Boston Pizza — Restaurant in Halifax

Folks, just no...please for the love of god - no.

The pizza is akin to something you would bake at home from the freezer. I would be dumbfounded to learn they actually make their dough fresh. It's not the worst pizza I've ever had, but I would never make a point to say "hey lets go to Boston Pizza for pizza". It's bland beyond belief and quite sad actually.

But get this...here's the kicker (this fact is still boggling my mind a week later) they do not list pizza toppings on the menu. Read that again. They DO NOT LIST pizza toppings on the menu. This is a restaurant named Boston PIZZA. Instead they list the various sizes of pizza available, and nothing else.

When I brought this odd fact up to the waitress, assuming I had been given a weird lunch menu, she said that I was correct in my observation "yeah, it is a bit odd isn't it". No further comment.

When I pushed a bit, now absolutely fascinated by this situation, her response was "we pretty much have whatever you would want to put on a pizza. The toppings vary in price". Toppings? Toppings you say? Varying prices for items not listed on the menu? I'm not exaggerating when I say this was now blowing my f-ing mind...I was at the point almost laughing at loud (and internally wondering if I was on some kind of low rent 'Just For Laughs' type show - oh you wacky Canadians!).

In any case, I ordered a completely forgettable bacon and pineapple pizza and since I had not eaten for 6-7 hours I consumed every crumb like a soldier in the trenches of some WWII battlefield - just thankful to the Lord for sustenance.

You would think this story ended here, but... I noticed that they had what they called a PINOOKIE on the dessert menu. This is a copycat version of a USA restaurant's dessert item called a PIZOOKIE (BJ's Brewhouse invented it). It's basically a little tin with a hot baked cookie and scoop of ice cream.

This is one of my all time favorite chain restaurant desserts, so of course I gave it a go. At BJ's Brewhouse, they have 6-8 varieties of the dessert and seasonal options as well (it's very popular), but at Boston Pizza they just have the chocolate chip cookie version.

Friends, I am sad to say this was also a disappointment. The cookie itself did not fill the tin as a true baked pan cookie should. It was almost as if they had taken a regular cookie, dropped it in, then heated it up inside the tin. It was greasy and had an aftertaste of old oil. And to top it off, as a final insult, they had added a tiny little scoop of plain vanilla ice cream the size of a quail's egg (well not quite that small, but way too small for the dessert). It was like I had bought a PIZOOKIE on Temu.

In any case, it's awfully hard to...

So disappointed with this place. On Friday we went down for a fish bowl like we do every few weeks. We waited out on the "patio" for service and talked after about 10 minutes of waiting for service we smelled something burning and started looking around trying to figure out where the smell was coming from but didn't see anything. About 5-10 minutes later we smell it a lot stronger and turn around to see the cigarette butt thing smoking so one of the people that i was with made the apparently bad decision to walk inside and ask for water to put it out. He put the fire out and we were still waiting for service. Meanwhile other people going into the restaurant were being served that had came in after us. So I went in to try and order our drinks myself since it was taking so long. The waitress said she would send someone out but I told her that we had already been waiting awhile so I thought it would be quicker to order them myself. She also said that she'd be ID'ing us (we're all 32+) We sat there Id's in hand for about another 5 minutes and she comes out saying that because of last weekend we couldn't be served. It made no sense because though we had been there last weekend we got great service from our waitress whose name I believe was Molly and we were polite and left her a nice tip and she told us to have a nice evening and everything. They literally tried to use nothing as an excuse to not serve us because of complaining about the slow "service " so we asked for the manager. The "Manager" Brad came out and tried to use the fire that we had nothing to do with and tried to help them with as an excuse to not serve us. Towards the end he seemed to come to the realization that we had nothing to do with it and seemed as though he may have been changing his tune and letting us be served but by this time we were offended and embarrassed. We made the decision to leave and not to spend our hard earned money there. I was the most offended and upset as I work in food service and would never make someones experience at my place of business like that especially if they were doing my business a favor like putting out a bloody fire. I could understand if we were the ones who started the fire or were staggering around being uncivilized but we weren't. So we waited for at least a half hour 30 minutes for service only to be told we started a fire (that we didn't) and that there was some imaginary slight from the week before pretty sure Molly would back us up on that too! (Any video surveillance in the area would prove us right on both accounts). I will be telling every one that I know about this as I have never been more offended in my life. Boston Pizza you dropped the ball big time...

Came by as it was the only restaurant open after a long flight. It was around 11pm and because it was a beautiful night out, we asked and were immediately seated at the patio. It took around 15 minutes for the server to come by and she said that it was just a little busy (when there were only 7 patrons in the establishment) and took our order; she reinterated that she had not forgotten about us. Initially patient and understanding, she double checked allergies and then took our order. 15 minutes later, our waters had arrived and she apologized for forgetting about us again because we were not supposed to be on the patio anyway at this time. We chuckled at the remark and wondered why she hadn't told us this honestly in the first place but brushed it aside. When we were served, she had accidentally spilled half the appetizer on the table and then asked if we needed the kitchen to remake it. Hungry, and left with the wrong utensils to eat spaghetti, we said of course. There was no mention of remedying the situation and instead she came by with a much smaller serving and the bill in hand before we dug in.

The food was overcooked, watery, and the fried items were shriveled.

When we asked about the mice scurrying downtown and into the restaurant, our server repeatedly told us that if we were concerned or disturbed by this, we shouldn't eat at any restaurants downtown because it is a problem with underground tunneling and restaurant density and food waste. She added that they do spray and inspect here, but it is useless and they always find them coming back. Seeing that we were uncertain and uncomfortable with this comment, she laughed that if we thought this was an issue, bear lake has an even bigger problem. As someone who has loved Halifax in previous visits and bringing someone new over for the first time, this interaction had soured our night. Please consider appropriate training for your staff members. Thanks.

Update: BP, your canned response to this review shows a lack of care towards the situation and is...