For as much hype that I had heard about Emporio, I was a little disappointed in my first visit.\n\nPros:\n- the food is excellent!  sauces tasty, meatballs flavorful and moist, sides surprising and delicious.\n\n- atmosphere is trendy and inviting.  \n\n- our server was friendly, helpful, and on her game.  reading some of the other reviews citing poor service - today was much better than \n\nCons:\n- i was disappointed by the size of the lunch entree.  i ordered the panini, with 2 meatballs.  it's literally half a sandwich, cut on a diagonal.  the meatballs are bigger than a golf ball, but not by much.  i think i was expecting Buca di Beppo size meatballs, because it's a meatball restaurant.  or at least a whole sandwich.  the dish of sauce that accompanies the meatballs was delicious, and there was enough to dip the sandwich in.  \n\n- maybe I'm too old, but i felt that it was too dark in the booth that we were seated in.\n\n- some of the waitstaff wore tshirts with the restaurant name on hem, but many others just seemed to wear whatever they wanted. I wasn't sure who was working there vs. not.  \n\n- though i liked the atmosphere, it's very similar to tenpenny, right around the corner.\n\ni'm giving this three stars, mostly due to the portion size of the panini being much smaller than I expected.