Salvatore's Fresh Ristorante Italiano — Restaurant in Ozark

We have dined in at Salvatores once in 2024 and ordered to go there most recently in 2025. We also had them make a catering order for our wedding in 2022, so we have given them a pretty fair shot to prove themselves.

The time we dined in for late lunch was actually good. Service and food were both on point. Our wedding food was not great, under seasoned and somewhat bland. My wife makes excellent pasta, and you would not have been able to tell Salvatores was "homemade" pasta.

Our most recent experience is why we probably will never return. This was a to go order, but the issues we have are unrelated. For starters the menu pricing on their website is out of date, with some items being nearly double what is listed, and one item I tried to order, the pork chops, being unavailable entirely.. "they no longer make that".

I ended up ordering the Chicken Picatta, which I have had before and know is good. My wife built her own pasta dish with noodles, tomato sauce, meatballs and three vegetables. I also ended up getting a piece of cake because it looked good in the display case while I was waiting for our order to be ready when I went to pick it up. The total bill came out to $57, plus tip. My wife's dish was $24; for 3 medium sized meatballs (maybe 1.5-2oz) pasta, and veggies. It tasted very bland. Not enough salt or seasoning, aside from garlic. My picatta was $18 for a smallish piece of chicken (maybe 6-7oz. 8 if I'm being generous) and a small serving of pasta. It was good as expected. They gave us 4 pieces of OK bread as well.

The kicker came when I looked at the receipt when I got in the car and saw that I paid $9 for the piece of cake in the picture. The small salad fork is for scale. I saw someone walk out with a piece of cake at least twice as large as the one we received, which I would have been happy to pay that much for, but the price for that along with everything else is ridiculous. The cake was good, but not THAT good.

I understand that overhead to run any business has gotten more expensive over the last 4 years, but it's really hard to justify their pricing when it's nearly at fine dining level, while still having a mediocre atmosphere, mediocre food, and tiny portions. From what I have heard this place used to be top tier Italian, I hope they are able to return to that standard and remain...

I hate leaving critical reviews, especially at mom & pop type restaurants. The service was excellent and the atmosphere reminded me of the casual Italian family owned restaurants you'd find in upstate New York. Unfortunately, that was pretty much the only positive.

We came for the first time for a late dinner (8:00) on a recent Friday night, and the restaurant was surprisingly empty for a Friday night (this should have been a warning sign but I figured maybe Ozark locals don't eat later at night).

Our party of 6 enjoyed the calamari appetizer and bread and olive oil dip. We should have just made a meal of that so I could give Salvatore's a four or five-star review. However, we did not. Three of the men in our group ordered the KC strip--a HUGE mistake! (We can debate whether anyone should be ordering steak at an Italian restaurant, but it was on the menu so the men in our group couldn't resist the temptation.)

All three steaks were light gray and raw inside, as if the cook dipped the steaks briefly in boiling water before plating them. All 3 steaks had to be sent back to the kitchen two times to get them to a hot pink center. None of us think the steaks ever hit a hot skillet or broiler. It was weird! How hard is it to properly cook a steak?

We also ordered the lasagna and manicotti and we were disappointed. The pasta was clearly handmade and we were really looking forward to tasting that, but the tomato sauce was very heavy on the tomato paste and the pasta was absolutely drowning in the overpowering sauce, preventing us from tasting anything else.

The only person who enjoyed their dish was our gluten-free friend, who ordered shrimp scampi with zucchini spirals as her "pasta." She was pleased with her dish.

All in all, we were very disappointed with the food, except the GF shrimp scampi. My recommendation to the owners is to clean up your menu and get rid of at least half your dishes and learn to do a smaller menu really well. Fewer choices done really well is ALWAYS much better than a huge menu...

Very noisy. Especially whey they let babies scream and holler. Charged $2.50 for more bread which was just plane ol French bread, It was nothing special. I was about 1/2 way through my meal, and the young waitress asked me if I wanted desert. I told her I was not even through with my meal yet! She said I was rude for telling her to wait because I was not ready to make a decision! Then they showed up with to go boxes just moments later.

If I didn't know better... I think they were forcing us to to GO! They were just starting to get busy. I guess they really wanted the table! Wait staff was probably being forced by the manager to get folks to leave.

That is just poor management. Force your diners to leave because you want to turn the table.

After I told the waitress that I may want desert and she called me rude, she disappeared, and other wait staff was visiting the table. When we were finished with our meal, then they brought a box. The make waiter can with the box, and the little tray that had our bill was laying INSIDE OF THE OPEN BOX! I'm sure those little trays are sanitized at least twice a day (of course they aren't). Months and months of customers touching them, and it was laying in the box where I was going to put my food! How can you be so DENSE to do something like that? I had wicked chicken parm. It was just ok. Pretty bland. Was all stuck together before I was done so I left the pasta and took the chicken home. The cats just love chicken, so that is what will happen to that because of the credit card tray in my take home box. This place was really good several years ago. But its changed hands quite a few times. Lots of help wanted sign in the front window.

All of the staff looked like high school kids with little to no experience in food service.

If your looking for good Italian food, find someplace different to go. There is a really nice professionally run Italian...