Sparrow Modern Italian — Restaurant in Edmond

We brought our mom here for her 71 birthday. Likely one of the worst experiences in dining we have had in Edmond. No parking-at 6pm. My mother had to park on a side street east of boulevard. There were less than 4 occupied tables in the restaurant when we arrived, so we were not sure why every parking space was full. We even witnessed a man on crutches create his own disabled parking spot 1/2 on the sidewalk to access the establishment. No lights were on in the restaurant at 6pm. We were using our cell phones to read the menus. We were asking questions about the wines and cocktails. Our server let us know a few times that she was under 21 and not educated on any of the wines or cocktail ingredients. We had to ask her to take our questions back to the bartender and relay the answers. We ordered drinks. Reminder- it’s our mother’s 71 birthday. All of us are well over 21, some over 50. 1/2 of our table was asked for ID to verify age. 1/2 of our table was not. 1 person at the table- over 50 years old, did not have his ID with him at the table. The manager refused to serve him - stating ABLE commission could come in and arrest him, fine him, or something else. Absolutely untrue. There is no law that states you must pisses an ID to drink in the state of Oklahoma. For those of us who ordered wine, we were not asked the option on size of pour we wanted. We just saw that the server had chosen the larger pour for each of us- which conveniently added quite a nice additional total to the bill. Our food was old, potentially by a few days. Cheese tasted not fresh and almost sour. The pepperoni on the “pizza tower” was definitely not fresh and was likely prepared the night before. Soggy when should have been crisp- and had an odd aftertaste lime it was spoiled. The manager- who now we know is the GM for the entire restaurant- was unconcerned with our experience. Several members of our party are unwell just hours after eating. We brought our concerns to the server and manager- quietly and respectfully- but those concerns were dismissed.

I’m sure this will be removed as were the other reviews we posted- but it’s important for the owners to see what is happening at their place of business.

We are all business owners in the community- and 2 members of our party actually own a successful restaurant themselves.

We support local businesses when we can, but based on tonight’s events, we will not choose to spend our time or money here again.

Many lessons to be learned by staff, management, and owners from this. They proved themselves too arrogant to pay attention or address situations...

We’ve visited many times over the past two years. The drinks and 100 layer lasagna are great! The service has however really declined so I doubt we will return. Usually we received excellent food and service in the past, but recently we were not happy with our experiences here. The night in question, our server was Becca, who was very nice, but seemed very confused at points during our meal.

When she greeted us initially I ordered a cocktail and my husband needed more time to order. She asked to check our ID’s, which we happily provided. We are in the Air Force and are stationed at Tinker, but are from Texas so had Texas drivers licenses. Our Texas licenses have never been a problem at Sparrow before, and we are both 25. Becca looked at our ID’s, was clearly confused, and said she thought they were ok. She gave them back. Several minutes later she came back to get my husbands order and he ordered wine. She proceeded to ask us if we were 21 and threatened to fine us each $3,000 if we were not 21. This confused me greatly because she literally had our licenses in her hand five minutes before. She said she did not know how to read a Texas ID. We said we were both 25. We offered to give our licenses to another employee, or to a manager, even including military ID’s along with the licenses and she said it was ok, but someone was going around checking. We insisted that was would rather just give our licenses to another manager instead of being accused of being underaged. She refused to bring over a manager so the whole thing was just uncomfortable. We have visited again since and found the staff still was not providing good service so I think we’re done...

Sparrow presents online as an upscale eatery featuring chef made, authentic Italian dishes of all sorts. My wife and got reservations here with some friends and ultimately we left the restaurant feeling severely disappointed and irritated that our two person experience cost over $120 with little to show for care or quality.

I’ll admit that I’m generally harsh on Italian restaurants, as their genre of cooking relies on fresh ingredients and time-intensive preparations. I’ve found that many restaurants use that as justification for high prices, while cutting corners at the same time.

At Sparrow, my table ordered arancini, which were served with blush sauce: those were passable. I found their chef special truffle risotto to be uninspired, bland, and lacking in both quality and quantity. I opted to add chicken to the dish, which was also bland and quite over cooked, and did not meet the standard I have for a $7 addition.

For dessert, our table shared the Italian ice cream cake among 4 people, which we all found to be quite nice.

It’s clear that this restaurant is catered to well-to-do Edmondites who assume that just because something is expensive means that it’s good, and if they don’t enjoy it, then they must not have a developed enough palette to understand.

We couldn’t find parking at the location, but we did find a spot on an adjacent street. The walk there was simple: over the drainage ditch and across the path; turn at the grease trap.

Overall I WOULD NOT recommend Sparrow to anyone looking for Italian food in Edmond. You could spend a lot less and get similar quality at the Olive Garden. If you want real Italian food,...