Vivo Italian Kitchen - Allentown

My daughter has wanted to come here for awhile, we came for dinner tonight and I have to say I have mixed emotions. We were seated promptly, waitress came out soon after and took our drinks, I ordered an alcoholic drink which took extremely long.....however I saw about 6-8 staff members around the bar just having a good old time! Finally got my drink and the scallops and bacon appetizer, which was a total fail. They tasted like they were microwaved. There were 6 scallops on the plate, between me and my daughter we ate one.....however the waitress just ignored it ! We then got our main course of gnocchi and marina and the chicken and crab vodka pasta, I will say it was piping hot!....which I love. Overall pasta was good. I left there feeling underwhelmed, seems like the staff just wants to hang out out more than respect and take care of their customers. We won't be back anytime soon!

Took my fiancé out dinner for our anniversary. The gentle men who got us a waiter was very pleasant as well as the young lady that escorted us upstairs to the dinning area. So far noting to complain about A young girl Sammy I believe her name was who was our waiter came to serve us my woman ordered cheese Tortellini and I ordered a simple spaghetti and meatballs dish. Weirdly enough when he stated our orders she just can went yeaaaaaah and a weird voice. Kinda strange anyways. The menu stated pasta dishes come with ether soup or salad but the waiter stated that would cost extra. Which is strange but anyways no salad or soup for us. The food arrives the portions were Mid but the Tortellini that my woman had was decent the spaghetti and meat balls on the other hand were not. The two meatballs were not only tiny but very dry the the sauce was watery and the Parmesan cheese they laid out for us was not real cheese that was ether Kraft or some super market store brand like great value. The meals did come with bread and that's was decent. Here is ware it gets strange the girl came back o take the plates away while we were still eating snacking the bread plate from Me as I was eating from it almost as they wanted us out of there as soon as possible she did not even ask if we were done. Who does that? But yeah that's my experience and I'll tell you it was rough never again.

Somewhat conflicted because I know why this place got great reviews for such a long time. It's a homey Italian restaurant... one where the chefs and waiters know the customers. It has that type of a vibe. Food is supposed to be good, which the earlier reviews state. Cocktails are supposed to be good too. It's a deceivingly large restaurant if you include the 2nd floor. I came with my cousins who've been here in the past as it's a family friendly restaurant. However at least from what they attested to the food and drinks didn't hit the same way. I've heard rumors that the restaurant is closing soon, hope that's not true. Long story short we got a reservation for 8pm on a Saturday. Generally late and then realized that the restaurant actually closes at 8:30pm. Seemed a bit odd to me, but that's ok. With that said, it made sense because it seemed like a couple servers were handling both floors of seats. They were clearly swamped. It took a while to get us seated at 8pm and then to order everything from food to drinks. Weird because our table was ready for like 10 minutes when we arrived. We arrived before 8 and left after 9:30 or so. Might as well break down what was given to us: Bread: actually pretty damn good Cocktails: We tried 3 different cocktails. One of them was a blueberry based cocktail. I think it was a bit too sweet. My cousin and I tried 2 of the holiday cocktails. I had the moscow mule which was alright, but the grinch cocktail was a bit too sweet too. Pizza: Solid. This was for the kids Pasta with Alfredo: Solid too. Also for the kids Bruschetta: Solid Gnocchi with Vodka sauce: We tweaked the gnocchi to make it with vodka sauce instead of marinara. We didn't really taste any vodka sauce. Maybe our server didn't catch our instructions or that the vodka sauce was diluted. A bit of a disappointment. Tortellini with Pesto Sauce: This was also tweaked too to add pesto sauce. This was pretty good honestly. To be quite honest, it seems like some of the staff are resigned to the fact that the place is closing. That's a shame. I wish I could give 4 stars again, but I don't think I'll have the opportunity to do so.

I have reserved for 5:00 for 5 people and before ordering told the waiter that we had to go at 6:00 a.m. I asked him if that was possible and he said yes. I also told him if someone in the party ordered something he knew would prepare to let us know and they would order something else. we ordered at 5:10. our salads were brought to us immediately. our meals arrived only 5:50. two people in our party asked for container to go immediately and took their lunch. the waiter was unapologetic and scarce. no offer to reduce bill or credit for return trip. if he was honest, we could have ordered salate and be gone in time. we have dined there in the past without problems, but we have certainly not thought that at 5:00 and one of the first tables sitting that we have to wait 40 minutes for our eating after ordering.

Here an excellent recommendation from our son. the only critic we have is that the dinners were hotter. except that everything was great