Article source for : Not too impressed with Pizza Papali's!
Went downtown with some out of town family yesterday to see what the place was like and have to say that we came away rather unhappy. The service was good, we were seated promptly (and they were busy!), the decor is awesome (can't wait till they open the garage doors upstairs), but the food sucked with a capital S, except for the pizza.
I got a 'regular salad with chicken' (couldn't have pizza) and it was a big plate...of chopped iceberg with 2 cherry tomatoes, 3 slices of cucumber, a pepperoncini, some carrot shreds, and some bland tasting chicken. Not complaining about the price, but it was blah. Also, it would have been better served in a bowl...lettuce got all over the table when I tried to mix in the dressing and every time I stabbed a forkful.
The Hub got a Philly steak and let the upstairs bartender talk him into the 'deluxe', which was a few bucks higher. What he got was a plateful of fake yellow cheese sauce, poured over a bun. He dug around and found what looked like a few teaspoons of chopped meat and a few strands of onion under the slog, but he couldn't taste anything but the cheese. Total waste of money.
Bro in law got a meatball sub and fries and the fries were stone dead cold. He sent them back and got hot ones in about 5-10 minutes but that never should have happened in the first place. The sub had very little flavor, which was surprising because the meatballs looked good. He said he could taste the sauce and bread and that was it.
12 yr old Grandkid got the wings and garlic cheese bread Junior meal and he liked it. The others tasted the bread and said it was good but nothing you can't get anywhere else.
My sister was the only one who was satisfied with her meal...a medium pizza with pepperoni, mushrooms and onions. She and I were in Chicago for Lollapalooza last summer and we got a pie from a restaurant downtown that was to die for. She feels that Pizza Papali's was almost a dead-ringer for that one...great crust, tangy-sweet sauce, spicy peppereoni, pretty much a perfect pie. We all had bites and agreed it was very good, and a large would have probably fed the 5 of us. They took home 4 of the 6 pieces because by the time her pizza came, the rest of us were pretty much done eating (the server did warn her that it would take at least 1/2 hour and it took 40 minutes).
So, to sum up, if you go to PP's, get a pizza. If yer in a hurry and want to eat in, order ahead and it'll be mostly ready when you get there. To be fair, we've had to pull this trick with the Original Gino's, too, but they're both worth it. :)
~fin~