This past Saturday night, we came to Dunaways as part of Devour Downtown event. This was our first time eating at this establishment. Walking into the building was very beautiful with a person playing the Harp. We were seated upstairs. Service was very good. We got our drinks right away and our appetizer which was pesto gnoochi crab with roasted red pepper. Then we got our dinner salad with balsamic vinagerette. I got the triple cold water lobster with smashed red potatoes with asparagus. My friend got 6 oz filet with smashed red potatoes. The dessert was creme brulee with whip cream and raspberry on top. The dinner was excellent. But the price we payed for the meals was not worth it. Total bill was $95.00 and we tipped our waiter $18.00. Total of $113.00. We started to park in the parking lot, they wanted $7.00 valet parking, so we decided to park along the street and walked up to the restaurant. I think its ridiculous to having to pay to park. I can park at a downtown garage for $2.00 an hour.
If you want a good fine dining experience, I strongly recommend this place. Just make sure you have plenty of money to spend on a very small dinner. It was a great experience and I want to thank the staff of Dunaways for giving a great service.
Appearance: externally it looks like a bar or pub. Internally it's a bit more inviting. Didn't like the area near the bar...too noisy. Lighting was tooooo dim. Fireplace wasn't up enough. Tables were a good size. View isn't so great.
Customer service: we stood waiting for almost ten minutes before a waiter answered us and said the hostess would be back soon to seat us. She never returned so he ended up seating us instead. That wasn't a great start. I'm not a food snob either. I rarely go to pricey restaurants for the mere fact that it'd be economically unwise of me at this time. However, devour downtown allows us to visit places in the hopes of wanting to visit them again. So the water boy was a bit odd. He also misinterpreted what we said and took our bread away instead of waiting until we were done. It could've been God saying, "you realllllly don't need anymore bread!" Either way it took a bit before we had our waters and bread. The waiter was decent but seemed soooo busy that it was hard to get his attention when we needed something.
Food: bread was so, so. The salad...well, we felt like rabbits in a wild open field. I love spinach leaves in my salad but it was just spinach leaves and a few chopped tomatoes with a hint of balsamic- wasn't impressed. The gnocchi wasn't a true gnocchi and the portion was ridiculously small. It tasted great regardless. The main dishes...decent. My scallops dish was quite salty and there was some grit still in my food. The scallops were cooked good and it seemed like there was some bacon chunks in the sauce that were far too chewy for me. The filet mignon was a bit smaller than expected. The scallops dish was far better. Dessert was pistachio creme brûlée and he liked his I thought it was so-so. Although....I'm not a creme brûlée fan. So for that, I'd say its good just the same.
Would I return? Probably not but it was worth the experience.
This was recommended by a local. Great place, but not sure how they stay in business. There were only three parties in the restaurant Thursday night, when we were there. It is an old renovated building, one room is almost all orignal and is quite quant. There is a fireplace and wood panelling. I recommend asking for a seat by the fireplace.
All the food was exceptional, except the risotto (but I know that risotto can be quite difficult). We ordered the crostini platter, calamari fritti and the shrimp cocktail. All very delicious. We orded the ribeye, the strip steak, the fish special and the sea scallops. The ribeye was to die for! Very juicy and cooked just right. I can't remember what the fish special was, but that was the best!
The manager gave us a tour of the restaurant, we even got to see the wine cellar! They told us the owner was a previous owner of St. Elmos (a staple of Indy).
One note: It seems like most of the negative reviews of this place were made during Devour Downtown. Â As much as you'd like to think you'd get the same quality and service when you dine during DD, most places aren't as accommodating when you're eating for only $30 a plate.
Pros: great steak, beautiful art-deco era decor and construction, great valet guy
Cons: hostess (Connie) was aloof, valet parking only
If you're looking for a nice restaurant in Indy, there are many other places that come to mind before Dunaway's. Â I came here on a recent weeknight for a business dinner, and had never heard of the place. Â I consider myself to be someone who knows local business pretty well, but this place slid under the radar.
I called ahead to see what the parking situation was, because I was going with a group. Â The hostess, Connie, answered and seemed slightly rude, as if my question was annoying to her. Â Parking was valet only. Â I can get a steak many other places without having to fork over $7 for someone to park my car. Â However, the guy who was working valet that night (sorry, his name escapes me) was the best part of the experience for me. Â He was super friendly, and earned his tip well by finding my lost cell phone in my car.
The food was great. Â I had the filet with mashed potatoes and enjoyed it. Â I usually leave steakhouses feeling like i prefer the steaks I grill at home to the $40-$50 Â I just spent. Â However, Dunaway's knows how to cook a steak.
All in all: I probably won't be back to Dunaway's. Â The food was good, but for the money there are several other places I'd rather dine in Indy.
The food is very good, but the setting is unmatched. Â All the levels are different and on a cool summer night you cannot beat the patio on top of the roof. Â The view of the city is picturesque and they usually have a little jazz band going. Â Yes its pricey, but if you're going on a date or just want a special evening that is about the people you're with go here.
Review Source:I was in town for a football and IU basketball game and we happened upon this place. Beautifully decorated with a warm fireplace in the main dining room. The waiter was attentive and very knowledgeable. My friends had steaks and I had scallops. All dishes were cooked to perfection. I had a piece of the filet and it was sublime. My scallops were in a light sauce topped with asparagus. So good!!!
They have a new chef who is turning around this place. He came into the dining room after the meals and chatted with us for awhile. Very cool guy.
I highly recommend giving this place a try with the new staff. It is excellent!!! Can't wait to go back to Indy and Dunaways!
A little hesitated to check out the place after reading the not so good reviews. But we tried it anyways and it was surprisingly a not so bad dining experience. Food was good especially their creme brulee (slightly warm the way I like it), the braised beef shank on top of mashed potatoes with crispy onion rings could use extra gravy but overall it was tasty, and the wife enjoyed the chicken marsala mushroom pasta (told her it tasted like the braised beef pasta from olive garden which I like a lot) she had and the honey martini. Service was nice, except for the snotty hostess who did not even bother to offer us a regular menu nor ask us if we wanted rooftop dining even though I think she did to everyone else after us. Maybe because we don't dress up and look well enough to her standards. Not fan of the parking situation as well.
Review Source:If I could give this a zero, I would. This was by far one of the most awkward dining experiences I've ever had, and I'm nowhere near a 'food snob' or expect people to kiss my rear end when I go to dinner. I'm just an average guy who likes a nice meal out on occasion with my wife & friends.
A group of us, (6 total) went for the Devour Downtown on 8/4/12. We had a couple drinks at the bar. The Speckled Hen beer was flat and had a terrible taste, even my friends & bar tender agreed...but okay, no big deal, I got a Sun King instead.
When we sat down (at our plastic table mind you) and the blinds in our 'private room' all jacked up looking like someone broke them. We finally got service after 10 minutes of sitting & waiting. The waiter who finally came in to check on us was SOOOOO WEIRD! He wreaked like incense each time he walked in our room. He brought us Devour menus, which was fine, but didn't bring us the regular menu to look at. We had to ask one of the people serving us our water.....speaking of, the water people would come in and just stand there and look at us. I'm not sure if they were trained not to interrupt conversations, but they would seriously just STAND THERE and listen in on what we were talking about. Not that anyone was really talking secretive stuff, but it was really really weird.
The food was 'mehhh', nothing that I would run and tell people to go try. just really not all that great. And again, this was off the Devour menu, which I'm sure they don't give 100% of their efforts when ordering off the Devour, but even then, totally not worth it. I couldn't imagine spending full price on what we got.
We couldn't get out of there fast enough when our meal was done. It was like the entire staff was a bunch of zombies. From the valet parking guy, to the hostess, the waiter, and bus boys.
I'm 100% sure with all the dining options in Indianapolis and surrounding areas, we (including our guests) will never be back. But, don't take my word for it, experience it for yourselves. It might make for a good dining experience around Halloween if you wanna be frightened!
Our meal was fine and the service was uneven but acceptable. The goat cheese manicotti was nicely done. However, Dunaway's is definitely price gouging. I paid $7 for valet parking, but my companions who arrived just 5 minutes later, were charged $20. When we asked the valet about the discrepancy, he said the manager told him they were supposed to charge more since they were also allowing people to park there for the NFL Experience. Never mind that we were there to dine! What a terrible way to treat your customers. I will not be going back.
Review Source:Wow reading some of the most recent reviews it seems like this place is having some downs lately.
My review is based on an experience when i was in Indy earlier this year, but i remember it vividly as it was a great experience especially since it was one a few places i was fortunate to visit while in town.
My business partners and i were in town for business and we were recommended Dunaway's as a very close 2nd after St. Elmo's (since we were not able to get reservations for our dinnertime schedule).
The place was full for dinner, but were able to get a table quickly in the back room with the fireplace. The fireplace heat was nice as it was a cool and rainy night.
I ordered the shrimp cocktail appetizer and top sirloin of prime beef. I was not disappointed. The shrimp was huge and fresh and the cocktail sauce was amazing. I really like how spicy it was. The carved prime beef was also great-soft, juicy and more than enough for me. I brought the left overs home to my hotel and ate it later that night. From what i ate, it was high quality food.
If i'm ever back in Indy again, i would definitely want to go again at least to see how the place has changed. I'm just really amazed by the low scores versus the amazing experience i had.
It's not an accident that Dunaway's is full of consistently poor ratings and shared negative experiences. I noticed that a lot of people had bad luck during Devour Downtown, which is a 2 week time frame when restaurants give substantial discounts for prix fix menus. It's been my experience that you have to lower your expectations a bit during this time because the restaurants are usually much more busy than normal and the staff generally feels like they're being under-tipped due to the discount. That said, my experience was NOT during Devour - Dunaway's is simply bad all the time. We went with a party of six for dinner. We had a drink before dinner which was fine, and then we were seated. We ordered a variety of items, some seafood and some steaks. My steak was very overdone. I'd have normally sent it back but we waited an extremely long time for the food and I didn't want to double the wait while they recooked my meal. To make matters worse, when they brought out our food, they only had 5 dishes. Ooops - they'd forgotten to cook one of our meals. You might think such an oversight might warrant a visit from a manager or perhaps even a comped meal? Not at Dunaway's. Again, I think they're so bad so often, this is just part of the standard dining experience. The 6th dish came out about the same time the rest of us were wrapping up the meal. I called to speak with a manager the day after we'd eaten, nobody ever got back in touch in spite of my request to speak with them. NEVER AGAIN.
Review Source:I left a scathing review of Dunaway's on another restaurant review site a few years ago, and it occurred to me that I should repeat that review here since I'm more into Yelp these days.
Long story short, we went for Devour, and everything that could go wrong DID. We waited a long time despite having a reservation, got a shitty table that was right next to a loud fan unit, had extremely long wait times between courses, dealt with a clueless staff that had to stop by to ask which course we were waiting for, and had crappy food on top of all that.
Worst part, though, was when we asked to speak to the manager and was told he was too busy for us (not joking). I called and emailed at least a dozen times over the next two weeks, but I got no response. Â Not one person apologized for our terrible experience. Â Years later, I'm still angry about how much money we spent there for what I consider the single worst dining experience of my life.
I would not go to Dunaways again if you paid me. Seriously. I wouldn't send my enemy there. I'd rather eat White Castle. I can't wait for this place to close so another business can take over that neat building.
I was very disappointed with Dunaways. I walked in about 6 pm and the place was completely empty. Never a good sign, even on a Wednesday night. Bartender/waiter claimed that a group had booked the whole restaurant, but they had to cancel because of delayed flights. Hmmm... it was 50 and rainy, so maybe that was keeping people away. The guy was pleasant and the bar had a great selection of bourbons... and after a visit from the manager, my colleague and I decided to eat.
The crab cake, while on the verge of being almost burnt, was tasty - all crab meat with a nice chili sauce. The petite wedge salad was OK... with a tiny amount of ranch dressing under the lettuce, instead of the traditional blue cheese on top.
The place was STILL empty. Not a single walk in. But, it's a cold, rainy night.
This is where things went downhill - the main course. The bone-in cowboy ribeye. Properly cooked to medium rare. This didn't seem like a piece of Prime meat. Of its 22 ounces, at least half was fat and gristle. I've had a lot of great cowboy ribeyes, including great Texas steakhouses. This was not a great steak. And it was salty. Even saltier were the asparagus and mashed potatoes. Like inedible salty. My mouth still burns of salt as I write this after the meal. I told the waiter how salty it was and he comp-ed my glass of wine. A nice gesture, but still a very disappointing and unsatisfying meal for an expensive restaurant.
If I were to sum up my dinner at Dunaways in one word that word would be.............disappointing. If it weren't for the beautiful rooftop seating and to die for black truffle mac n cheese I'd take another star away. Â Forunately we were there during devour downtown so the 4 course meal was only $30....which is a steal compared to their normal menu prices.
All in all the food was pretty good, but it was apparent that our main dishes sat in the window for awhile as my medium rare steak came out without a trace of pink and my boyfriends salmon had burned curled up edges. Â Because we are laid back diners the wait between courses didn't bother us, but be prepared to wait an hour for your salad to arrive. The pacing and order of food served was weird, but once again something I can overlook, we decided we would adapt a European attitude about eating......slow down and enjoy.
The food was good at the special menu price, paying more would have been annoying. Service was slow and weird....but watching the servers run around clearly crazed was a little entertaining. Rooftop atmosphere can't be beat.
My overall advice.......snag a rooftop seat, order a bottle of wine and a side of mac n cheese, settle in for a wait.......enjoy.
I'd like to start by saying that I wanted to like Dunaway's. It seems that Indy is home to every national steakhouse chain, and while St. Elmo's is fantastic, sometimes you just crave something new and different. I had hoped that Dunaway's could satisfy that craving.
From the moment I arrived, it was chaos. It appeared that a 14 year old kid was running the host stand - it was a Friday night during Devour Downtown and he informed us that "it was his first day." Probably not the best idea to start a new host on the busiest night of the week during what I assume to be one of their busiest weeks of the year. The owner would stop to "check in" on the many reservations that were waiting to be seated, but would then return to schmooze at the bar. All in all, we waited for 45 min for a table that we had reserved days before.
When seated, we were greeted by both our waiter and a woman who appeared to be a manager. They were both friendly and attentive, but there seemed to be some confusion over who was taking our order. That being said, I would say that the waitstaff is the one positive experience we encountered during our time at Dunaway's.
Our food was late and cold and also delivered by a bus boy who asked "Are these yours?" After looking at the plates of the patrons near us, we realized that half of the croutons for the dip we had ordered were missing, which led us to believe that our food had been delivered to the wrong table first then sent back to us. When we voiced our concerns to the management they were unapologetic and anything but helpful. Definitely not what you would expect from an upscale restaurant.
Basically, if you are looking for a pleasant dinner (and a warm one at that) - look somewhere besides Dunaways.
Horrible experience. We decided to try this place out as a part of Devour Downtown. We made reservations, and upon arriving were told me would have to wait a little which is fine. We had to wait 45 minutes past our reservation time to get seated. This restaurant looks like a place that used to be great but has been lazy. Looks like those you see on the restaurant make over tv shows.
Once seated, our server was friendly. However, he forgot to bring out our appetizers. When they were finally delivered, they were both cold. At this point I asked to speak with the manager. He was unapologetic and said, "You know how these things happen." No, I do not know how these things happen as I do not own a restaurant. He then said, "Well what would you like me to do about it." You would think he would already have an answer for us on how to correct the situation.
We ended up leaving so we could salvage our Friday night at a restaurant we knew we would be treated right.
I will not be going back to Dunaways. I believe management needs to adjust their attitude towards their customers.
So, I just tried this place as part of devour downtown, which is a great way to experience and test out some of indy's more "expensive" restaurants at a reasonable price. First off, our service was excellent. No complaints there. The building is great and I hear the roof top is wonderful. The restaurant was quiet, but not too quiet. Wine=excellent.
The food is another story. The devour downtown menu offered several courses. For the appetizer I got a goat cheese and marinara sauce. The marinara sauce tasted like Ragu out of a jar. This was disappointing for me, given that I had ordered the mannicotti as my main dish (which also came with marinara). Barcelona Tapas offers this same dish and it's like a little slice of heaven. I also had a Caesar salad, which was probably one of the worst I have ever had. It was completely bland and the lettuce was actually warm. The mannicotti again tasted like it had Ragu on it. I had the chocolate Gelato for dessert and it was fantastic--almost tasted like dark chocolate, yum! It was the best part of the meal. My friend had the salmon over some sort of pasta as his main course. I tried the salmon (and I LOVE salmon), but it didn't taste fresh to me. It was also quite dry.
I won't be going back. However, maybe their main menu is better? Personally, I didn't even think what I had was worth the $30. I had really high expectations for Dunaways, so I was quite disappointed when I tasted the food.
We went here for Devour Downtown for the first time, and I have to say, I'm glad we only paid $30 for our 3-course meal! Â Don't get me wrong, the food was good -- nothing was wrong with anything I had to eat, yet for the price of the regularly priced meal ($75-90 for 3 courses for one person) would have left me disappointed. Â The best way I can describe it would be that the flavors were not as rich as they should be. Â I feel like I could have gone to Palomino or R Bistro for the same money (or less) and had a better meal. Â Also, I feel like retaurants, particularly of this caliber need to be more creative in menu choices.
I had:
Salmon Roulades
House Salad
Manicotti (Others had the Strip Steak and felt the same way)
Pistachio Creme Brule
This review will probably get filtered because that is how explicitly negative it will be. However, you can check my FourSquare account, Gowalla, and Yelp account to see I checked in there and am not trying to bash a competitor or what have you. I also will have my complete experience on a Talk Thread.
This was the worst restaurant dining experience I have ever had! The service was awful, the food was terrible and the management doesn't care that their servers tip themselves a little extra.
The server was non-existent and wrote herself an extra $14 dollars to add-on to what she thought was an inadequate 10% (she is lucky we even paid for the meal thats how bad the dining experience was).
We weren't acknowledged by ANYONE for 20+ minutes once we had been sat down.
The skirt steak and fried catfish (our main course) didn't come to the table for almost 2 hours and they were lukewarm.
The bathrooms are rest area grade at best. This place is flat out awful and for the outrageous prices they charge they should be ashamed!
Take your money elsewhere: St. Elmo's, Oceanaire, Palominos, Ruth Chris
This is the exact opposite of fine dining! Dunaway's is awful, I MEAN AWFUL. From Service to Food AWFUL!
We had been to several other steakhouses in Indy before we visited Dunaways. On a warm summer night, the roof terrace is a great place for a late dinner. We had the calamari as a starter, which were well battered, but the homemade marinara was stale. The house salad was simple but tasty. I ordered the Kansas City Strip Steak, but they were out of it, so I went for the Filet Mignon instead. While I ordered it medium-rare, I got it well done. Still not bad, particularly with the mashed potatoes, but not what I had ordered. My wife was happier with her Pan Seared Scallops. All in all, a decent meal, but not worth the high price. Moreover, there are many (much) better steakhouses in Indy (e.g. Sullivans, Ruth Chris, St Elmo's).
PS Â The menu that we got at the restaurant was quite different from that on their website.
Horrible service. Our party of 3 was seated at 7:15 and service was so slow that we did not finish our entree until past 10 PM.  I could better understand if the place was crowded but there were empty tables around us.  The waitress said that the manager wanted her to devote her time to a large group at the expense of  better serving other diners so it was not totally her fault but there was about 30 minutes of wating between courses. Food was so so.  One ribeye was so fatty that less then half was edible - and with such slow service we were not going to ask for another.  The shrimp cocktail was worth forgetting - almost no tang to the sauce.  Service was so slow we did not order dessert as we were afraid it would be served at breakfast time.  This place used to be good - but no more.  Eat elsewhere.
Review Source:Dunaway's is a fantastic, locally owned steakhouse that has a very authentic Indianapolis feel unlike the larger chain restaurants right downtown. Located inside the Palazzo D'Ossigeno, a beautiful, old, historic building it is an all around wonderful place to eat dinner or any meal for that matter.
NOTE: I would highly recommend making reservations, and asking to either  sit in the dark oak (fireplace room) or if it's nice outside on the roof (amazing view). I say this because the building is huge, and when Dunaway's is busy they will seat people upstairs in this huge, ugly room that has far less atmosphere than the above mentioned rooms. This is especially true if you are on a date or trying to be romantic because the circular oak room with the roaring fire is quite fantastic, and adds a whole new dimension to the meal.
The waitstaff will baby you, taking care to clean up every single crumb and make sure that you have everything you need to truly enjoy your meal. The menu is small, but consistent; everything is solid, and good. Â I had a filet that was very tender, and everybody else seemed to enjoy their meal as well.
In town for the weekend, we decided to try this place out based on the positive reviews that it had on Yelp. Â We arrived around 7:30 on a Saturday night and weren't really sure if the place was open. Â There was a lone person sitting at the bar, and two tables filled all the way in the back. Â I don't mind eating in a sparsely filled place, but it did seem off given the positive reviews. Â
The food was great. Â I had the house salad coupled with the Chicken Visuzio while my fiance had the Caesar Salad (no anchoves) and Lobster Ravioli. Â Both of us enjoyed our dishes immensely. Â We finished off the meals with carrot cake and chocolate mouse cake: both top notch. Â
My only issue with the restaurant was the waiter. Â He was a good waiter, but he seemed rather disinterested in our table, especially compared to the other table he was serving. Â Did I smell?
My favorite restaurant in Indianapolis!! Â Rooftop seating is the way to go. Â Not only is there a great view, but every time I've been up there, they've had live music as well. Â The food is incredible and the service is always outstanding. Â My only complaint is that it's oh so very far from me. Â I'm definitely planning on making an appearance on my next trip home to Indy!
Review Source:This is one of the nicest, and best restaurants in the city. There are several factors that compose its standing amongst the finest.
For one, in the spring and summer, this is probably the coolest rooftop dining in town. The view of downtown is spectacular, and when the weather is right, you just can't beat it.
Of course, it wouldn't get the praise it deserves without having great food. Certainly not your average restaurant, they serve up all kinds of delicious entrees and the appetizers are just as good. I think the last time I was there I had a flank steak over mashed potatoes. Regardless of what you order, you're going to have a great meal that is unique, well-prepared and tasteful. The bar is fantastic, too, as they carry several liquors you won't find at most bars.
Another great feature is the building itself. The restaurant is housed in an historic property that was at one point some sort of foundry or something (there's a sign on the outside that explains the origins). It has original lead glass windows and brick, and just has this cool factor that comes along with it. One room in the restaurant, which is somewhat private, though anyone can sit there, is like a library or old dining room in a historic home, which really makes you feel like you're not in a restaurant.
Definitely a place where one can enjoy a great meal, and relax afterwards with a drink and chill for a while, it's a favorite of many locals who prefer to eat somewhere unique. While reservations are not required, I would recommend one on weekends, especially if you have a group larger than 4.
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