2nd review - the pizza. have been really wanting to come back to italian gardens and try their pizza. glad i did. my son and i went and had the large meat lovers for $15.99. gonna hafta do an eyeroll here on the dot ninety nine price. go ahead and bump it to sixteen. i can afford that extra penny!!!
we got there before 7pm and there were a lot of cars outside. i was worried there would be a line. i don't do well in lines. luckily the place was pretty full but there were open tables. we were told we could sit where we want. that is a nice touch i thought. don't you hate places that put you in a bad location like right next to the kitchen or bathroom, or next to someone you think looks weird or strange? or worse yet, next to your ex who left you after 15 years of good marriage who is with her latest bf? haha, that has never happened but i fear it might someday and not sure how i will handle it.
so after much debate, we decided on the meat lovers specialty i think i already said this. sorry. waitress was pretty blonde we got last time. this is a good sign to see same employees and not new ones each time you go to a place.
i drank water and it kind of tasted strange to me. but water is free and one should not complain about something that doesn't cost you any money.
i looked around and there was a young girl with glasses. kind of nerdy looking but cute. i actually think almost all women are pretty and cute. but she was starring at me. or at least it felt like she was. she was probably in her twenties and she was sitting across from some young guy with bushy curly hair. her bf? i don't know and don't care.
this staring continued until we left. every time i looked up she was looking. i thought about taking her pic to see if that would make her stop but i chickened out. my eyesight is not that great so it is possible she wasn't even looking my direction. but to whomever you were, if you were indeed staring...yeah i know i am goofy looking. take a picture it lasts longer. ha ha remember that one from elementary?
pizza got to table and damn it looked good. it was good. it was great. the toppings, the cheese, the sauce all were primofantastic. just made that word up btw. the crust was just ok for me. son thought it was great, but i have had better crust in my day. but i do not want to downplay how good this pizza was. may be the best pizza i have eaten in dirt city. has to be in top three. would eat again. god bless you pizza maker who made this for us.
few things that would make this place the best restaurant experience in dirt city: add some music. you have two tvs going with is fine and there is no sound which is fine. but it seems odd to me that there is no music. maybe some italian music would be nice. keep it low. would be a nice touch. the other thing is how you pay. it is odd and weird like me. we were not given a ticket. girl says to go to register whenever we want. said our ticket would be there. so we go there and no one is there. we wait patiently. wait some more. then the dude shows up and picks up some ticket laying there and ringing it up and i say to him: hey, how you know that is us? he asks where were we sitting. i pointed. he said oh you guys had the pizza right? i said yes. he says did you have anything to drink? i said yeah one coke. this is very awkward to me. anyway he rang stuff up. he knew the numbers as they are in his head. this fine, and i am sure he doesn't cheat anyone. it is just odd and seems inefficient. please just have your waitstaff write out a ticket and bring it to the table. this is literally how 99% of restaurants do it and it has worked for hundred years or more.
this is an official frekview. go to this place. you will like i guarantee it. god bless.
ps: to the girl who was by herself and eating alone. you were very pretty and i admire you. you were too young for me but perfect for my son. he thought you were pretty too. fyi
-----21 aug, 2014-----
good italian food in dirt city. ha ha my imaginary friends who went to tech and live elsewhere refer to lubbock as dirt city and to us homers as dirt monkeys. i suppose it comes from the haboobs we get every spring. i digress. people have been telling me i need to go downtown and try this new italian place. i worked downtown for years and years and only recently moved out to west lubbock. i know downtown well and don't generally go there unless i absolutely have to. been waiting patiently for the mcdougal billionaires to revitalize the area. plus, if you drive around downtown chances are pieces of one of the few skyscrapers owned by some idiot in katy might hit you on your noggin or dent the top of your pick up truck. yes, dirt monkeys for the most part drive trucks.
went with my son who had just completed an als ice bucket challenge at my house. he was soaked and i thought i would buy him some dinner. he's a good kid and i am proud of him. we arrived and the parking was pretty full but we found a place in front on 13th street. this place is right across from asb and city building. easy to find and get to. just go down q and turn east on 13 and look north. you can't miss it. it has been a hundred different restaurants since i have lived here but i don't think i have ever been to any of them.
inside was nice. not too big and not too small. everything was clean and well maintained. i was not crazy about the wall decor. not like i am some interior designer expert but i know what i like and i think they could do a better job of making the place look and feel like italy. candles on the tables would have been nice. there is no bar. they do not have a booze license. you can byob though and many do, and it looked like the wait staff will open your wine bottle and bring you wine glasses. no clue if they charge for this but betting they don't. this did not apply to me because as you know i gave up booze recently. i think i am on day 43!!!!
nice young pretty blonde waitress waited on us. she was way too young for me but my son seemed interested but he didn't try for his digits. too much of a chicken like his old man. we both ordered the same thing. lobster ravioli. actually my son ordered it and i said yeah bring me one of those like he's getting. i think it was like eleven bucks or so. it came with a dinner salad and some rolls. the salad was just a generic iceberg type salad...nothing special but was fresh. she brought us a basket with three rolls. now think about it. there are two of us. 3 is not divisible by 2 or at least it wasn't at tech. how about bringing 2 or 4 rolls to a table of two so there aren't any fights over who gets the extra roll? just a suggestion. the rolls were good but not to die for. i did not dream about them. the rolls at roadhouse are more to my liking. but these are not bad by any stretch.
our entree arrived and my first thought was ......hmmmm that is not very much food. it was four raviolis and they had this pink sauce all over and around them. actually the sauce was orange but the waitress told us it was pink sauce. i was wrong. i was more than full when i finished eating the food and spooning and sopping up all the pink sauce. the meal was absolutely delicious. i enjoyed every single bite. my compliments to the chef. man it was good. i could eat it again but there is a ton of stuff on their menu to try and it is probably all delicious. they even make pizza. i will probably try that next time. prices are high enough to keep me from coming every week but i do plan on coming back often as i can. it is my new favorite italian food restaurant for dirt city.
i guess if i could complain about something because it is my nature to bitch and complain, it would be the way you pay at this place. waitress brought us a ticket that just showed our two entrees listed and no prices. we then took this to a guy at a register at the front and stood in a line of people waiting to pay. this seemed odd and uncomfortable to me. it was finally our turn and the guy took my ticket and did some stuff on the register and handed me a credit card slip with a total price that i was to tip and sign. i had to immediately math up a tip and sign it because others were waiting and the guy looked annoyed like he needed to be doing something else. i may have under tipped blonde and for that i feel bad. it wasn't intentional. i needed to give her 36 cents or so more but i suck at fast math. actually now that i think about it, you did not refill my water glass and you never offered more rolls so it was probably an ok amount.. i feel better now.
shout out to steve k for telling me about this place and to scott for his encouragement on continuing to write these reviews instead of doing my work.
final word: go ahead and go to this place. it's a go
this is an official frekview. thanks and god bless