Anthony G.
Yelp
For being an out-of-towner living in NJ and having access to NYC, I never thought that a place in Scottsdale, AZ would hit it out of the park with Italian food.
So me and an old girlfriend of mine - from 25 years ago - decided we wanted Italian food. Being a bit skeptical, I decided to be adventurous and try Evo. Beforehand, we were just looking up places on Yelp and she found this spot in Old Town Scottsdale. The amount of reviews and the star rating was a no-brainer so we headed there.
As soon as we got to Evo, the lot was full and that was indicator 1 that this was going to be good. We noticed some outdoor seating and like most, if not all, other restaurants in the PHX/Scottsdale area they had misters (or whatever they're called). We get inside, and we noticed a dimly lit and intimate dining room with a nice bar on the left. A nice neon sign on the back wall that read, "Feed me pasta and tell me I'm pretty" in script was illuminated. Eventually we were greeted by what seemed to be the manager (there were a few other guests in front of us waiting to be seated). If you are planning on visiting, make a reservation - luckily for us we were able to find seats at the bar.
We were greeted by a bartender that was attentive to our needs for the evening - now that I recall, there were 2 other bartenders that also helped out and we noticed they were doing an IMMACULATE job making sure everyone at the bar was taken care of and drinks were full. My girlfriend had a question about one of the guava drinks on the menu and this 'tender clarified all her questions and was professional about it. Turns out she LOVED the drink! My glass of water was always topped off without me asking for more - talk about great service!
I ordered a couple of apps for us - the Bruschetta and Arancini. At first I thought we had to pick which kind of mozzarella combo out of 3 we wanted for the bread but it turns out it came with all 3 - talk about a great variety! It came with mozzarella and tomato, mozz and pesto, and mozz with fig jam and apples - ALL SO GOOD! The only thing that stood out was the bread - I'm used to sliced Italian but these came with what seemed to be pita bread slices. It was different but still good! The Arancini was stuffed with cheese, peas, and something else and came with marinara - this was surprisingly good too so when you come here I strongly recommend these 2 apps.
For dinner, my girlfriend ordered the Chicken Alfredo and I ordered the Filet Mignon (came in 9 ozs) medium with mashed potatoes, spinach, and baby carrots. Steak came out cooked to perfection and the sides were also good. The Chicken Alfredo was good too but we felt that the fettuccine was slightly overcooked - not a huge deal but we prefer it al dente.
We filled up on dinner and didn't have room for dessert but had we saved room, there were a few things that caught our eyes. All-in-all we would definitely come back here for a quality dinner with a great staff. I honestly have to say I was a little sketchy about Italian food outside of NJ/NY - a bit biased you could say but this restaurant knocked it out of the park! We will always remember this place and will definitely return! Thanks to the entire crew for a great evening!