Columbus was once home to the largest Spaghetti Warehouse location in the U.S. Found just outside Downtown proper on West Broad Street, the expansive institution was a dark and cozy adventureland of eclectic finds. (More evidence of that here.) There was a trolley car, a barber chair, a fortune-telling machine…and a big parking lot. After 45 years of business, the Warehouse also had decaying shell that one day caved in.
Like novelist Thomas Wolfe once said, you can’t go home again. Well, of course you can go home to the old West Broad address, but you won’t find any spaghetti there.
(Whoops, breaking news.)
These days, you can instead check out the new Spaghetti Warehouse. It’s on the Columbus Commons. The Warehouse is no longer so huge and warehouse-like, it’s more contemporary with Downtown parking and its trolley concept is integrated into the restaurant’s architectural features that host booth seating.
What remains at the new spot is the spaghetti. The aforementioned facts are good starting points for developing dining expectations.
If you expect the dark wonderland from a couple decades ago, that is gone. If you expect a big suburban parking lot, you’re out of your mind. But if you expect throw-back American-Italian fare; maybe old-school spaghetti and soft garlic toast, well, you’ve come to the right place.
In this spirit, then, let’s start with one of the classics from dining scenes of yore: While a loaf of house bread will accompany a meal, it’s still worth ordering more in the form of something called Our Famous Garlic Cheese Bread ($7). This offering will thoroughly frustrate modern preferences that lean towards crusty, chewy and dipped in oil. Instead, it provides unapologetic slices of soft Vienna bread, coated edge-to-edge with a garlic-romano base, then topped with melty mozzarella and cheddar cheese.
It’s a cheese bread that will satisfy the guilty desires of a Midwestern palate.
There are other throw-backs in the appetizer section too. There’s a calamari offering, and also mozzarella cheese sticks. Alternately, you can start a meal with a soup or salad. That is where Italian Wedding ($8) soup comes in. An order yields the classic collection of meatballs and chicken with noodles and spinach. Plain-ish, the broth in which its hosted could use fortification to make it more worthy of its substantial contents.
But let’s get to the spaghetti. An order of Spaghetti and Meatballs ($15) will yield a pile of soft pasta topped with pleasantly pulpy sauce and three not-too-processed meatballs made from a pork and beef blend. A sprinkle of parmesan punches up what is otherwise a comforting, traditional dish.
While in throw-back mode, you can also score Fettuccine Alfredo ($13) in which folds of fettuccine noodles hold a classically rich Alfredo sauce that involve Romano cheese and garlic; it’s distinguished mostly for its creamy, rich attributes.
Both pasta dishes include a soup or salad starter – and the salad option will complete the experience with an abundance of the crunchy lettuces that were popular before spring mix and greens took over.
Pasta possibilities on the menu expand to include gnocchi and ravioli dishes as well as a the famous 15-layer lasagna. The new warehouse also sports a full bar with beer, wine, cocktails and importantly: A flight option that celebrates sangria variations.
Change is hard, but we’re rooting for the Warehouse. It’s a retro joint trying to find its place in a new age: With any luck, cheese bread will build the bridge. You can find it at 150 S. High St.
For more information, visit spaghettiwarehouse.com.
All photos by Susan Post
