Salvi’s Bistro

Given the price and atmosphere I believe this Resturant deserves a higher average rating than three stars. The food is good, wine prices are reasonable and the service was attentive without being intrusive. We’ll definitely be back.

We stopped here a month ago. Service was a little slow, Bread was wonderful and the Food was pretty traditional. Not a bad place to get Italian.

My recent visit to Salvi’s Dublin was a disappointment. The food was mediocre; the salmon piccata was definitely not worth $ 17, $ 10 would’ve been more appropriate. The lasagna was edible, but not much beyond that. Service was bad. The staff were slow and unprofessional at best, complaining constantly about each other and customers. One staff member loudly complained about a 25% tip left by a customer. Why they assumed they even deserved that is beyond me. I would not recommend Salvi’s Dublin.

Got a personal recommendation but should have listened to a Unilocal.Tired place with new owners who don’t get it. Caesar salad was drowned in dressing, deco is faded and web site was pushing Father’s Day in July!
There are better places in town.

The bread was good and the ice tea … but, everything beyond was terrible!
My daughter got the Spaghetti with Meatball — bland. I got the Steak Salad with the dressing on the side — didn’t even make it to the dressing — had to pick out all of the core from the generic lettuce which left nothing much. The steak was more of a pressed meat. I will never go back and I must say to all that are reading this review — don’t go and waste your hard earned money!!!
I want to give a 1 ½ * for the bread, tea and the waitress!

Let me start off my saying that I’ve been going to Savli’s for probably twenty years. My father was a general manager back in the late 1980s and early 1990s before the chain went out of business. As soon as Ron Savli reopened the restaurant in Hilliard, my family went back to eating there.
Their move to Dublin was not a relocation but rather a closing and reopening by a franchisee. The new building and location is a step up from the Hilliard location, with a welcoming entryway and a great gas fireplace. There is a lot of space inside and the décor is rustic. It’s relatively dark, but not so dark that it’s a problem. Most of the décor is wooden and is overall a really welcoming place.
The staff was helpful most recently when they seated our party of 11. We were placed at a long table in the back of the restaurant right by a window into the kitchen. It was a great place to put a large party. I’m glad we made a reservation — they were on at least an hour wait for a party of four. I have never seen this location that busy on a Saturday night — a good sign!
The server was prompt with drinks… the first time. He introduced himself and another female server who were going to be taking care of our table. The bread and oil was already placed (great!) and the drinks came. The server took our appetizer order and then our dinner orders quickly thereafter. Being that all eleven people were on one check, I was impressed by this server. He was kicking ass!
And then he and the other waitress disappeared. Literally. No one at my table saw either one of them for at least half an hour. It took someone from my party finding the GM to get someone to refill the drinks. The person from my party was in no way, shape, or form polite about the delay. Suddenly we had both our servers and another one refilling drinks.
Our food came shortly after and mine was mediocre, though I can ‘t speak for anyone else. I got the chicken marsala with a plain Pasta Salvi, which I get every single time I’ve gone to Savli’s in the past ten years. It was not the best version of the dish I’ve had. It was evident my food has spent a significant amount of time under a heat lamp. The Pasta Salvi had gone from delicious and crunchy and just okay and chewy. Not a delicious combination. The marsala sauce and chicken were lukewarm but edible.
The service improved slightly through the rest of the meal and I could tell the waiter was really trying to do well. Once again, however, our waitress had disappeared. I never saw her again. When the bill came it was well over $ 175, which for a dinner of eleven people is reasonable. I was surprised, however, that no part of the dinner had been comped or discounted.
We weren’t trying to get anything comped and if I were the GM, I wouldn’t have wanted to comp anything at our table because of the person from our party who was upset, but the service was admittedly poor and barely improved. I do understand that the restaurant was very busy and there is physically only so much a server can do, so I’m very willing to cut the place some slack. As I said, it was the busiest I’ve ever seen the place.
If I were to rate this place based on our experience last night, two stars would be appropriate. But because I know what this place is capable of, I’ll give it three stars (though more like 3.5).

I’ve only eaten here for their sunday brunch. It’s hard to explain, but the brunch presentation makes it look like an above average spread that in actuality comes across as your average brunch fare. Their brunch roughly consists of scrambled eggs, bacon, sausage links, salad, fruit tray, macaroni, pies, pasta, baked fish and desserts. They also have an omelet station and prime rib. For me, the presentation of the brunch buffet doesn’t overshadow the lack in quality and the $ 19 price tag that comes with it.
The one item I really do enjoy on their brunch is their pasta salvi, a small baked pasta brick that is topped with marinara sauce. Nice little signature pasta item for them.
The new location on 161 is very log cabin, ski trip-​ish. That’s not a knock, I actually think it’s a step up from their old location.

Really don’t see anything special from this place.
Food was average and price a little high for Italian food. Both my wife and my orders were heavy. Flavors were basic and did not show any skill or creativity.
Don’t have a reason to go back.
Feeling is that this location will get new owners in a little bit (would make 3^rd in about as many years).

Salvi’s has run its course. They have managed to make absolutely everything on their menu as unhealthy as possible. I went there last week and probably will never go back again. The margarita pizza had about an inch of greasy yellow cheese on top. Gross. Their popular chicken Marsala was covered in a thick eggy sauce that added little more than tons of unnecessary fat and sodium to the dish. Next time I want Italian? You’ll find me down the way at either mezzo or moretti’s.

Went here to celebrate a birthday. Our server was outgoing, friendly and helpful. The menu offers a traditional italian faire and was quite filling. The restuarant tends to be quite dark inside with the darker woods and paneling, nice for a romantic place.
I have also been there for Sunday brunch as well. They offer a buffet of several brunch items and reasonably priced.

This place is pretty authentic to American I-​Talian. Meaning that most people will like it. The Salvis special pasta cake is a must try. You can get different sauces for it and you’ll agree it’s a bit on the heavy side. i had the veal, and the veal meat was kinda rough. It’s not like eating sand paper… but it wasn’t like eating butter either. The salad was good and service was fast. I’ll probably go back one more time for a more traditional pasta dish.

I tried this restaurant on Saturday night, after driving by and finding out that the Hilliard location had closed up. According to them, it’s a different franchisee at the new location, which leads into the first thing I discovered … the
coupons for the old location are no good for the new location. I’m glad I had asked about it before ordering, it was evident the waiter had been asked this before, but I was disheartened as to the fact there was not even a small sign on the door about it. I understand any more than that might be tacky for a place with a very nice interior, but it’s easy to see why people would think this was a «move», not a close and re-​open by a new franchisee, especially when the web site only shows one location!
Anyways, once we got that sorted out, my wife and I decided to split an entrée and get a kids meal for our child. Since it was our first time there, the waiter brought us out a sample of their Pasta Salvi, their specialty. I thought it was alright (nothing special), my wife didn’t like it at all. We then decided to go ahead and order their Filetti de Manzo, described as two beef tenderloins with sauteed mushrooms and onions on a demi glaze, since we could split it and each enjoy one.
The salad brought out was quite nice, still cool to get a big family style bowl of pasta even with just splitting one entrée, and it was pretty good. The bread was alright, nothing special but not bad either, same goes for their Olive Oil blend for dipping … the way it looks, you’re expecting some sort of peppery bite to it and it just never shows up.
The disappointing part was after that. The child’s platter came out, and the chicken fingers we ordered were hard as a brick, certainly not something we could cut up and easily feed to an 18-​month old. They did take it back and brought us the grilled chicken instead, and took it off the bill, so they did their best to recover on here.
The entrée for us? That has to be the most descriptive way to say you’re getting a Salisbury Steak in history, and it’s one of their more expensive items! The Pasta Salvi with it came with marianara and cheese we didn’t ask for (but they did take off the bill when we told them this, didn’t have them bring us new ones, no point), and that really didn’t help the taste of it because it removed the crunchiness that made me like it in the first place. The entrée was okay, but it’s just the thing where you’re expecting something a little more «wow» than fancy described salisbury steak.
While the food did take some time to come out, our waiter was doing his level best to take care of us, and no complaints there. I gave him a decent tip for his efforts. As noted by other reviewers, the interior is nice but is very dimly lit, if you didn’t see a ton of cars outside, you may not notice they’re actually open from the outside.
Overall, it just wasn’t anything special at all, and I have no real compelling reason to return as opposed to going to other local Italian eateries that I think offer much better food for the dollar. The place had been hyped up by people I know, so from that sense, I was disappointed, no doubt.

They only get a star because it wouldn’t let me post without it! Large group of heavy wine drinkers ($$) gathered for a holiday luncheon today and we had the rudest service (particularly by the manager). No return planned.
P. S. Field greens=iceberg

My family and I ate at the Thanksgiving buffet this past week. The food was very good especially given the buffet setup, and the service by our server, Caleb, was impeccable. I don’t think I ever had an empty glass. I agree with the others about the Pasta Salvi — a fried macaroni and cheese bite — they are amazing!
The reason I’m giving them two starts instead of four or five is the horrible management. We arrived at our reservation time of 4 and had to wait almost 20 minutes to be seated. Not a huge deal considering it was Thanksgiving day albeit a minor annoyance. However, as we waited the manager chewed out a customer for staying longer than their hour and a half reservation time. She went so far as to thank him for never being a customer again, and then continued to rant about him in a loud voice for several minutes after he left. I’d like to point out that I was never informed when making the reservation or on the confirmation call from the restaurant that the time was limited to an hour and a half.
There were five of us in our party, and we were enjoying the food and company and talking when the manager came out a exactly an hour and a half after out reservation time and told us that we’d need to finish up. We pointed out that they sat us 20 minutes late and that we were going to enjoy our desserts. Also at this point there were several — nearly a dozen — empty tables in the restaurant so seating other patrons shouldn’t have been a problem. Luckily, our amazing server, Caleb, saved the day and came to us a few minutes later an told us to take all the time we needed.
All in all with the good food and good service, I would consider going back. The only thing that makes me hesitant is the bad form of the management.

I’ve eaten here a half a dozen times because my bookclub meets here on occasion. They have a nice large round table that works well for the meeting. However, even with SPECIFIC reservations for the ’round table’ and being promised said round table, we’ve been seated at a long conglomeration of square tables pushed together before which really defeats the purpose.
I’ve never loved a single thing i’ve gotten there. All the food is mediocre, and most things are fried. The waitstaff is unattentive when i’ve gone (Wed or Thursday nights), and apathetic about mistakes/​taking too long for refills. The salad dressing is WAY too salty, and the sauces are nothing to write home about.

As soon as the waiter explained the Pasta Salvi to me, I knew this was a place that we would be coming back to. Deep fried pasta covered in cheese and meat sauce? If you can’t hang with that, then this isn’t the place for you. But for those of us who can, its amazing.
The food is great and the portions are big enough to take home leftovers for lunch the next day. One of the best Italian places in the city for sure.

I went in for the sunday brunch and my jaw dropped. The place is clean, the staff nice and the food spread looked as if it was meant for a royal family.
Waffles were the best I’ve ever had. Salmon, Prime Rib, baked pasta, omelets, right there next to staples like bacon sausage and eggs.
Will go back in a heartbeat.

For sure, the food here is good. However, this place has no regard for healthy eating in any stretch of the imagination. I would really appreciate it if at least something on the menu wasn’t deep fried. Yes, things that are deep fried are pretty good, but if my Pasta Saliva is deep friend, and my main dish is deep friend, and both are covered and cheese, well, you know where I’m going with this! Basically, if you want to have a heart attack before you turn 30 this is the place to be.
In my opinion, this place would be more more enjoyable if they had at least one or two menu items that were reasonably health conscience. Also, the portions are way too big, I usually feel sick every time I walk out of there. Sometimes less is more.

I came here again tonight for dinner. Had the Pasta Salvi for sure. Along with that, I had Italian Beef. It was pretty good. The waitress was top shelf. Her name was Kim.

This place is great for entertainment. Go on a weekend. This is going to sound cruel but I am telling you the buffet or whatever it is brings in an interesting crowd. I am not sure how some of these people fit in a single chair or reach the table if you catch my drift. You’ll find a corral of Little Rascals. I can see why though, they have a spread of dessert you would only expect to see in some movie dream sequence.
In my opinion, the only reason to go here is for the deep fried macaroni and cheese. It’s called Pasta Salvi. They take a rich macaroni with generous cheese and great seasoning. Then they chill it, cut it into cubes, bread it and deep fry it. Yes, you read that correctly. You can even get it with some red sauce ladeled over the top and a round of provolone cheese hugging it tightly like a sweater (this is called speciale, and I say toss in for this upgrade). The cube seems small but believe me, it will fill you up.
I first found out about this place when there was a BG Salvi’s at the Continent (back when the Continent was a hot spot. I know what you are thinking, but yes, it actually used to be a cool place.) My gf at the time worked there with a guy from Pretty Mighty Mighty. He seemed like a nice enough guy.
The décor isn’t great, the service isn’t the best, but five stars just for the Pasta Salvi Speciale. It’s a must have before you die.