Amaro Bistro

Always impressed by the food and stellar service. They rotate the menu so it’s always interesting to see what they will serve next. I really enjoyed the pork tenderloin, cooked perfectly and delicious side.

Went for a Birthday Dinner and was nicely surprised. Easy enough to find, ample parking in the garage behind the restaurant. A nice and inviting space inside with clean lines and nice simple décor. Wait staff was mostly prompt and did a good job. Food came out quickly and was very good, the Risotto special was with hangar steak, spinach, mushrooms, and garlic, it was rich but quite good. The staff accommodated the birthday surprise and made it worthwhile. We unfortunately had to skip out a bit earlier than expected, but everything was boxed up promptly and was easy to take home and enjoy later. Overall a good experience and a nice find. Would return if I am in the area again sometime, worth checking out. Great happy hour!

Awesome happy hour menu. Their brushetta is amazing. Large portions and strong drinks. Bartender was very polite and was chatting it up with some locals. I will definitely be returning when I’m in town.

The staff and food is always amazing! Chad runs the place smoothly. Everyone there always has a smile on their face and the food is top notch whether I am their for work during the week or out in the evening with my husband and friends. I have recommended the restaurant to colleagues, clients and friends and all have came back to say thank you. A true Gem to have in Bothell.

Worthwhile skipping.
We came here when McMenimin’s wait time for brunch was too long. Next time we’ll just wait. Brunch choices were a pretty boring affair, and my entrée was supposed to come with sausages — but didn’t. «We ran out, sorry». So pretty pricey for a couple eggs and some frozen potatoes.
Asked for cream with my coffee and waited twenty minutes for it before asking again. Coffee wasn’t refilled and I was there for over an hour.

Great service! I went there on a busy friday night, but our server was still very attentive and thoughtful. Overall, food was pretty good. I liked that their short ribs and salmon were tender and not dry. Their risotto was so bland and tasteless though. Tiramisu was just okay, but the ricotta cake was so nice and moist! However, they should probably source their ice cream from elsewhere because it was not creamy at all and reminded me of cheap wall’s ice cream…

Good prices and dishes for happy hours ($ 5)
The shrimp and mussel are really good. The squid is «rubbery»

Amaro is delicious! We’ve always had stellar service, I’m sorry to hear that other reviewers have not. We live upstairs so probably come every 2 weeks or so, and every time we’ve had a great experience. The waiters are friendly and attentive. They do get busy at night, especially with McMenamins opening next door, so you definitely need a reservation for a weekend dinner. Good wine, good wood-​fired pizza, good appetizers (try the Brussel sprouts!). Really, everything here that we’ve tried is good, but we always just order Italian.
Check out their brunch, it’s delicious and the restaurant is way less crowded. The Tuscan Toast and the Italian Baked Eggs are delish!

Edit: The general manager Chad reached me back assuring that this would be taken care of and would make sure this wouldn’t be happening again! I am adding two stars for the manager! Thank you for listening!
I just had the worst Restaraunt experience of my life! I came along with a bunch of friends for a birthday celebration!
At the end of the night I asked one of the server who was polite about my check and she said someone has already paid for it. There was this guy in the group who paid the entire bill but left no tip, which is a horrible thing to do! But there is a way to deal with situations like this. Another server came and slammed the check on the table saying this person hasn’t left any tip in-​spite of the fact that we took good care of you! Excuse me, you gotta be polite to a customer and not make them feel like shit! We definitely recognize that not tipping was not the right thing but then slamming the check on the table and then talking to customers like this is unheard of. At, this point another lady from a different table starts arguing with the support of another guy who was trying to muscle his way on us! She called the guy a jerk and said I had seen it all. Excuse me, I didn’t even know he had paid my bill! And then talking back to us. Moments later she says that she doesn’t work here which is even more shocking since no Restaraunt staff stopped her and she was sharing the table with one of the servers. She has no business to talk to us and tell us what we gotta do and her friend who looked very intimidating was getting aggressive on one of our friend! Our entire birthday night ended on such a bad note. As a customer, I recognize that you work hard and I will take care of you and reward the good work but don’t insult the customers!
We left tip in spite of this incident. I would have been totally happy to start with to take care of it if the server bought up this issue in a polite way and not call us jerks!

Maybe it was sleep deprivation, but I had to relearn two very important lessons last night:
1. ALWAYS ask where your salmon is from… Wild alaskan, yes please. Atlantic or farm raised, no thank you. Most likely, if the menu doesn’t flaunt that it is WILD ALASKAN… it’s farm raised.
2. When in doubt, order Italian food at an Italian restaurant
The salmon was terrible. I should have complained in the restaurant, but I thought I might have been full and was going to try it at home the next day. It was still terrible. The seafood broth it was in was overly fishy and the farro was too chewy. You would expect great salmon from PNW, and in fact, I have become accustom to it at all my favorite restaurants.
We also ordered the caprese salad and the bruschetta. Both were mediocre. The mozzarella cheese needed to be better selected. Also, the tomatoes were not fresh.
My husband ordered the short rib. That was decent; however, very fatty, which in the meat was not my favorite, but at least the polenta delivered some much needed taste.
At the end of the night, with no alcohol ordered, we walked away with a dissatisfying $ 100 bill. Service also left something to be desired. We waited too long for water. I ended up just asking for a glass and it was not kept full.

All I can say is that these guys must be killing in recent weeks with all the slop over from the new McMenamin’s place. I didn’t even know this place existed, mainly because it’s in that new apartment building in downtown Bothell. I have too much going on in Woodinville to get to Bothell! Just kidding… but my wife and I wanted to experience the whole McMenamin’s thing by staying the night last friday. See my review there about how bad our experience was. Anyway, even though we were spending the night, everything was like a 2 hour wait. We decided to wander over to the old part of Bothell and get into a restaurant and lo and behold this place was like 100 yards from McMenamin’s! We were hungry and we like Italian food so why not.
We had a great meal and our waiter was very attentive. The prices on the entrees were too out of line and we had the best beef carpaccio I’ve ever had. The pastas we both had were excellent and large. The wine list was really good and some affordable decent wines by the glass.
So, if you want some good Italian food with a nice ambiance, I highly recommend going here!
Also for all you people that can’t get into McMenamin’s, this is a great alternative instead of waiting for 2 hours…

This is a really really great place for brunch. I’m worried that absolutely nobody knows about it because I’ve been there twice but it’s been pretty much empty inside. I hope the brunch business picks up because I really hope they keep brunch service as the food is excellent as is the service.
I had the Amaro special and it’s excellent, my husband had a cheeseburger lettuce wrapped with a fried egg. Both were amazing.

My husband and I came here during restaurant week. The tables were fully reserved so we were seated at the ‘chefs table’ by the hostess, which is on a first come first serve basis. For the first 15 minutes, no one came to greet us and we didn’t know who our server was. After patiently waiting, I made the initiative to get another passing server’s attention who seemed to be training another server. Bit disappointing, especially since this is our first experience at this establishment.
There were two other servers who were not assigned to us, but made friendly conversations, refilled our beverages, and offered more bread on their own initiative. Thanks Michael and Katy for being accommodating and polite throughout the course of my meal. Almost deducted a star for our first impression, but the service and dining experience compensated the rating up to four stars.

This a new place that offers indoor and outdoor seating if weather permits. The interior is well decorated and has a modern and fresh look. The servers match with professional uniforms/​attire. They are generally friendly and welcoming. They also provide speedy but courteous service.
HH would be a great time to go check it out and try. Just know that you’ll have to order a drink in order to order food off the HH menu. I would say the pizzas are pretty decent while the pastas seem be a hit or a miss.
The food is not amazing but I think it’s still alright enough to go back. I’d say this a great place to take some to catch up and have a few drinks.
I would recommend this to anyone in the area especially if you’re looking for new place to try.

We came in around 9pm for late dinner and was immediately let down that we were an hour shy of happy hour.
Menu prices were higher than expected and the food was definitely what you’d expect of an italian bistro. We ordered safe and got the wood fired pizza (mushrooms and pep), a Ceasar salad and a appetizer shrimp dish. Everything was mediocre especially the unremarkable and forgettable pizza. Service was on point by the male bartender but the food was lackluster. We will probably give it another chance if we can make it for happy hour but otherwise pass.’

I enjoyed happy hour with a colleague here. From the looks of it downtown Bothell is undergoing change and urban development. This spot looks newish and a welcome addition to the area.
The happy hour food menu is extensive and affordable. The pizza and pasta was excellent but not authentic Italian. The happy hour drink menu is nice but not what you think of as «happy hour» prices.
Amaro Bistro is a great spot to wine and dine when in Bothell.

Amaro’s service + pacing is on point!
Our waiter was awesome –super friendly, welcoming, and knowledgeable about the restaurant. He introduced the SRW menu, as well as their regular menu. It was our first visit to Amaro, so he recommended the SRW menu, since the dishes offered basically showcased their restaurant.
We ordered from the SRW menu, and tried the cozze, polpette pizza, tortellini, maiale, tiramisu, and torta cioccolato. Both the appetizers were delish, and almost made me full. I normally don’t eat mussels, so I can’t make a good comparison, but I enjoyed Amaro’s. It went nicely with the white wine broth. The shell was surprisingly cold, but the mussels themselves were still heated. I also enjoyed both the entrees! The maiale/​pork was nicely tender. The tortellini wasn’t anything special, and the pesto didn’t stand out as much as I expected, but it was still a yummy dish. Very filling! As for dessert, the torte was decadent and rich. Although smaller than the tiramisu, it was definitely very heavy/​filling. The tiramisu was lighter, and moist.
Although the food was good, it didn’t really «wow» me. Worth a try for SRW, but I’m not sure about regular menu price. I was definitely more «wow’d» by the service and pace though! Each dish came out at the same time, and was quickly cleaned up after we finished. Utensils were changed out depending on the course, and we didn’t have to wait very long for the next course to be brought out. I think the entire dinner took about an hour. Very well-​paced!

I look forward to coming back here again sometime soon. Decided to try this place for lunch with some family visiting town. Great first impression. Solid flavors and portions, very good service, nice ambience.
I ordered the rigatoni Bolognese and I would recommend it to any red pasta sauce lovers. Good portion of meat, sauce wasn’t too dark, perfectly cooked noodles. I also tried other people’s foods, and they were all pretty good. Polpette pizza has sausage and peppers, chicken pesto pizza was also tasty. Nice pizza crust always results in a better pizza.
We got a side of fries out of curiosity, and they were perfectly fried and seasoned. The tomato aioli was a great ketchup dip alternative. Bistec sandwich was a good portion, and the French onion soup side was very flavorful. Tortellini was well cooked with a squash cream sauce. Mushroom risotto had cooked grapes and balsamic — cool.
Clearly one of the best restaurants in the Bothell/​Kenmore area. Prices are reasonable for lunch. $ 13-​$ 14 pastas and $ 9-​$ 10 personal pizzas or $ 14-​$ 15 for a large.

My husband and I wanted to try a new place to eat yesterday so we stopped in Amaro for lunch. We just had a baby and it was our first day of maternity leave together and our first outing with our new little one. In my head, after being cooped up at home for a week, I was hopeful for a 3 star experience.
We were happily greeted by Melissa who ended up being our server as well. She was incredibly friendly, fun, knowledgeable about the restaurant and the dishes and was excited about us having a great experience. With her help, we chose the steak sandwich, a chicken pizza… and beer!
Our food arrived and it only took one bite for us to go dannnng! That was some good food! Seriously. I can’t even tell you which one was better as they were both amazing. I don’t even like to share and I had no problem splitting both so I got the best of both worlds.
I don’t give 5 stars often but when I do, I look for most all criteria to be met. Good atmosphere, great service, excellent food and just a general feeling of wanting to go back. We absolutely will be back.
Just a shout out to Melissa who made our afternoon date that much more special. She is a doll and took fantastic care of us. Thanks!

My friend and I were looking forward to checking this place out ever since it opened up in downtown Bothell, and tried their happy hour this week. We went around 530pm and it was surprisingly packed! The happy hour menu looked pretty good with a variety of apps, pizzas and pastas, but a drink purchase is necessary (boo…) for happy hour pricing. I had pretty high expectations knowing its sister restaurant is Il Bistro, but I was quickly and sadly disappointed in the food. See photos for reference.
Clams and mussels — $ 5. I love clams and always look forward to trying them wherever I go but these totally (!!!) let me down. There was absolutely no taste or flavor to this dish! I guess you can tell even by looking at the picture that the clams and mussels are just in a clear broth with a few normally chopped up tomatoes. It looked and tasted boring. The clams and mussels themselves were on the small side too. I guess portion-​wise though, it was decent for the price. but I still wouldn’t recommend it. I think we left a clam or two to be taken away, and I NEVER do that!
Wild mushroom ravioli — $ 4 for 5 ravioli. The ravioli itself was okay/​not bad because the mushroom filling was actually tasty, BUT the cream sauce was bland and pretty much flavorless — sad. The chopped hazelnuts on top were nice though. Soo… half the dish was good, half was bad. Overall, still not good enough to get again.
Veal and lamb meatball with sweet peppers pizza — $ 7. This was okay (a little on the greasy side) and would be my «favorite» of the three things we tried IF I had to pick one. The toppings and cheese ratio was good and the veal/​lamb was pretty tasty. However, the crust wasn’t chewy or crispy, just weirdly soft. Meh. better than the rest of the food at least.
Ginger ale — $ 3. Full cup of ice, little soda turned into a sweet. watery drink.
Overall, my friend and I were quite underwhelmed by our experience at Amaro. The food was mostly tasteless and bland, and the service was minimal. Despite the great happy hour prices, we agreed it wouldn’t be worth it to go back :/