East Side Mario's — Restaurant in Whitchurch-Stouffville

I've been to this location last year during the pandemic and it was still pretty good but this time the food quality seems to have dropped. The chicken parmigiana was burnt around the edges and the minestrone soup was basically just reddish water, even with salt added. The garlic bread was slightly soggy even though we only took about 12 minutes to get home and arrived on time for pick up. It was actually pretty bad to even drink and I normally don't like to waste food. The Scarborough Lebovic location was spot on, comparable to pre-covid times, on my previous ESM meal.

Updated April 2024: Went to dinner here because my daughter wanted their Caesar salad and it's improved from the last review. The food was much better and they even have a new soup, potato bacon in addition to the tomato and Italian wedding. The server, Linda, was attentive and friendly.

Updated July 2024: Had a mid week dinner here and we were lucky enough to get Linda again as our server. She is so friendly and attentive that I'd recommend coming here for the service even if it's out of the way. The food was great. She gives good advice on the offerings and comes back to check on us often as well as offer to bring bread, soup and salad without us having to work really hard to flag someone. There seems to be a painting class happening while we were there. Might be interesting to try that some time. Thanks for a great evening!!

Apr 2025: Came here as a pick me up dinner with my daughter and so thankful that we got Linda again!! I seriously think that lady is by far one of the best servers anywhere. She's friendly, helpful and attentive and gives good recommendations. We thoroughly had a good time and by the end of dinner not only did we have food to take home but also bigger smiles than when we got there. Thank you Linda!! I hope your boss appreciates you as much as we do!! Btw, Monday special is the chicken parmesan for $19.99 with the purchase of any drink. I'd recommend the cotton candy Cosmo if you like cocktails. It was...

I have ordered takeout from here on multiple occasions the last two were very upsetting. On one order they messed up on my payment. They then began to tell me that they were unable to refund money so the lady gave me three cards worth $10 each to make up for the refund (she did not give any other details about these cards). The following week I ordered food online for takeout because I figured that I had three $10 gift cards. When I got to the restaurant to use them to pay for my food, the lady swiped them thinking that they were also gift cards and then she realized that they were $10 off dine in meals only and that I couldn’t even use them with a takeout order and that they were only to be used one at a time. The only reason why I ordered the food was because I thought I had $30 in gift cards to make up for the amount that I was charged on a previous order. When I found out that they weren’t gift cards I no longer wanted the food. She then continued to rudely demand that I still pay for the takeout because there is nothing that she could do with the food now. I told her I didn’t want the food and I wasn’t paying for it and explained that these cards were because of a mess up the happened the last time when I ordered the takeout I left the food there and walked out of the restaurant. I’ve never heard of someone not being able to be refund someone’s money. I will not be returning back to this location horrible customer service and the last girls attitude was disgusting. I was also standing at the takeout counter for at least 10 minutes with multiple staff peeping around the corner from the kitchen seeing that I was there and no one helped me. If they mess up your food or mess up on your order or payment don’t expect be reimbursed for anything. I don’t think I’ve ever written a Google review so the fact that I am writing one right now...

I used to love this location but today is the last time I will ever come here again. The last encounter I had with this waitress already made me wary of this location but this time she was outright sneaky, rude and undermining. Our server was 144 Jennifer. We came for lunch and I ordered one of the pasta lunch specials which did not come with AYCE salad and bread whereas my sibling ordered a create your own pizza that did come with AYCE. She did not ask us what salad we wanted and it took 20 minutes for us to call her down. When we finally did she did not apologize for missing our salad, rather she was very accusatory and reluctant to give it to us. We did end up getting our salad but it was a smaller portion and very soggy. At the end when we received our bill. she did not even open it for us and simply handed us the machine. When we looked at the bill we saw that she charged us for the AYCE pasta AND pizza special when we only order one AYCE portion. When we corrected her she was more annoyed rather than sorry. She was reluctant to give us AYCE because I ordered a cheaper lunch special, however we did not abuse the system. We only ordered one salad and one extra home loaf and what we received was soggy, small, overdressed. Their dishes are ridiculously overpriced so we should at least receive what we paid for, but that did not happen today. This establishment is only concerned with making money by topping it off with greedy and arrogant servers. Naturally, we did not tip her and instead of accepting responsibility and acknowledging that her service was lousy, she goes over to gossip to the other servers. Overall the meal was decent but the experience was ruined by this...