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Business & Tech

A Love Song to Il Fiore

Collingswood Foodies Jamie and Jessica Blanchard are in love with Il Fiore, and they don't care who knows it.

Come snow or rain or heat or gloom of night, the line outside Il Fiore on a Friday or Saturday night never wavers. 

Owner Landi Daku (who runs the restaurant along with his brother), is doing something very right—and draws the crowd to prove it. Of Collingswood’s myriad Italian eateries, we keep coming back to Il Fiore, and consider it one of our town’s most valuable and beloved.  

We'll get to the outstanding and affordable food momentarily, but the real standout in our opinion is the level of service provided. 

We’ve come to we measure the service of other restaurants by the standard set at Il Fiore as a rule. Even on the busiest of nights (and they do get busy), wait staff ensures your water glass is always full and food is served in a timely manner. 

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Moreover, they treat you like an esteemed guest. We’ve come to know this firsthand as we quickly became repeat visitors—so much so that they know us by name even if passing by on the street.

With so many Italian restaurants on Haddon Ave., how does their food stand up to the other offerings on the strip? Some may argue that Collingswood (and maybe South Jersey in general) is overrun by Italian fare. We agree that we’ve probably reached a happy limit, but each one offers something different. 

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Sapori’s Trattoria and Nunzio Ristorante Rustico set the scene for a special occasion. The Kitchen Consigliere is an excellent choice for traditional pasta dishes, and Villa Barone even sells fresh pizzas in its big oven. 

Il Fiore is the place to go for an everyday great meal. When it comes to value, service, and uncomplicated flavor, the restaurant can’t be beat. 

Menu

The menu includes a reasonable selection of salads and appetizers, pastas, chicken, veal, and seafood. They have daily specials, including a salad, soup, pasta, seafood, and pork or beef dish. Having eaten there for the past three years, we’ve tried almost everything on the menu, including the desserts.

For our latest visit, we started with the antipasti salad and sautéed mushrooms; the latter tastes delicious with the complimentary crusty bread. Sometimes they serve a mushroom soup (no cream) that is out of this world.

For entrees, Jamie consistently chooses the penne con piseli (penne in a savory vodka sauce with pancetta and peas). If there was one restaurant dish he had to eat for the rest of his life, it would probably be this. The portion is so large that we always box up half of it for the next day’s lunch.

For the sake of variety, this time he chose chicken parmesan (only offered on the lunch menu). Jessica had the mushroom risotto. Both were packed with flavor and, as usual, the portions were large enough to box up leftovers. 

Il Fiore food tastes like something your Italian grandparent would cook – simple, hearty, and flavorful. We skipped dessert this time, but can vouch for their homemade selection, especially the cannoli and tiramisu.

If our review sounds a bit like a love song to Il Fiore, maybe it is. We think they bring the best of the old-school family-run restaurant business to Collingswood—warm service, unpretentious food, and unbeatable value. 

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