I dine at Cafe Amici upon every visit to Sarasota (every 2 weeks). It is by far the best restaurant in town with the freshest seafood and pastas. Tonight I ordered the fresh Octopus from Portugal as well as the Tomahawk Ribeye. Just amazing which motivated me to write this review. I’ve become more impressed with this restaurant upon each visit and highly recommend! Massimo is also an amazing host!

Great home-made pasta and gnocchi. The chicken milanese was perfect. I will definitely return. Top shelf liquor and great wine selection too.

Love it here the food is great and the service is fast and they have so much options, and Gigi was so nice.

Hidden gem in downtown dinning! Cafe Amici is awesome Italian restaurant! Food is truly brilliant, Russian speaking waitress provide excellent service! We be definitely back soon!! Beef short ribs with polenta is my absolute favorite meal! And guess what it’s only 26$!!!

Suburb ambiance, takes a long time for food but worth the wait. Super cosy. I got the special that was a stuffed pepper. It was more like a meatball on top of a deflated pepper but still wonderful! The real MVP was the espresso martini.

Food is amazing, hostess amazing, manager amazing. Unfortunately due to the behavior of one server, we walked out. I will say we have eaten here previously with no problems, and better yet, excellent service and food. We stopped in, they sat us promptly, we were there for desert and drinks only after enjoying a great holiday parade on main. Out waiter promptly appeared, and we began to order. 3 deserts, four drinks. There were 4 of us. The 4th person simply asked for a simple scoop of vanilla ice cream (understanding this was a true Italian place) and based on previous service the waiter would simply offer an alternative (sorbet flavors, etc. ) instead after after asking once, the waiter replied "ice cream is next door, go there" we kind of laughed it off figuring he would follow up with a "seriously though we have x, y, z" Instead, after we stopped joking about his initial response, WE said, no seriously, what options does our guest have. He replies " go next door". My wife and I apologized to our guests, promptly said this was not acceptable and we left our table. The extremely aware hostess saw us, politely inquired as to what was wrong, we explained, the manager stopped by, all exceedingly apologetic.. unfortunately to late. With so many options, just no point.

My group was there for dinner on a Saturday night. The place was packed but we were able to walk in and were seated quickly. Unfortunately the acoustics in the restaurant were awful. It was so loud just from the chatter of patrons we couldn’t hear each other talk. It hurt our ears. The food was good. I really enjoyed my eggplant parmigiana. 2 in our group ordered linguine with shrimp & crab. When they both alerted the waiter there seemed to be no crab in the dish, the owner came to the table and was a bit rude about it. He gave them some crab in a bowl to add to their dishes but clearly didn’t believe they were telling the truth. The desserts we saw looked delicious but due to the loud environment we declined to stay for dessert and went elsewhere. This place is clearly well-loved by locals and regular patrons as it did have the vibe of a favorite neighborhood spot and the bar was also full. If they could do some to sound-proofing to improve the acoustics, I’d go back. Recommendation: Get an outdoor table if possible or one in the other dining room away from the bar.

Love the atmosphere. Massimo and Achilles are wonderful hosts. Always so involved with their guests. I have dined here a couple of times and they make me feel like I am around friends.

5 stars across the board for service, ambience and taste. Great spot, we sat outside and enjoyed our dining experience thoroughly. I only gave 4 stars due to price, maybe it's just downtown Sarasota (quite possibly) but that was by far the most I've paid for 2 (for pasta).

Food was very good. Loved the Buratta appetizer. We ordered the Beef short ribs and the Bone in real chop....really tender. Staff was very friendly and knowledgeable. We sat outside on a gorgeous night. Definitely going back.

I recently visited this restaurant, and unfortunately, my experience was far from pleasant. The manager’s behavior was incredibly rude, making us feel unwelcome. It’s just not acceptable for a manager to act this way! We had considered having our wedding party here, but after this experience, I would NEVER come to this restaurant again. I’ll be advising all my friends to choose a different place to eat.

The lasagna was the best I've ever had; husband had the Branzino and he thought it was great. The calamari appetizer was very good but a bit on the salty side. My Hendricks gin and tonic was unusual - didn't really taste like a G&T, but can't quite figure out what it tasted like...

Sadly this Cafe is a shadow of its former vibrant self. This may reflect the pandemic related struggles so many places had and thus begin now to recover. I hope this will be the case.

Amazing food and wine selection! I highly recommend the Rigatoni Alla Norcina, and for dessert the Tiramisu. Service is also great!

One of the top places in downtown Sarasota area for authentic Italian food. Waiter completely ignored our mention for a birthday dessert last time we were there. But on the whole, service is good.

What a disappointment. I was here last night with a party of 8 to celebrate a friend’s birthday. They served me the wrong meal, although I didn’t realize it because I didn’t know what my correct meal was supposed to look like, except that I substituted vegetables instead of pasta. The meal they gave me had pasta and I assumed they didn’t make the substitution, as that has happened before at other restaurants. I began to eat it and then they brought out my correct meal. Turns out they’d served me my friend’s dinner by mistake. My date told the waiter he would pay for the second meal (the more expensive one which they’d brought late) and to please box it up for me to take home. The waiter said ok and boxed it up. My date had leftover food which he’d had boxed up. My friend received her meal, the same dish (bracciole) they gave me and we both agreed it was fairly tasteless. The meat was very tender but tiny and the sauce tasted like bland tomato paste. Nothing special and certainly not worth $33. The birthday boy’s girlfriend arrived early with a cake. She wanted them to bring the cake out whole so we could sing happy birthday and see the cake. Instead, they cut the cake into pieces and served us the slices of cake. At the end, they brought my date the check. They’d charged for both meals, the bracciole I didn’t want or like, and the osso bucco which had been boxed up. My date told the waiter he wasn’t paying for the meal served me in error. The waiter said, “But she ate it.” We said I ate it because I didn’t know something different was coming and it’s not my fault you served me the wrong meal. It took conversations with three people to fix the check. They took the osso bucco off the bill and he paid for the bracciole. They wanted me to return the osso bucco. I grabbed the plastic bag of food in front of me and handed it to him. The waiter came out later and accused me of trying to steal the osso bucco because I’d handed him my date’s leftover eggplant by mistake. I realized I’d put the osso bucco under the table because the table was packed full and there was no room for it. I handed him the osso bucco and said it was an accident. The waiter kept insisting I did it intentionally. My date said, “You made a mistake. We made a mistake.” Let me tell you, that server was a few cards short of a full deck. The only good thing was the location-atmosphere because we sat outside and had a front row seat for the holiday parade — no thanks to the restaurant itself. We agreed we would not come back to Cafe Amici, and the bill for our table alone must have been well over $400. In a world full of competition and choices, clearly Cafe Amici couldn’t care less about repeat business.

Every dish we had was amazing! The spinach Gorgonzola salad was delicious. I got the pear pasta and my boyfriend got the chicken milanese. Highly recommend the pear pasta if you like a combination of savory and sweet. The ambiance and service were excellent.

Absolute terrible quantities and server when questioned why one plate serving was smaller than the other just ignored and said that was normal. As a local bringing visitors we were shamed of our beautiful cities culinary restaurant. Luckily there are plenty of other restaurants downtown for next time we have family/visitors in town. Best advice for others reading this is to go some where else 👍🏻

Both the food and wine were wonderful. Portion size was very nice, not a huge pile of food. Very tasty and well presented. Service us excellent, attentive and friendly.

Had a poor experience here tonight - the place was so noisy that we could not speak to each other without yelling. The food was so garlic infused that we could not taste it. To be fair, our waiter was great and did his best to accommodate us and we tipped him out as such. But honestly the food was not good at all - tough, dry, over cooked, and covered up with sauce and garlic. As I write this I feel sick. $230.00 for indigestion and going home hungry and sick. The owner is nice and charming . The food, well you get it - we will never go back. We told the hostess on the way out but she was more concerned with her lipstick than out experience

We celebrated our wedding anniversary night at Cafe Amici 🇮🇹. I would recommend this restaurant, excellent food and service. Steak Fillet with peppercorn and layered potatoe with vegetables❣ wife had Braciole & Orecciette rolled steak and pasta 💕.

Cafe Amici was wonderful! Highly recommend the lasagna - it was delicious. Service was great and the atmosphere was very nice. My husband had the Linguine Alle Vongole and he loved it as well.

We had a great experience dining here on St Patrick’s Day. The best tomahawk steak that I have had in town. Excellent wine selection too. This is also a wonderful place to celebrate a special event. We had our own room with a dance floor and DJ! If I could add a video you could see the bicycle that you ride that blends a Margarita! It really works. Ask for the owner Massimo he’s a class act.

Fabulous place, amazing food and exceptional staff! Friday night no reservations and the place is packed. We walk in and they ask if we can wait just a few mins so they can set up a table for us , they quickly move some things around and before you know it we’re seated by the front window sipping some pino. Everything was just fantastic, I mean everything. Let’s talk bread, they make the most amazing bread I’ve found in FL since moving from Boston. The eggplant rollintini was as good as my mothers (she’s right off the boat from Italy) The salads just perfection and the 10oz strip steak special was so tender you would think you’re at a steakhouse. Cappuccino and dessert was a great way to cap off our fabulous dinner, and how could I forget Augusto our waiter, he is fantastic. This place will see us next time we’re in Sarasota.

PERFECT! One of the best restaurant experiences ever! We will be back soon. I dreamt about my meal the same night we ate there recently. The best Italian food I have ever eaten. Superb service. We were spoiled Saturday night! Highly recommend. Be sure to make a reservation.