Trattoria Il Panino, Boston

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This is a real cute, hole in the wall, laid back yet gourmet restaurant we ate lunch in on a Friday afternoon. The staff are all Italian and are friendly and helpful. Friends of mine had the crab and lobster ravioli, while I had their gnocchi. To drink, I had Birra Moretti, but friends of ours found out the hard way that they only serve alcoholic or carbonated drinks. Even water was only served carbonated, which was a bit strange. Nevertheless, the food was amazingly delicious (and authentically Italian). Prices were decent and decor was beautiful and simple. If you're looking for a tastefully casual Italian restaurant experience in Boston, I would definitely recommend this place!

Favorite Dish: I would not hestitate to order the Gnocchi Alla Sorrentina. They describe it on their menu as a mixture of potato dumpling, homemade mozzarella cheese, plum tomatoes and fresh basil. It was really, really, REALLY good. So good, I still have cravings for it to this day. No joke!

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This is the very famous Italian restaurant with a little garden seating area. It's very popular and hence the constant wait outside. It's so close to a few attractions on the Freedom Trail like North Church and Paul Revere's House so it's a convenient stop.

Favorite Dish: Well, the food is good, no question about it. It's pricey, and the service is at best OK, and sometimes gruff. There're a lot of seemingly good Italian restaurants around so you need to decide if this is worth the wait and the less-than-thrilling service.

What a mistake it was trying this place. While the hostess who stands on the street trying to lure (seduce??) customers into the restaurant seems nice, once you are seated, forgettaboutit, thats the end of the service we received. I asked for plain old tap water, and the waiter brings a bottle that mysteriously appeared on the bill, when i told him we wanted regular water. The wait for the bread was interminable, everyone around us seemed to get it before we did (and they sat down after us). Was the poor service because we didn't buy a bottle of wine? I ordered the Veal Milanese, a pretty simple dish that i use as a standard on which to base my opinion of a restaurant. It was overly salted to the point of being inedible. I would have sent it back, but the waiters ignored us. When i left most of the dish on my plate, no one asked me if there was anything wrong, a bus boy just swept the plate away without comment. My daughter ordered a pasta dish, which was nothing to speak of, not worth commenting on. She also didn't finish it because there was nothing to recommend it to her. But, it was all made up (joke) by the high prices and poor service (we had to wait an incredibly long time to order and even longer to receive the food) A total waste of time and money, poor service, inadequate food. The setting on the outside patio is nice, but doesn't make up for the negatives. Don't go there and waste your money.

Favorite Dish: None that i've had.

Okay, so I actually went into this restaurant because I liked the look of the menu. I had no idea that it was famous or that there were other off-shoots of it around town. Apparently, however, after reading reviews I realize that I went into the best of the bunch. This one is the "original" and to me it had the look of many small Italian trattorias that I have been to in Italy and Croatia. It was small and had more staff than guests and the atmosphere was charged and happy. The pricing was about average for the area, although it was a little higher than most Italian places of similar calibur.

Favorite Dish: I ordered the penne arrabiata. it was just spicy enough and the noodles were al dente as they should have been. I hate over-cooked noodles. The bread was fairly average and I would have liked to have had some olive oil instead of the pre-packaged butter that came with it. Over all, it was a nice lunch but I would probably try somewhere else next time, if just for variety's sake.