Pasta Point of No Return: Four Old-School Italian Joints to Visit...While You Still Can

You used to be able to find old-school red-sauce joints all over metro Denver, but their ranks are dwindling. Gennaro's Lounge, which opened back in 1951, closed for good earlier this year after a few revival attempts, and next month Frank the Pizza King must leave the home where it's been since 1961.

Over the last decade, the metro area lost Louisville's Blue Parrot, which closed just shy of its 100th birthday, as well as Dino's, which made it almost sixty years before closing in 2019. The Saucy Noodle was a relative newcomer when it closed in 2022, two years before its own sixtieth.

But there are still old, old-school Italian joints in town that date back to the '60s...or even earlier. Here are four favorites:

Carl's Pizza
3800 West 38th Avenue
303-477-1694
Situated in the hip Highland neighborhood, Carl's Pizza is anything but trendy. It's an old-time neighborhood Italian joint that's been serving good spaghetti and meatballs, manicotti and pizza since 1953; current owner John Ludwid landed his first job at Carl's in 1976. Dinners come with soup or salad; spaghetti and meatballs can be ordered by the pint or the quart. It's nothing fancy, just good food with a good long history — and as the Denver dining scene rapidly evolves, that's good enough for us.

Gaetano's
3760 Tejon Street
303-455-9852
Gaetano's underworld history, when the place was run by the Smaldone crime family back in the ’40s, is familiar to Denver natives, as is the overhaul by the Breckenridge-Wynkoop group, which purchased the place in 2006. There's still plenty of history left in the joint (though it's not so much of a joint anymore), and it's been back in independent hands since it was purchased by Wynkoop vet Ron Robinson in 2013. Today Gaetano's remains a great neighborhood spot with a swank Frank Sinatra vibe, and the sauce is markedly improved from the days of the Smaldones.

Lechuga's Italian Restaurant
3609 Tejon Street
303-455-1502
Lechuga's got its start in 1961 (a very good year for Italian restaurants) as Carbone's Bakery, and was transformed into Lechuga's in 1990. With each new owner (it sold again in 2014), people worried that the place would change...but Lechuga's is still using the recipes that made it so popular sixty years ago, and making its own sauce, spaghetti dough and meat products fresh daily. Beyond the old-school atmosphere, the real draw here is canoli, stuffed with meat instead of the usual cream filling. Go for the Little Devil, which also includes a green chile.
[image-3] Romano's Italian Restaurant
5666 South Windemere, Littleton
303-798-4944
Romano's opened on a sleepy street a few blocks from Littleton's Old Town in 1967, making it the baby of this list. Back then, Neil and Ellie Romano ran it as a little pizza joint with just three tables. But over the years, both the menu and the space expanded, and today the second generation of the Romano family runs what's become a landmark in Littleton, known as much for its welcoming atmosphere as for its homemade spaghetti, eggplant parmesan and amazing red sauce that covers almost everything. (And it should go without saying that there is absolutely no connection between this classic place and Romano's Macaroni Grill....)

Know of an Italian joint over fifty? Send an email to [email protected].