Savute's Italian Ristorante — Restaurant in Wichita

My son was craving pasta and wanted to try a place we've never been before. I read the reviews and decided to try it out. Well, I'm quite surprised at the high rating of this place. It must be mostly from older, loyal customers whose tastebuds are shot. As a matter of fact, 90% of the restaurant patrons were elderly people.

The first thing I noticed when we pulled up was Frank Sinatra's 'Come Fly with Me', playing on a speaker in the parking lot. Nice, so at least I thought...

The second thing I noticed, walking into the very farthest corner to be seated, was uneven flooring in there. There are lots of places to get tripped up from the front door to the back dining area. Now, I may be a little more aware of that because I have to lead a blind man around, but he did trip twice.

The tables were clean, but for some reason, the place just felt dirty. Maybe it's all the extremely old furniture and carpets, but it just felt dingy to me. Some of the pictures had dried food or something stuck on them. I don't think those pictures have been cleaned in decades, and it was not very appetizing to see.

Food: I ordered an Italian side salad, and I couldn't even finish it, it was so bland and absolutely drowning in whatever dressing it had, which had an overwhelming garlic flavor that just burned my taste buds instead of satisfying them. Soggy salad, yum. 😑 My son had a salad as well, the ranch dressing was delicious, but his was also drowning in the dressing.

I also got a cheeseburger without a bun, and although juicy with a nice char, it was absolutely flavorless. Also, it crumbled every time I tried to pick up a bite. Less than halfway through it, I realized I wasn't asked how I'd like my burger done, and what kind of cheese I would like. (Was there a choice?) I was served a well-done patty with orange plastic cheese that I ended up scraping off. I left a quarter of the burger on the plate because again, no flavor. We ordered a side of toasted ravioli, and that was pretty good. The onion rings had absolutely no crisp to them, and they were barely warm. Almost like they had been sitting around for a while under a heat lamp. My son decided on the fettuccine alfredo with grilled chicken. He said it was good, but it needed salt and lots of parmesan, because again it lacked much flavor.

Lastly, back to Frank Sinatra. They had this ONE song on repeat, so we heard 'Come Fly with Me' approximately 30 times. I really couldn't wait to leave.

The woman at the register wasn't very personable. No salutations, didn't ask us how our meal was, just very basic. Maybe she was just tired. I did hear her tell a guest who was leaving to be careful of the step going out the door. Sure enough, when I was leaving, I tripped on that MF step. Seems very irresponsible to me to have to tell people to be careful, why not just fix it???

I took the onion rings home, and I'll put them in my air fryer to see if I can crisp them up.

A positive: there was a little blonde boy there who greeted us on the way in, and on our way out told us to have a good evening. He was about 10, and he seemed like a very sweet young man. If he's the next generation of owners, hopefully, he can bring some modernization and flavor to Savute's. Cannot...

Amazing service. I don't normally see service this good. They were very accommodating of a rather large group on a Friday night. It is 75ish years old and I feel like this place needs to be experienced by any ICT foodie just for the history. Now why they didn't get 5 stars...the food and the atmosphere. I ordered spaghetti and sausage. It came with a salad. The salad was just iceburg lettuce with a glob of mayonnaise with a few blue cheese crumbs mixed in. Nothing wrong with it, just not impressive or blue cheesy. The spaghetti wasn't drained well enough, or the sauce had separated between the kitchen and the table. I'm not sure. The sauce also taste like it was made palatable for small children and old people who don't care for excitement in their food. It was almost too sweet. The table bread was interesting. It was loaves of white and rye bread with butter. Not what I'd expect at an Italian restaurant. Now the desert. They killed that. I saw several different offerings at our table and they were very well received. Also I will say this. For what you pay there is plenty of food. As for the atmosphere, most of my complaints are about the age of the building and the tables and chairs that are probably older than I am. The table I sat at was very wobbly. The lighting is inconsistent, with bright spots and dark corners. The building itself was almost a maze of rooms. My last beef with the atmosphere was the garlic salt shakers on the table. They were mismatched store brand spice bottles. I have never seen this before at a restaurant. I will be going back at some point but I will probably be going for the steak, as those...

A neighbor recommended Savute's, so we tried it out. First thing I noticed when I walked in the door is how old the building is. It looks and smells old.

Food was very generic. In writing this review, I'm comparing Savute's to other Italian restaurants in Wichita. I ordered the manicotti and it was nothing special. Pasta sleeves were pre formed and I think the cheese was straight ricotta and nothing else. Angelo's, back in it's heyday, had the best manicotti hands down, no argument. Second best was probly Olive Garden, but they don't offer manicotti anymore. My dish was also served with a meatball and a tomato. The tomato was good but I'm pretty sure the meatball was previously frozen.

My wife ordered a beef and spaghetti dish. She said the spaghetti was very bland but the beef was ok.

For desert, I had cheese cake and she had turtle cheese cake. In both cases, the cheese cake was frozen. As in, solid ice in the middle.

My wife and I both enjoy good Italian food, but this didn't do it for us. I can make better food at home, and I'm not Italian.

The service was very good. Our waitress didn't hover over us. She made sure we had what we needed and then left us alone.

This last part is more of a pet peeve... the lighting in Savute's is horrible. I can't stand a restaurant with bad lighting. The only light sources are compact flourescent bulbs attached to ceiling fans. I know the place has been there forever, but maybe hire an interior decorator to re vamp the place.

The only way I could recommend Savute's is if you live on the north end of Wichita and don't want to drive very far for...