Johnny's Italian Steakhouse Eau Claire

Very welcoming, great service and the food was amazing. I had dinner here last night. The restaurant is located on the back of a Holiday Inn, but is anything but cheap. The ambiance is very nice, fine dining with many couples, very few families. I had the Filet Oscar and wish I had upsized to the 10 oz. because 6 oz. was not enough, it was that good. The soup, which was a pulled pork chili with a broth that was delicious. The salad was great too. They serve a light focaccia bread which I had never had before, but was pleasing to the palate.

Our Valentine 's date started off great. We sat at the bar and enjoyed a drink before our table was ready. Once we were seated at our table, our server was bubbly and nice. The popovers were delish, the appetizer was tasty, our soups were also good. Then, our entrees were delivered, and I ordered a drink from our waitress. My husband said his Chef Andy 's Cavatappi was decent. I ordered the 18 oz. bone-in ribeye and scallops with a side of asparagus with Bearnaise sauce. The ribeye was TOUGH, and trying to cut it with a butter knife (they don 't provide steak knives) had the table rockin '. My asparagus was bland and slightly undercooked. I am a slow eater, so it was about 25 minutes before I was done eating my entree, and still no drink. Our waitress finally came back to the table and listed off dessert options. I did order warm chocolate cake and asked if my drink was ready at the bar; she told me she would check. Some time later she came back and said they ran out of the mix used to make the cocktail and the bartender was mixing more up. I am not kidding, it was maybe 45 minutes after I ordered it that the drink finally came. Tables that were seated after us, that had a different waitress, were already leaving. At no point when she came back to update us on the drink, did she ever apologize for the delay. In any regard, the warm chocolate cake was amazing. So, poor service and a tough steak at a steakhouse. If I could convince my husband to go back, I would totally have scallops as my main entree and the same dessert, but make sure we had a different waitress (I have her name on the receipt, but I 'm not going to post it here since maybe she was having a bad night, but I won 't chance having her as a waitress a 2nd time). A disappointing Valentine 's experience, for sure!

We were in town for a wedding and staying at the hotel. After the Friday night events, we stopped in for a nightcap. The bar was pretty full. On the far side, there were 2 open chairs. We asked a young waiter, Erik, if we could pass through the back of the bar, and he said we could. The bartender, Cody, told Erik we couldn't do that loud enough for me to hear. He wasn't nice about it and gave me a look. He never greeted us or smiled. We were then waited on by Nate. He also never greeted us or smiled. He made our drinks fast enough. My old fashion was okay. My husband's Manhattan was not. We have never seen a practically clear Manhattan( my pic makes it look darker). It also had very little flavor. We we questioned were told that it looked that way because of the ice. He also unkindly told us he could make it again, but it would be the same. We sat by where the wait staff dropped off the dirty barware. The bright spot in all of this was Erik and Don. When they came by, they smiled and engaged with us. We went back Saturday night with some family. Nate again waited on us. He was not any more friendly. The drinks again were just okay. We have been in before with a large family group and were treated very well. We had that expectation.

The appetizer beef Wellington was chewy and spinach artichoke dip bread was way too hard, cut the roof of our mouth. They brought out different bread which was good. Then said risotto was supposed to be hard when it 's cooked and continued to tell us that it was a presence we wanted when no risotto is supposed to be creamy . I wouldn 't come here if you except a good dinner but for drinks might be fun but risotto came out bad again twice and got stuff in teeth , they took off the risotto portion which is not right and no seasoning on pasta there number 5 special best pasta dish said the waitress and it was not

The Food was excellent, with a Classy atmosphere and attentive service. Steaks are good but we typically opt for the appetizers and pasta dishes. Derek