La Zingara
La Zingara Trattoria
Chicago Suburbs - Arlington Heights
2300 E. Rand Rd, Arlington Heights, IL 60004
Phone: 847-398-3700
www.lazingaraitalian.com
Visited: December 2025, 5:15 PM
Reviewers: Andrea and Rich
Our Italian Credentials
We've been visiting Italy for nearly 40 years, enjoying hundreds of meals in every type of Italian restaurant. Most were good, a few truly great, and yes, a few were terrible. We've learned to appreciate an authentic Italian preparation style that's surprisingly rare in American "Italian-style" restaurants. Over the past year, we've dined at La Zingara five times, and we've never been disappointed.
The Place
Geographically, La Zingara is perfect suburban-typical: neatly tucked at the end of a strip mall with a pleasant entrance facing a large parking lot. The dining room itself is ordinary—adequate decoration keeps it from feeling bland, but you won't find elaborate artwork, dramatic lighting, or plush seating.
And that's perfectly fine. We're here for the food, not a spread in Architectural Digest.
While not a cozy setting, La Zingara does get right a familiar annoyance in many American restaurants— generous table spacing. You're not elbow-to-elbow with neighboring diners. This personal space is more common in Italy, where restaurant dining is woven into the cultural fabric. The room can be simple, and comfort and atmosphere contribute to a meal, but they still never take a backseat to the food.
When we arrived at 5:15 PM, only two other tables were occupied. By 6:30, the restaurant was nearly full.
The Food
Italian cuisine is among America's most popular, with a long tradition of southern Italian, red-sauce menus. Over the past 25 years, northern Italian and regional cuisines have become more common. La Zingara offers a good selection of both familiar favorites and less common dishes.
The food has consistently been excellent and properly prepared. This matters especially with pasta, where overcooking is all too common—but never here. After decades of Italian dining, we've learned what constitutes proper Italian preparation:
Pasta must be cooked al dente—with just enough bite and texture, never mushy.
Saucing is where most American Italian restaurants go wrong. Whether it's pasta, meat, or fish, the main ingredient often drowns in sauce. We go to a couple of other good Italian spots, but I have to specifically request half the normal sauce to approximate what would be considered generous in Italy. If you love sauce-heavy dishes, you'll be happy anywhere. We don't—sauce should complement, not overwhelm.
For this visit, I ordered the lobster ravioli. I'd given up on ravioli at most Italian restaurants due to overcooking and stingy portions. La Zingara gets it right: a generous serving of properly cooked ravioli. My only complaint? It's so good, I wished for one or two more pieces.
Andrea chose the veal Vesuvio—tender, nicely thin, perfectly cooked with just the right amount of sauce. Instead of the traditional Vesuvio potatoes, she substituted her favorite creamy mashed potatoes, which were excellent.
On previous visits, we've enjoyed chicken Parmesan, fish, and various pasta dishes. All have been consistently good.
Outstanding Value
Dinner entrées include a better-than-average bread basket and your choice of soup or salad—a genuine value.
This brings me to another Italian-authentic detail: the salad preparation. In Italy, you get an insalata mista (mixed salad)—not a chopped salad, not aggressively tossed, and definitely not drowning in dressing (which typically arrives on the side).
La Zingara's mixed salad features a mix of ingredients—lettuce, shaved carrots, cabbage—arranged like what you'd be served in Italy. This preparation reflects a thoughtful attempt to create a more authentic Italian dining experience. And the included salads rival the size of salads we've paid for separately elsewhere.
Andrea's lobster bisque was excellent.
We don't typically drink much—it's not part of our value equation—but we usually enjoy one glass of wine. Andrea selects the wine, and she's found reasonably priced wines at La Zingara that we liked enough to later buy at the wine store for home. The point: these weren't extravagant $20-per-glass selections, but reasonably priced wines that proved equally affordable at retail.
The Service
The staff is prompt and attentive, regularly circulating to refill water glasses, and more bread is quickly available. On a couple of occasions, servers were slightly over-enthusiastic with information and suggestions, but never to the point of disrupting the meal.
The Experience
The restaurant features a main dining room plus a second room off to the side. While we've never felt crowded, the space can become noisy when reasonably full—hard surfaces and minimal sound-absorbing elements in the décor.
We enjoyed an excellent, satisfying dinner with a glass of wine and two premium entrées (veal and lobster ravioli) for $75 before tax and tip. Not fast-food prices, certainly, but an exceptional meal at a more-than-competitive price point.
The Verdict
⭐ Food Quality: Excellent
💰 Value: Excellent
🕐 Early Bird Timing: Not crowded between 4:00-5:30 PM; fills up afterward
🔇 Atmosphere: Simple, reasonably comfortable; can be noisy when full
👍 Would Return: Absolutely—it's become one of our go-to spots for Italian food
Final Thoughts: La Zingara Trattoria delivers a better-than-typical authentic Italian preparation and genuine value in an unassuming suburban setting. If you prioritize food quality and proper technique over Instagram-worthy décor, this is your place.
