Antonio’s Made in Italy

I was very disappointed in my meal tonight. I got the grouper special. It was a bad cut of fish plain and simple. The texture was horrible and it was tough. The waitress and service was great however. I may try one more time and get a simple pasta with red sauce. It is close to where I recently moved so I was hoping it would be great! :(It was also quite expensive.

Amazing food and incredibly nice staff! The restaurant is beautifully decorated. We got the mussels and clams for an app, the sauce was delicious. For dinner I got the Ribeye special, it was cooked to perfection! My boyfriend got Chicken Marsala and loved it. The sides were delicious as well. At the end of our meal being we were last to leave, we got to meet the owner Antonio, very nice man! Just amazing customer service! It’s a pleasure supporting this restaurant. We can’t wait to go back! It’s a MUST try!!! I think we’ve for sure found our new favorite spot.

Our family had a wonderful lunch at this quaint «country» Italian restaurant. The food was excellent, the service was exceptional, and the ambiance was welcoming. We will definitely return.

The Mozzarella might be made every day but it sure wasn’t the day we went.
The olive oil for «dipping» was almost as clear as water. They brought us something a little better when I asked.
Salty, salty, salty.

Our favorite place to eat during our winter stays in the area. Awesome food, homey atmosphere, and usually a meet and greet with Antonio. Can’t beat it!

Looking forward to more yummy Italian in 2016 at Antonio’s. Meant to post a review a few weeks ago after another great anniversary dinner: fresh caprese appetizer, stuffed veal chop and demonico steak entrees cooked just as we love them, decadent chocolate dessert.

Love this place. What a great find. The food was delicious. We had the tuna, gorgonzola salad and canoli for desert. Good wine selection and the atmosphere was very nice. The service was also very good. It’s a gem and we are sorry we are not living in Micanopy anymore or we’d be eating there more often.

I ate here with my folks on a drive back from Thanksgiving vacation in the panhandle.
Places like this are one in a million… reminds me much of Café Rel in Franklin, NC. Café Rel is an excellent restaurant run by a «legit» French-​trained chef… that’s attached to the Hot Spot gas station. A perfect blend of unassuming and hoighty-​toighty :)
I chose Antonio’s blindly, never been in the area, just based off Unilocal reviews, and they didn’t lead me astray. Like the whole experience, the service was a good blend of friendly and professional — it’s obvious they actually train their servers. The building is an old house that doesn’t look much from the road, but once inside the atmosphere is cozy. I got the house-​made Gnocchi, ermerrgerrrd. Melt-​in-​your-​mouth good. Folks’ dishes were also great, but my mom’s chicken/​ham dish wasn’t as good as the others. ¹⁰⁄₁₀ would eat here again.

Custom made an entrée for my Aunt due to dietary requirements. Food was excellent. A gem.

Like most others mentioned-​passed it on way to Univ. of FLA & also same name as my nephew so of course we were compelled to try it out. Excellent service, freshness of food was fab, lovely atmosphere. My parents are from Naples & super picky about restaurant Italian food so huge when they give a place 2 thumbs up!
Only negative was the bread-​barely warm & not cooked all the way through. Given the level of all of the food-​it was quite a disappointment.
Hope to be back next time in this area. Grazie Antonio!

Best food on the area. Friendly and great service. Highly recommended. It is absolutely authentic and delicious.

Antonio’s is an incredible restaurant to dine in! Their bruschetta is the most AMAZING bruschetta I have ever tasted in my life! Who knew that bread and tomatoes could taste so good. I’ve had two different dishes and they were both very delicious. We went the second time for our wedding anniversary and had an espresso which was good and the «chocolate cake with the gooey center». At first I thought it should have ice cream, but after that first bite I said no way, it’s perfect! The gooey center just melts in your mouth. Too good for words. We have also had the canolis which are yummy. To summarize, you can’t go wrong with any of the dishes here. Oh the soups are good too! Everything is good! Staff is friendly and if you decide to hang around outside after dinner then you might see the super sweet cats on the property that will come say hello.

This is a hidden gem. Best Italian food since I’ve been to Italy. Hands down the real deal. Thank you

We were driving from Micanopy to Ocala on 441 and made an unplanned stop at Antonio’s. After a glass of wine on the deck of Antonio’s pizza restaurant next door we had lunch at Antonio’s Made in Italy. It turned out to be a wonderful afternoon and fantastic meal. No doubt the best Italian we’ve found since moving to Gainesville a year ago. At the recommendation of Antonio’s wife, Arlene, I had the Gnocchi with pesto sauce. It was fantastic. My wife had the equally tasty chicken piccata. A highlight was getting to know Antonio and Arlene and hearing his story (gained his love for cooking from his grandmother as he was growing up on a small Italian island). We’ll be returning soon and often!

#Life is the best way to describe this hidden gem.
The lasagna was amazing, the bread was amazing, the tea was amazing, the Caesar salad with the smoked romaine was amazing, the bruschetta was amazing, the atmosphere was amazing, the music was amazing. I will be back!

Another great Friday at Antonio’s deli side. Check out the picture of Dale’s latest special, an amazing pizza with pancetta, spinach, diced tomatoes, roasted garlic a white base and Wisconsin cheese curds.

I had heard a great deal – all fully encouraging – of Antonio’s long before dining there today. A close friend says his parents eat there often when in the Gainesville area for UF football games despite all the restaurants in Gainesville itself and the reviews on Unilocal are overall very good. So I had very high hopes, and having dined at two of the best restaurants in Florida two days prior in Saint Augustine (the Floridian and the Ice Plant) my standards and expectations may have been too high. While I want to give Antonio’s a five-​star rating, I honestly cannot. It’s certainly «good» and probably quite authentic, but it’s not perfect and I noticed a few issues.
The space is charming, a word I rarely use for anything but the best term for this restaurant. It’s an old house converted to serve as the restaurant and located at what long was an antique market and now contains this old Cracker-​style house, a train depot that was moved to the site, and an old Texaco gas station. They have a deli in the train depot that’s open during the day and the restaurant; I’m not sure what their plans for the rest of the property are now. The restaurant’s interior is homey and appropriate for a family-​run Italian restaurant. It’s clear a lot of care and love went into this business.
As to the food, my salad was fine: it was clear all the ingredients were very fresh and the menu claims all are sourced locally when possible. I have no complaints over the salad. The gnocchi in a pesto cream sauce was a great concept and overall good, but both too salty and too sweet. The ingredients seemed top-​notch and the gnocchi were certainly homemade, but the sauce was just a bit too sweet, too salty, and even too creamy (though I know it ought to be creamy).
For Easter they has a special, traditional, Italian Easter panatone cake with lemon curd. The lemon curd was very good but the cake – which resembled a typical coffee cake though I have no doubts it was homemade and made as it should be made per tradition – didn’t impress me greatly.
The prices seem high: $ 22 for even a generous serving of gnocchi without any type of meat in a pesto cream sauce seems a bit steep. Obviously, they are running a fine dining establishment and that’s great, but all the prices for the pastas seemed high for what they were. The chicken and veal dishes appeared reasonably-​priced, however. Thus, the prices and the saltiness and sweetness of the sauce deduct a star from five down to four in my view.
All that said, the claim that Antonio’s is the best and most-​authentic Italian food in our region is quite possibly true. It’s only competition would probably be Manual’s or Amelia’s in downtown Gainesville. As to complaints some reviewers had of the remote location, I think it’s nice actually to have something of this caliber between Gainesville and Ocala and it probably gets plenty of business from both cities, as well as Micanopy which is for its size pretty affluent, too.

This is very likely a 5 star Italian restaurant in Ocala/​Gainesville. No offence to my swampy friends, but this is probably the best Italian food you can get in your area. However, for me, it was not a 5 star meal. Strong 4 to 4.5, but I can’t quite get myself to 5.
To start with the reasons I can’t go to 5 stars — first, it is in the middle of nowhere. You have to wonder why a man who is from an island off the coast of Italy only accessible by a 2.5 hour ferry ride would choose to bring his masterful cooking to here, unless he wanted to continue to be somewhere virtually inaccessible. If I remember what his wife told us, he owned restaurants on that island and in Milan, and he moved to America to open one in Micanopy? Really? Anyway, its in the middle of no where.
Second, I had Antonio’s Lasagna, which is something he is known for, and I went with that over my old reliable chicken parm. I have never ordered lasagna in a restaurant before — only made it myself — so this was a risk for me. And while I liked it — the sauce was fantastic — it was almost all pasta. Very little meat in it — except what was in the sauce — and not a tremendous amount of cheese. It was really good and I ate every bite and practically licked the plate clean, but it wasn’t the best Italian I have had.
Lets move on to why it comes really close to 5. First, while the location in nowhere is strange, it is a cute place. Built in an old big house, it is decorated beautifully and very intimate and romantic. The staff was fantastic — our server was awesome and attentive and highly knowledgeable and the owner’s wife greeted us and told us about her husband and closed the meal with some kind of lemon 190 proof everclear that was like sucking on a lemon candy.
The food was, again, excellent. Down to the bread service, everything was delicious. Speaking of the bread service — garlic knots. Wonderful delicious garlic knots. Besides the carbs, my girlfriend and I started with an order of mussels alla diavola — a huge bowl of mussels in a spicy tomato sauce — which was delicious. She ordered their eggplant parm and said it was the best she ever had. Have to admit, it was the best I ever had, but I’ve only ever tasted hers and once ate half of a friends eggplant parm before realizing I was eating his food. Story for another time.
I loved this meal. We had a great time catching up with an old friend of hers and the staff made the experience even better. I just can’t give it the fifth star, when 5 is reserved for the absolute best, and the lasagna wasn’t the best Italian I ever had. Still, if any of you University of Florida folk still have some teeth left and want a great romantic meal with that special someone who I assume would be your sister, you should absolutely come here.

Located on an almost deserted stretch of Highway 441 north of Macintosh, Antonio’s has settled into a nondescript yet funky little commercial village which is home to an auction and antique shops. We’ve passed it dozens of time on the way up to Gainesville and the plethora of good restaurants (and theatre) in that university town. Have even stopped in many times to the (now gone) little home made ice cream shop which probably failed because there is simply no traffic into the complex.
So we decided to give Antonio’s a try as we weren’t in the mood to go all the way to G’ville. And what a great decision that was! As can be seen by the high reviews here, this place is a find. (Honestly, we shouldn’t publicize it so it can be kept to ourselves!)
From the outside it looks like a typical cracker shack, sort of old Florida cottage style. But nicely maintained and sharp looking. Inside it is a gem. Felt like we were back in Tuscany (well, almost) and immediately felt comfortable, in that Italian sort of way, as if we were in a neighborhood bistro anywhere in Italy.
The wine list was small but excellent with many Italian and California vintages covering the low to middle price ranges with at least one $ 85 bottle at the high end. The menu is not extensive but adequate and varied. Our server emphasized that it would not be a problem to alter almost any menu item, especially in terms of accompaniments or, in a limited way, preparation. It sounded like Antonio himself does the lead cooking most, if not all, of the time.
We started by sharing the «signature» starter which was a mozzarella ball filled with a creamy ricotta and Parmesian mixture, with olive oil, balsamic vinegar and some olives. Different and superb. Dinners come with the traditional (American, not Italian) soup or salad. Between us we enjoyed the house salad with Antonio’s special dressing and the Pasta Fagiole soup which was the only somewhat low spot of the evening as it was overloaded with beans and could have used more seasoning, a lot more pasta and maybe some lentils.
For the main, I went for the special dish, swordfish under a marinara cum putanesca sauce. The steak was a large cut and there were plenty of capers and olives. Not being a spinach fan (the recommended side) I requested «anything pasta-​ish» and received perfectly prepared linguini under more of that fabulous sauce.
My partner had a fabulous dish of many large yet tender mussels with white wine sauce on a bed of fresh spinach, this vegetable being a requested gluten free alternative to the menu accompianment.
It didn’t stop there. Service was impeccable and Antonio himself appeared after kitchen activity had settled down to visit the tables and get the well deserved kudos.
Anyone reading this, stop by (call in a reservation!) and enjoy a very pleasant surprise. And sorry, Gainesville restaurants, expect a good reduction in our visits now that Antonio’s is nearby.

After a busy moving day in Gainesville our family took the scenic drive to Macintosh to have dinner here after reading great reviews
The atmosphere is superb as is the food
I ordered the eggplant — hold the cheese, it was perfectly fried eggplant cut lengthwise with a delightful light red sauce
My husband had the veal parmigiana my son veal Marsala — sauce was divine and the veal was thin and sautéed perfect his girlfriend had lasagne
We also had the fresh home made mozzarella and an order of clams/​mussels fra diablo
For dessert a very sweet and different tiramisu