New Restaurant Review - Pizza Mafia
My friends and I have been watching the old Queen of Sheba site ever since the sign went up that a new restaurant would be opening at Sibley Plaza. Finally after months of waiting, Pizza Mafia opened at 2447 W. 7th St, St. Paul. The first week my friend brought over a beef and black olive pizza. Very good. I know tastes vary, but I really liked it and liked it just as much cold. Square cut pieces.
Only complaint: some of the pieces weren't cut all the way through.
Three days later, another friend and I had their hoagies, I had meatball, and it was delicious. She tried the Philly and liked it alot. We both agreed we would have them again.
Today, I ordered several appetizers and a cheeseburger with fries. The burger was for me and two friend were to split the appetizers. We wound up fighting over the appetizers (figuratively, not physically) and splitting my cheeseburger and fries. The chicken drummies were Great. The BBQ wings were very good. The cheese bread was very good. It was on of the best cheeseburgers I've had in ages. But it was the fries that was the only thing that tied with the drummies. Old fashioned french fries where you can actually taste the potato.
They have an all you can eat buffet for $5.95, Monday thru Friday. I haven't tried it, but the take out menu says it has pizza, salad, wings, and soup. I am a shut-in due to health, but my friends act as delivery people for me from different restaurants, and this old fashioned comfort food it becoming one of my favorites.
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Pizza Mafia
2447 7th St W, St Paul, MN 55116
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Firstly, I am not a professional food critic. However, I do know what I like, and I did not like Pizza Mafia. My fiancee and I went to this particular eatery twice in a two week period. The first time we went was at 4 pm, the buffet was closed, and we were the only ones in the restaurant. We were greeted by two waitresses who told us to sit wherever we liked, and provided us with menus. The service was friendly enough, and since it was our first time there, we admired the walls and the general atmosphere. The tables have a cheap, plastic cover over them, the walls are decorated with posters of Italy and of famous mob bosses. The menu is kept simple, which is normally a pleasure.
I had wanted to order the mozzeralla sticks, as I think you can tell a great deal from a place from how the most simplistic menu item tastes, but my fiancee wanted to try their pizza dunkers. The pizza dunkers are made up of bread and cheese, like small flat bread pizzas. They are served with their marinara sauce, which we praised because it tasted quite fresh.
My fiancee ordered a calzone, while I ordered a cheeseburger. This is where things started to roll downhill. The calzone is monumentally huge. It is impossible to eat in one sitting. She had ordered hers with chicken. Due to our budget, we have had to purchase frozen chicken nuggets from the grocery store. After taking a bite of the chicken in her calzone, we concluded that the chicken tasted the exact same as the frozen chicken in the store. I may not have a palate to end all palates, but I do know what frozen - reheated chicken tastes like, and that was definitely frozen chicken.
The cheeseburger I ordered tasted disastrous. The meat had an odd texture to it and it tasted bland. I honestly thought it had been cooked a little and then stuffed into a microwave. This was not a rich, juicy burger. This was sadness on a bun, ordered medium. The fries, however, were delightful.
We also learned that while the menu stated that they delivered, it was a falsehood. They do not deliver at all.
We came back because my fiancee was happy to find a place that might still have good Italian food. Being an Italian, she was still hopeful. I went along with her, back to Pizza Mafia, but this time at around noon. It was fairly busy, but then it's a very small establishment. Since there is no sign for seating, we seated ourselves and waited over ten minutes for someone, anyone, to come by. No one did. I finally had to go up to the counter where two female waitresses were standing, talking to one another, and request two menus. They looked up, clearly surprised to see that two people had come into their place without them knowing.
So I sat back down and when our menus were handed to us, the waitress also had to spray down the table. We decided to move since some of the tables in the establishment were far too small to support two plates at the same time.
We decided to try for the buffet, since the menu advertised pizza, salad, and mozzarella sticks. I really wanted the salad and sticks, since their meat products last time left a lot to be desired. And my fiancee wanted to try the pizza. Upon going over to the buffet, I realized that there was no salad and there were no mozzarella sticks. There were only the pizza dunkers and one kind of pizza. I asked one of the waitresses about those cheesy breaded sticks that always seemed to elude me, and was told that sometimes the buffet changed and that I should just enjoy their dubious looking wings in place of the sticks.
There was no salad to be seen.
I opted to go back to my original plan of just ordering from the menu while my fiancee made a meal of the pizza dunkers. I ordered the sticks for starters. The waitress was a little surprised that I had not figured out an entire entree to order and asked me if I wanted to just order the sticks right now and wait.
Well, yeah. That's kind of the whole point of appetizers, isn't it? Nevermind that we had no idea where to order. Some people kept coming up to the front of the store to get food, some to pay their bill, some to just chat. So I ordered my appetizers up at the bar area and sat back down, clutching the menu as though it could possibly save me from this experience.
Spoiler alert: It couldn't.
When my sticks finally came, the waitress asked me about my entree. They had one kind of pasta, several pizzas, several kinds of hoagies, the calzone, and the burgers. I decided to just go for the cheeseburger again.
And then I tried the mozzarella sticks. They were bland, the cheese came apart easily, and the only memorable thing there was, was the marinara sauce. Honestly, this sauce and the pizza dunkers are the only reason for me giving this place one star. I've had worse sticks, but I've had a lot better. The menu is fairly pointless since what it advertises for the buffet lies, and again, they do NOT deliver.
After being so disgusted by the service and my appetizer, I went up to the bar and asked her to forego my cheeseburger. I wasn't in the mood any longer to take a burger to go, knowing that it's a frozen product that will sit in my refrigerator. As it is, my burger had already been cooked - record time! Not a good sign - and had been left to cool or be stolen by another up on the bar area. We still had yet to get our check and my order had just been sitting up there, ready to be taken. What were they waiting for?
They took the burger off the bill, of which I was glad because I didn't feel like going into detail as to why I didn't want their frozen reheated foods. Though by that point, I was certainly in the mood to shout it from the rooftops. We were given our bill, we paid, and we left.
All in all, horrible experience and I won't be going back. Not only is the atmosphere informal, but it's ridiculously informal. I still don't know where you're supposed to order from, I still don't know if we need to seat ourselves or if we'll be seated by another. I just know that if two people came in, sat themselves, went over to the buffet, grabbed what they wanted, ate at their table, and then left, then they could more than likely get away with it. I've rarely been treated to such a bad experience. I would still be happy if the food was, at least, passable. But they couldn't even have that going for it.
So here's my advice. If you want to eat at this place, stick to the pizza dunkers and a plate of fries. Everything else and you're taking your gastrointestinal system in your own hands
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Pizza Mafia
2447 7th St W, St Paul, MN 55116›1 Reply-
re: kvh81
I work nearby Sibley Plaza. I started going for the buffet because it was a great deal for a quick lunch. Now I've moved on to the burgers and hoagies. Yummy! The spaghetti for $7 lasted me 3 meals. All of their portions are extra large. It's great to have something new with options in the neighborhood.
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