The Sample Room Tavern

Decent little restaurant. The staff were very friendly and welcoming and service was good. The food was good though my steak was a little dry. The bread pudding was great and service was quick. Overall my experience was good and if you looking for a place to eat in Wilson I think this is the best your gonna get.

Best chicken-fried steak ever! Finally a gravy with some flavor. It’s a cool location in the basement of the historic Midland Railroad Hotel. Cozy and clean. Staff is friendly and everything we had was delicious. The portions are huge so come with an appetite or plan on leftovers. Highly recommend stopping at The Sample Room in Wilson, KS if you are traveling I-70 in the evening. Check their website. Currently only open for dinner.

The setting is quite nice with a lot of authentic character, in the basement of an old railroad hotel. However, I was not at all favorably impressed with the food we had there. The quality was mediocre to poor in my opinion, but at proud prices. Since my husband is vegetarian and I’m vegan, we knew our options would be limited, and that’s fine. We got the homemade flour chips and salsa, salad, French fries, and I got a side of green beans. The chips really weren’t what I was expecting for flour chips. Instead of white, with a softer texture, they were yellow and hard and crunchy, and slightly burnt tasting. The serving of fries was shockingly small for the price, a small huddle of limp whiteness (not well-fried nor golden) on a tiny plate, and they tasted of old or poor quality oil. Bleh. Fortunately the ketchup masked the taste. I asked for the green beans to be plain with no butter. Alas, they were well coated with butter. At first I thought perhaps it was just an oil-type coating when I saw the sheen on them, but no, once I tried to eat them, all I could taste was butter, which I didn’t want. It wasn’t even a nice tasting butter, and the beans themselves I couldn’t taste at all. I had my husband taste them and he agreed the butter flavor was strong. He didn’t mind so I gave them to him, as I didn’t want to hassle about it, since the beans didn’t seem worth the hassle. The entree salad was for my husband, it looked fresh enough with a variety of greens and croutons and a bit of tomato and onion. Husband said it was ok, nothing special, but he was fine with it, so there is that. Anyway, overall I was very disappointed with what we got, I found most of it just edible and not pleasant to eat. For the prices, I expected something quite nice, and it wasn’t, not at all.