Nicola's Italian Restaurant And Catering — Restaurant in Town of Philipstown

Wife and I went 1/30/15. We hade a reservation and arrived a few minutes early. Hostess greeted us right away and with a warm manner. Seated us at a very comfortable table for 4. Waitress (Susan) was an absolute delight. Warm, friendly, and caring. Spoke to and took a genuine interest in my wife's shellfish allergy. Started off with a martini and glass of Cabernet. I had the clams casino appetizer which was outstanding. Next was the salad, Bread and garlic knots were placed on the table with olive oil. My wife had the chicken/bow tie pasta in a pesto sauce special and I had the veal & chicken alla Nicola (with red peppers, eggplant, ham, and mozzarella). Outstanding! 2 large medallions of each! Had 2 Peroni beers with dinner. For dessert: I had the Pistachio tortuffo (a sort of an Italian baked Alaska), cappuccino, and a Sambuca with coffee beans. The bill was less than $110. You decide if it was worth it. The food was outstanding and the service impeccable. We will be returning without doubt. The only complaint (minor): the gravy (no self-respecting Italian calls it "sauce" unless it's on a pizza) on my side dish was a bit on the sweet side. Not the end on the world. The atmosphere was comfortable and the noise level was minimum. The décor was modern but very old-school Italian. We live in Westchester but this place was well worth the ride. Can't wait to go back. When in Cold Spring or Garrison, stop in and give it a try. Very highly...

Less than mediocre. The food, no matter what you ordered, was watery and very salty. The waitress more or less told us what to order…we ordered one thing and she said, “No, you don’t want that.” Then the owner went from table to table greeting people. Seemed innocuous enough until she told us that she didn’t care if she got a bad review or not. She’s been in business 50 years so it didn’t matter if things were good or not. She even made a face when two of us told her what we ordered. Clearly they don’t seem to put much care into their cuisine or customers which was clearly obvious when I told our server that I am severely allergic to mushrooms and yet our food still had mushroom. When I asked both the server and the owner prior to eating it if there were mushrooms in the food they said they would check and never really got back to us. We had to wave down and ask the chef to confirm whether it was safe or not. Sadly, we chose to go here because of its proximity to Cold Spring, but clearly we should have dined in town instead. We were all very...

Fooled again by reviews. It saddens us that we won't be returning because we were quite unimpressed by the food, however, the wait staff were attentive and lovely. Meal started off with doughy flavorless garlic knots, and poor quality Italian bread. My husband & I shared the appetizer special, "fried ricotta cheese". Sounded interesting, but turned out to be a pile of mushy bread crumb coated cheese served atop greens & served with a side of marina sauce. Totally unimpressive. We then shared a sad looking salad of mixed greens, some shredded carrots, &1 small slice of tomatoe. Worst eggplant parmigian we've ever eaten. Didn't taste like eggplant, just tasted soggy breadcrumbs, covered with poor quality mozzarella cheese and sauce. Ziti was way overcooked. Portions average. Prices for that quality of food, overpriced. Place needs to be updated, however pretty clean. So disappointed with meal, we didn't want to add insult to injury by attempting desert. Unfortunately the food is repeating on me, so now I have to be doubly...