Amici — Restaurant in Springfield

A Night of Missed Opportunities at Amici

I recently had the opportunity to dine at Amici, a new restaurant I discovered while scrolling through Facebook. Despite the lack of a Facebook page, the restaurant did have a website, albeit one riddled with spelling and grammatical errors. These errors extended to the printed menu at the restaurant, featuring items such as "banked" chicken thighs and "dejon" mustard.

Despite these initial red flags, the five-course menu looked promising and the fact that it changes every two weeks added an element of intrigue. We decided to give it a try and made a reservation for 6:30 PM on a Wednesday.

Upon arrival, we were promptly seated, but it took a while for our server to arrive and explain the menu. The service seemed a bit disjointed, with our server appearing ready to walk away before we had the chance to order cocktails with our first course.

The restaurant was not overly crowded, with two servers managing five tables and a total of 17 customers. However, the service left much to be desired. Our cocktails, a Rosemary Old Fashion and an Italian Paloma, were delayed due to interruptions from the hostess desk phone. When they finally arrived, my Old Fashion was watered down and the tequila in my husband's drink was barely discernible.

The pacing of the meal was slow, with long waits between courses. The food itself was a mixed bag. An unidentified tough piece marred one appetizer, and my tomato bisque, served lukewarm, quickly turned cold. The pasta dishes were unremarkable, with unbalanced flavors.

By the time we were waiting for the fourth course, we had already been at the restaurant for an hour and a half. We decided to ask for our check and our server offered to box up the remaining courses. After paying for our meal, we waited another 15 minutes for our boxed food, but it never arrived. We decided to leave, only to be handed our to-go bags in the parking lot by our server.

Once home, we sampled the fourth course. The chicken thigh was surprisingly still somewhat warm, but it lacked flavor. The Italian rum cake for dessert was decent, although the trail mix sprinkled on top was an odd choice.

In summary, Amici has potential but fell short in execution. The service was slow and disjointed, and the food, while promising on paper, was disappointing in reality. For a five-course meal that costs close to $200 after tip and drinks, the experience was underwhelming. I cannot recommend Amici unless you're willing to spend a significant amount with very low...

*Everyone, please take the comment by the reviewer before me with a grain of salt. He only gives 5 star reviews to every single place he visits. I read his amazing review of this restaurant without realizing he just is a guy with a good camera that gives every place he visits 5 stars. I decided to go to amici because his pictures and review were convincing.

After my underwhelming experience tonight, I came back to Google to share my poor experience.

As a life long local of the 417, I would hate for y’all to be given false information about the quality of this restaurant. Don’t be tricked how I was.

I dined at Amici, hoping for an exquisite culinary journey with their five-course meal priced at $60 per person. However, my overall experience left me underwhelmed and wanting more.

Appetizer - A Lackluster Start

The appetizer is usually the course that sets the tone for the entire meal. Unfortunately, the salmon appetizer at Amici fell far short of expectations. It was unseasoned, bland, and ultimately, underwhelming. A high-quality restaurant should excite your taste buds from the very beginning, but this dish failed to do so. Furthermore, you don’t get but 1/3 the amount of bread pictured in the photos my the previous reviewer.

Service - Politeness Over Professionalism

Our waiter was indeed very polite, which is commendable. However, it seemed evident that some of the staff lacked proper training in hospitality as we felt rushed. This may be attributed to the restaurant being relatively new, and it's an area where improvement is needed.

Main Courses - A Redeeming Aspect

Thankfully, the main entrees managed to salvage some of the experience. They were very good, showcasing the culinary potential of Amici. However, it's essential to remember that first impressions matter immensely.

My main suggestion to Amici would be to revisit their first course. Charging $60 for a meal that begins with a meager sliver of salmon, a slice of mozzarella that could be from any supermarket, and a piece of cucumber feels like a missed opportunity. A memorable appetizer is the gateway to a remarkable dining experience, and it's an area where Amici could certainly improve.

Amici has potential, especially in their main courses, but they need to pay closer attention to the crucial element of their appetizers. With some refinement, they could provide a more consistent and delightful dining experience for...

My wife and I had dinner at Amici at 6 pm on Sept 13th. The owners, on their website talk about taking your time to enjoy a relaxing old-fashioned dinner; not being rushed in & out in an hour. We were done and gone by 7 pm.

First, you can’t truly relax because the seating is uncomfortable. Inexpensive Rattan-type chairs with a steep sloping back that provided no support. My wife, on the other side of the table was seated in an old wooden church-pew, with no cushions.

Secondly, the server, who was very nice, polite, and personable, asked us for our entire 5 course selection at the beginning; which we provided; thinking she would space out each course in a timely manner to allow us to enjoy our wine, digest the previous course, and enjoy some conversation. This did not happen; she delivered food as fast as we could eat it.

We considered asking the Server to slow-down our food delivery; but were afraid it would result in our food just sitting in the kitchen, getting cold, so we said nothing. I’d recommend not ordering anything ahead of when you want it.

The wine: OK, but nothing special. We tasted 3 and settled on a couple glasses of their House Pinot Grigio, and House Red.

The food: also nothing special, but presentation was fairly good. The big problem was that nothing was served hot; and only one course was warmer than room temperature.

We had the Prosciutto & Ricotta, which was okay, but far from the highest quality.

Mussels Italiano, were barely warm, but quite tasty and in a good marinara.

Cacio e Pepe, was a big disappointment. I had high hopes for their made-in-house pasta, but it was served at room temperature, with just a little pepper & parmigiano on top. No seasoning throughout the dish, so after eating the pasta on top, it was just cold, wet noodles underneath.

Tuscan Chicken was definitely the best thing we had with lots of flavor, and served warmer than anything else. Unfortunately it was very salty; so be aware of that.

Cannoli Bowl for desert was different, and very good.

The check, with 2 glasses each of House-wine, plus tax & tip was $199.34.

I’m sure we’ll give them a few months to work on fine tuning their offerings and hopefully add some seating comfort. I certainly wish them well because we love good...