Amore Mio | Italian Bistro — Restaurant in Placerville

As locals of Placerville who frequent local restaurants and shops we were very excited to hear a new restaurant had opened, but very disappointed with our experience there. We saw our waiter twice. Once to order and once when he brought our bottle of wine. Otherwise all of our courses were brought out by bus girls. Who by the way were very pleasant. Our waiter never inquired if we were enjoying our dinner. We also observed two women walking around introducing themselves as owners to surrounding tables. Throughout our whole dining experience they never came over to our table to acknowledge us. We then observed every table receiving a free appetizer the owner or server would just bring it out, out of the blue saying it was on the house in thanks for there patronage and in return that they only ask for a nominal donation to the fire victims. It was a nice gesture and I would have donated. The point is that it was never brought out to us like everyone else. Apparently they did not appreciate our patronage. I ordered the crab fettuccine. Could not find one piece of crab in the sauce. Seemed like the sauce was only flavored with some kind of fish juice to give you the impression there was crab in it. We were looking forward to dessert. While we were dining we saw the owner walking around to the tables describing an assortment of desserts to guests on a tray. We waited a while after our dinner plates were pulled for someone to come to our table to offer us dessert and no one came around. So we asked the bus girl to see the dessert tray and she said we ran out of dessert. You would think the owner would have, maybe at this time, come to our table, introduced herself and let us know they were out. Since she was the one going around from table to table describing the desserts. Still never saw our waiter again. Even though he was there. Oh wait, I was wrong, we did see him again when he brought our check. Then when we put our card out to pay all of the sudden the owner came out of the wood works and swooped up our payment card real quick. Our bill was over 100 dollars for two people with average plate costing 15 dollars in this restaurant. We ordered appetizers, wine, higher priced entrees. We were completely ignored. I would think that being a new establishment the owner should acknowledge all guests that walk in the door. Locals are important to Placerville businesses . We are all not tourists that frequent shops and restaurants here. We are the ones that support you when the tourists go. It was just so strange for us that this is a small intimate restaurant and we spent more than most people there and we were totally ignored. It was almost a slap in the face how friendly the staff and owner were with everyone else and our presence didn't matter. We will give this restaurant one more try cause we truly do want to support local . Hopefully it will be a better experience and it will be another go to restaurant for us with friends and family that come to visit us in this beautiful...

I was fortunate enough to attend a dinner party hosted at Amore. It was my first ever visit to this Italian restaurant right on Main Street in downtown Placerville. It’s hidden in the back of the Creekside Plaza, access is from the Main Street gate.

The restaurant interior is smallish, with the tables seated really close to each other giving it a quaint cozy vibe. My dinner party sat in the back room. That too was a cozy situation. It’ll get loud in the dining room especially with a full house.

The owner is from Rome. Everything on the menu is from her recipes. We got to meet her and she provided us the option to have family style entrees. Which we took her up on the offer.

To start the meal, we received complimentary cubes of cheese and jam, and sliced warm bread with butter. Being lactose intolerant, I passed on the cheese. The bread was delicious. It was a rustic artisan bread served sliced and warm to the table with olive oil and balsamic vinegar. Yum!

The dinner party host ordered family style entrees of la semplice (mixed green salad), deep fried artichoke hearts with mascarpone and goat cheese, bruschetta. gnocchi in red sauce, lasagna, and creamy lemon chicken.

The salad was fresh and gorgeous. The deep fried artichoke was breaded with a crisp golden exterior and creamy decadent cheesy ooziness. Lactose intolerant me, geared up for the dinner by taking a lactase enzyme. So I did take a bite of the fried artichoke. Mmm. Bruschetta was divine, the bread was perfectly toasted and the balsamic vinegar was top notch packing a lot of flavor. The gnochhi came to the table as del norcino in a cream sauce with gorgonzola, mushroom, and bits fired crumbled sausage instead of red sauce. I took a few bites of this dish as well, the gnocchi was probably one of the best I’ve ever eaten. Perfect texture. The sauce was heavenly. The lasagna that was served in the smaller casserole serving dishes was baked to a perfect doneness with a broiled top crust. I sampled a bit of this as well. Yum! The one served in a deep dish casserole pan was under cooked and didn’t set quite yet. But it had all the right flavors. They normally cook the lasagna in the smaller pans. The chicken in the lemon chicken was a paillard style, pounded super thin. It was served in a thickish white sauce that had a nice flavor, not sure if it had any dairy...

Yesterday, my wife and I had the opportunity to visit this restaurant. The place is located a bit off the main street, hidden behind some shops. You can find it either by spotting the sign from the road or by typing “Italian Restaurant” into Google Maps. The restaurant itself is nestled in a picturesque corner and immediately impresses with its cozy atmosphere. It’s quite small but charming. You can tell the owners tried to fit in as many tables as possible, which unfortunately led to some of them being placed in areas that, in our opinion, were not ideal. It was quite uncomfortable to squeeze through the narrow spaces just to get to our table.

As for the service, we were quickly seated and served water right away. Unfortunately, that’s where the fast service ended, even though the restaurant wasn’t fully booked. This gave us time to look around and, unfortunately, we noticed that cleanliness didn’t seem to be a top priority. There was a lot of dust and cobwebs, and the glasses we were given were dirty with visible fingerprints. When the waitress asked if everything was okay, I told her about the dirty glass. She acknowledged it but never brought a replacement.

We ordered a Caprese salad, two desserts, and a bottle of Menabrea beer (if I’m not mistaken about the name). The salad wasn’t anything special—I wish the basil had been fresher and there had been a bit more balsamic vinegar to enhance the flavor. Perhaps that’s just their recipe, but unfortunately, there wasn’t much of a pleasant aftertaste.

As for the desserts, we enjoyed the tiramisu, but the second dessert clearly seemed like it had been sitting in the fridge for too long—it was tasteless and hard. We mentioned this to our server, and to her credit, she handled it very professionally and politely, apologized, and removed it from the bill.

We have mixed feelings about this place. On one hand, it was pleasant. On the other, there’s definitely room for improvement. Why did I give it five stars? Because I truly believe they care about what they’re doing and that it matters to them. Will we return? Yes—we’ll definitely come back to try...