Regina La Pizzeria — Restaurant in Sydney

The open pizza kitchen at Regina La Pizzeria feels electric. Expert pizzaiolo Matteo Ernandes mans the paddle, tipping pies to get well-distributed char in the imported, Fazzone family pizza oven. Owner, Federico Zanellato (Lumi), works the pass, issuing soft reminders to his all-male crew. The energy of the music encourages them to occasionally break out in dancing, though the playlist needs work and the tinny speakers need bass. The floor crew aren’t quite as confident as the kitchen—mucking up both pizza and wine delivery—but it’s early days. Everything else is on point: take two of Wunderlich Lane is definitely a winner.

The proof is in the pie. Fellini ($28) presents corn, ham, Comté, for di latte and spicy honey on a ridiculously light base with a chewy, blistered crust. It folds down into nothing: lucky as the ‘slices’ are full quarters. An extra drizzle of chilli oil improves it even further. Thick, Torinese-style pan-baked pizza (padellino) as Mina ($28) arrives drizzled with pecorino cream. The fluffy golden dough is sliced open and filled with white bolognaise lifted with lemon zest, rosemary and pungent parmesan cheese. This one is sliced into six stonker-you wedges. I’m going to come back for the misdelivered pizza fritta: fried and baked pizza dough topped with gooey stracciatella, folded mortadella and vivid green dollops of rocket pesto ($30). It looked so good I was sorry to say we didn’t order it.

A pretty pomodoro ($16) salad tops heirloom tomatoes with fragrant strawberry slices, escallots, basil leaves, extra virgin olive oil and plenty of salt. You’ll also find ways to contrast the dough in the one-page all-Italian wine list, with plenty of good options—the Mazzolino Camara Chardonnay ($17) and the Adalia Singan Soave ($18)—available by the glass. The decor is classy without being so intimidating that you couldn’t drop in after work on the way to do the weekly shopping to eat pizza and neck a vino in an actually...

Went last Sunday for dinner and honestly, what a letdown. As someone who’s worked in food and hospitality for years, I can tell you — this place is all flash, no flavour.

We were seated outside because there was no room inside. Big mistake. No outdoor heaters, no blankets — just cold, noisy chaos. People brushing past constantly, and you’ve got to yell just to talk. Atmosphere? Non-existent.

Food? Overrated. I tried the so-called Versace Pizza. Sounds fancy, tastes bland. Barely any prawns, no bold flavour — felt like a soggy frozen pizza from the supermarket, dressed up for social media. The mushroom and cheese arancini was the only decent dish — crispy, well seasoned, fair play there.

Partner had the Burrata Pizza Fritta with lemon. Honestly, don’t bother. Tiny, and I mean tiny, amount of ham (or whatever processed meat it was), tasted like something out of a bargain bin at a corner store. No punch, no richness — just greasy and sad.

Service? One saving grace. Our waiter was amazing — friendly, switched-on, knew the menu, did everything right. I tipped him well. He was the only thing keeping that ship from going down.

The kicker? $227 for 3 pizzas and 2 arancini balls. For 3 people. And none of us were full. If you’re a bloke with a normal appetite, you’ll be swinging through Macca’s on the way home. Not even joking.

All up, not worth it. Feels like one of those places that’s built for Instagram, not for people who actually love good food. Plenty of better pizza joints around that know what they’re doing — this just ain’t...

I want to emphasize that the one-star rating is not about the product itself (the pizza), which we have enjoyed many times—sometimes even multiple times a week. But tonight, you lost not only us as regular customers, but also the group that was with us, and potentially others once we share our experience—because we all know how word of mouth works.

To be 100% clear: you lost us over $35 (a 10% service surcharge). It’s not about the $35 itself, but about the principle. For the first time since we’ve been coming, once we received the bill, you charged us both the Sunday/public holiday surcharge and the service surcharge for a table of six people. You’re certainly not the only restaurant that does this, but usually this kind of fee is applied to groups of eight or more.

That said, when we pointed it out, you could have handled the situation with a bit more grace—perhaps showing some consideration toward loyal customers who, at times, as a party of two plus a 4-year-old, have even ordered four pizzas. We also work in hospitality, and for customers like that, we usually offer a limoncello or a coffee—rather than adding a service fee—because that’s something we leave as a tip, and that’s what we call hospitality.

Remember: you work in HOSPITALITY. And you call this hospitality? Italian hospitality, no less! Perhaps the rapid “popularity” has gone a bit to your heads.

Best of luck...