Sofia's Fine Italian Cuisine Restaurant — Restaurant in Springfield

Heed that I don't often eat Italian. It's actually my first time eating in an Italian restaurant.

Came for dinner. Sofia's had a good number of people eating and overheard a few Italian-Americans engrossed in deep discussion. Interior is simple and cozy with some dim, ambient lighting. Casual fine dining.

Service is great. Relaxed, smooth and attentive. The gentleman provided us ample time to peruse over the menu before coming over. He checked up on us twice, refilled our water and cleared the table without being obtrusive. When my dish arrived, he considerately asked if I would like some parmesan over it. For some reason I never thought to ask about cheese so that was really nice and made me really happy (I really like cheese...).

We were given complimentary sliced sesame seed bread and butter and a cup of vinagrette dressed sliced carrots. First was standard, not warm but still much better than supermarket bought bread. Latter I quite enjoyed, like it's been sitting in a pool of vinaigrette dressing to absorb the flavor. Not crunchy; soft but not mushy and still has some firmness.

Some pieces of the CALAMARI had light, thin breading, others slightly thicker. Not crisp enough for me personally. Actually tasted kind of like french fries. Squid slightly rubbery. What's nice is you're given a generous bowl of marinara sauce.

I decided to go classic: SPAGHETTI WITH HANDMADE MEATBALLS. Forgoed chicken fracese since handmade caught my eye. Made the right choice. Noodles were al dente and absorbed the sauce's flavor. Sauce wasn't too thick or too watery with bits of tomatoes. Meatballs big and moist with a hint of herbs found in every other bite. I liked it-- clean simplicity on a plate. Is it worth $17.95? Arguable. Still, hits the spot as leftovers.

Special of the night: chicken wrapped prosciutto with mushroom sauce and green beans and potatoes. What I liked was the strong mushroom flavor while the chicken itself was overcooked (a bit tough and dry). The former did not penetrate the latter.

I find questioning authenticity tricky and complex with the nature of history and (r)evolution. Context and perspectives of all levels are involved so I don't know if Sofia's is authentically Italian. I'm by no means well-versed or experienced in the cuisine but am still pressed to say both yes and no. Aspects of it are. At the very least it's authentic Italian-American. I lucked in on picking a dish Sofia does quite well. I'd give the spaghetti and meatballs 3.5 stars. The rest overall 3 stars-- not amazing but also not terrible....

My family and I came to this restaurant for the first time on a recommendation. The experience was nothing shy of HORRIBLE. From the unprofessional staff to the poor quality of food, the experience from start to finish was a fail. The head waiter or ( the boss) as he called himself, failed to tell us the filet mignon would take 1:30 ( that’s one hour and thirty minutes) to cook. This was communicated to us upon inquiring on the hold up with the food about :45 into wait time, the waiter simply answered with ‘it takes a while to cook the filet’. In my mind I’m thinking :45 minutes is ample time to cook a slab of meat, so an hr and a half is the total time it took to get our food from the time the order was placed. UNACCEPTABLE! Once we finally got our food my wife’s veal tasted like it had been just taken out of the freezer and cooked to a burn all temperature. It tasted soapy and charred. The pasta with sausage was decent, lobster ravioli was good as was the chicken parm. The restaurant had about 4 tables with guests at best during our time there, so it wasn’t like they were super busy. As a former business owner for almost 20 years, I have a clear understanding of things happening at times, perhaps unexpected and unforeseen , short staffed, or whatever the case may be. I’ll take it all day. This was clearly not the case, the wait staff were extremely unprofessional, careless, non communicative and non apologetic, the wait time was ridiculously long and the food was marginally edible on a few of the choices we picked, $427.00 for poor food is a pass. Glad we gave it a go but it’s certainly not a place I’ll be coming back to and will discourage anyone from going here if you’re looking for decent authentic Italian food. In summary, it’s BYOB and a $30 bowl of pasta along with bad service is what you’ll walk away from...

At the moment of seating the waiter throw the menus in the table like poker cards. Then a few minutes later the sliced cold bread arrived to our table. It was a little hard to eat but it was included. We had Fried Calamari for appetizer, that was good, fresh, well cooked. The sauce was unflavored, it was missing more garlic and herbs flavor. For main dishes we ordered Chicken Parmesan, it was good but the sauce was missing more flavor, salt and pepper. Chicken Francese, was not good. It had the intention but didn't became what it was supposed. Very week lemon flavor and needed more weight on the sauce. Also the dish came alone without any side pasta or vegetables. Penne alla Vodka, it was very good. Well cooked with a balanced flavor. Will just add more sauce to it. And finally, I got Pork with peppers, the flavor was very good but it has some parts that needed to be more cooked. But I guess it was because of the thickness of the cut. For dessert we have Italian Cheesecake and Chocolate Mousse Cake, the cakes were ok but the Italian Cheesecake can be much better. Because of the price and service I will give it a 3.5 - 3.9 stars. If they serve hot or warm bread, the waiters refine their manners, improve the details when serving, and improve the sauce they can have above 4 stars. We spend around $170 without any drinks (not...