italian garden

this place is in a downward spiral. once the best italian in town, it’s now just bad. fazoli’s is much better.saladwas warm. garlic bread, well, lacked garlic, and tasted and felt like day old bread from united. shrimp alfredo lacked alfredo sauce. it was basically a olive oil covering noodles with 6 shrimp on the rim of the plate.... with a sour taste. not good. i’m done won’t be back.
p.s. it was mid january and they hadn’t even taken down their christmas decorations. sad.

good food, good service. italian garden is a landmark in this college town - but maybe people have forgotten just how good it is because it wasn't very crowded. we did a friday lunch with a special (seafood ravioli) and a menu item (chicken piccata) that was wonderful. prices were very reasonable: $7.95 to $8.95 seems to be the general price -saladwas $1 extra. wonderful garlic rolls delivered quickly to the table with our drinks. the place does not offer beer or wine, but you can bring your own. the waitress was very good - asking us repeatedly how things were. (could have done with less). we will go back! but do not, do not park next door at the taco bell. [the garden doesn't have enough parking for their clientele.] you will get towed if taco bell catches you. it happened to me. what was wonderful was italian garden's owner who insisted we take $50 toward the $116 it cost to get my car back. will eat at italian garden again - and will walk there! as it is on the fringes of the texas state campus.

i'm very impressed. good food. huge portions. rolls and olive oil were spectacular! and at a very decent price. don't know of any other place you could add a huge sidesaladfor a buck! very friendly wait staff and i thought the ambiance was very relaxing. i'd drive from san antonio to eat here again. my only recommendation to the chef is to not hold back on the garlic.

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 dinnersaladand some rolls. thesaladwas 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

not worth trying. we thought we would give this a try since ig received good reviews. the food was not very good. the pizza was greasy, the pasta had no flavor, the cheese sticks tasted as though they were frozen from a box and thesaladwas room temperature. so in fact it was terrible. not sure if the kitchen crew were having a bad day when we were there, but we won't be going back.

this restaurant is amazing. the sauces are impeccable. pasta always right on. superb tiramisu and homemadesaladdressings. my favorites are the veal piccata and the linguine tuttomare with piccata sauce in place of red sauce. super friendly service by both owner and staff. great prices. absolutely one of the best restaurants in lubbock!

...all of our meals came out looking wonderful. the quality is the best i’ve had in lubbock at an italian restaurant. everything is homemade, even down to thesaladdressings. the sauces tasted fresh and the portions were perfect. we did not try the dessert but we hear you must get the tiramisu...

great italian food!!!. i have eaten takeout from italian garden in the past, but today we ate in the restaurant. my daughter treated us to dinner at her favorite italian restaurant. we started out with the fried calimari for our appetizer. it was pretty good. my daughter really liked it. next, my daughter and i had a dinnersaladwith the house dressing. the house dressing is really good. i even bought a bottle to take home. my daughter had a spinach calzone which she declared to be excellent. my husband ordered a large chicken caesarsaladwhich was also very tasty according to him. they did not skimp on the chicken in his salad. i ordered spaghetti and meat sauce which was also good. for dessert, we took home a cannoli. we split it three ways. i wish we had ordered more as it was very delicious. our server was very nice and right there when we needed anything. we would all go back here.

this has become one of our favorite places. take a bottle of wine (it's byob) along, and enjoy a wonderful meal at a spectacular price. service is good and the staff is friendly. some of our favorites.. penne vodka in pink sauce, cheese tortellini, and for dessert tiramisu is great. go for the housesaladdressing , a nice tomato vinaigrette. love this place.

really solid italian food. i thought italian garden was very good. it was my first time here and i really enjoy italian food. i had the chicken parm. it came with asaladand garlic rolls.

thesaladwas crisp and the house dressing was fantastic. i asked for a little extra and used it as a dipping sauce for some of the bread. it was deep in flavor with a lot of punch.

the garlic rolls are everything you dream of when you want bread at an italian joint. crusty and thick but soft on the inside. tasted great.

the chicken parm was very good. the sauce has food flavor. it was balanced and deep with rich flavor. the cheese was great and melted perfectly. everything worked together to make each bite excellent as it melted in my mouth. the pasta was cooked well.

i will be back and will try something different next time. good menu with great selections.

finally a real italian restaurant in lubbock, well, we do have one guy too. this family owned and run place has restaurants in the dallas area. almost everything is made from scratch, pastas,saladdressing, sauces, etc. i ordered lasagna and my wife had manicotti. the side dinnersaladwas larger than i expected. the house made italian dressing was execellent, not creamy, but sweet, with the hint of raspberry. the lasagna and manicotti were served in single serving bake dishes. the pasta in these dishes was light and tender. both servings were too much to eat at lunch, so we both took home two thirds of our dishes. prices very reasonable with many items under $10.00 (lunch specials $7.99, w/ drink,saladand bread). service very attentive, but not overbearing. now, the big surprise! spumoni !!!! only place i know of in lubbock to get my favorite dessert, unfortunately not homemade, but still of utmost quality and taste. i will become a "regular".

this place is awesome and affordable. don't listen to the haters on here. huge portions, byob and cozy environment. what else do you want? if you want gourmet then go to olive garden(cough cough).


-----11 dec, 2011-----

great hole in the wall. prices and food are awesome. i do however have 2 minor issues. 1. they are closed on sunday. i understand everyone needs time off but sunday is a huge pizza day and you in suburbia. they are missin out on a lot of $$. 2nd- pizza is my favorite in the area and we like to get asaladwith it to split, however we have been disappointed in the salad. i ordered a dinner largesaladfor 2 and it was the size of a sidesaladand didn't have much to offer. i much prefer brotherssaladwith salami and cheese. if they fixed that this would be my favorite restaurant. overall a great place

stay clear of this place.. i will start this off by saying, in my opinion this was a horrible experience! when i go to a non-chain restaurant (especially an italian restaurant) i expect them to make their own pasta (any self respecting italian would agree.) i asked the waitress if they make their own pasta, she said no. to be fair the food is mediocre at best what really ruined it for my family was the poor service and the absolutely awful treatment from the incredibly rude owner.

here is a break down of what happened, food took about an hour to get our food and the order was not complex,saladwith chicken breast, cheese steak sandwich, one slice of pizza and tortellini alfredo. the issue was non of the food came out at the same time (im not talking about just a few minutes im talking quite a while, they totally forgot my sons pizza and when i asked the waitress said "oh i forgot to put that up" (maybe that's because she was talking at another table for about 15 minutes catching up with friends as it seemed.

my son never got his dinner, i just asked for the check so we could leave. when we got the check we saw we were charged for ranch dressing...yes i had to laugh (i have never been charged for a dressing, no decent restaurant charges for dressings...first sign of a poorly performing restaurant)

as we were getting ready to leave the manager came over and said "i hear your causing a scene" (great customer service). i said "actually no, i am just surprised at the poor service (food taking an extraordinarily long time to come out) food not coming out at the same time and the waitress forgot to put in the order for my son" the "owner" was unapologetic even indifferent.

trust me, save you time, money and your sanity and go to taco bell right next door....i will make sure to let everyone i know plus post it on my facebook and ask people to share to make sure people stay clear of this disaster of a "restaurant".

more solid italian.... gave this place a try on a rainy saturday night because of the strong reviews on this site.

pro's: flavorful rolls, portion size, paintings on walls, house dressing.

con's: bizarre service...

the ambiance was nice, better than your average small italian place. what stood out was that some of the walls actually had murals painted on them, vs. just having pictures up. nice touch. it was not that busy when we walked in, plenty of open tables.

the free rolls were very tasty, again better than your typical place. thesaladwas your standard fair but their house dressing really made it stand apart from the rest. the chicken parm was huge, the breaded meat took up over half the plate! as far as the food goes i had zero issues, probably the top three italian places i have been to based on that alone.

the service was friendly...but wow are they just that overstaffed all the time? there had to have been about eight employees, all around high school age, just sitting around. some were wrapping silverware in napkins, most were just talking. our waitress, while nice, would come to see how we were doing then just sit back down and talk to her friends/co-workers? we waited about 10 minutes for our salads, and when she asked if we wanted more rolls i hinted to the fact that we would just wait for our salads. it was almost as if we reminded her of that, because then she brought that out immediately afterwards. was their manager not around?

i would definitely go back for the food, though i do wish the overall service was better. a "like" from me and could have been a "favorite" with better service.

i love ig!. i waited tables at both the san marcos & canyon lake italian garden locations during college & ate everything on the menu (except the veal). the food is amazing & although i ate there all the time, i still love it & crave it regularly. my favorite dish is the chicken piccata & the homemade house dressing (tomato basil) is better than anysaladdressing i've ever tasted. they should really bottle the stuff & sell it online or in grocery stores. the greeksaladwith this dressing is heaven for any feta cheese lover. other favorites of mine include the chicken carcioffi, chicken parmesan & some awesome off menu specials they create. in addition to having the tastiest italian food in san marcos, the family that owns the restaurants are truly awesome people & to work for them is like becoming part of the family. i haven't been employed at ig for over 5 years, but i have very fond memories of the place & can't wait to eat some take-out from there tonight! :)