to keep fluidity in the restaurant. We ended the night with 2 squares of Tiramisu and had the pure pleasure of this local and world renowned singer sing happy birthday to my husband. He works hard for our family and at 60, sure deserved a great birthday night. It was perfect and we will be back for sure. Thank you Nick's for giving us a great memory served...

This place is just okay. Upon walking in, there is no clear host/hostess location. There is a counter in the far back of the main room, but luckily we ran into a waiter and I had to ask how we are supposed to be seated, picking table or wait for someone to seat us. He pointed to a table that was being cleaned off, so we sat down. There were several different people who helped us over the course of the meal, which was great, but when it was time to tip ot was a toss up as to who would get the tip or if it was split 3 or 4 ways. I ordered the veal parmigiana and and it barely fit on the plate, which made it hard to eat without spilling food onto the table. The plate was full of excess liquid and I had to literally pour it off the plate into another plate. The breading on the veal was completely soaked and coming off. The meat itself seemed gray in color with little or no flavor, the texture was slightly tough. I sent it back and management took it off my bill. They were very concerned and cordial, which I appreciated. The Lasagna was delicious and the pizza...