Cafe Pizzaiolo — Restaurant in Alexandria

1st time to Pizzaiolo.

If you are wanting to spend GOOD money to have poor service, ZERO personality from your sever, have to find your server server to ask continuously for drinks & water, to clean up after yourself after your meal, ask for to go boxes, work REAL hard as a customer (yet decent food), also to have your to go food order WRONG after that mess, then this is the place for you!

Had to exercise LOTS of patience as a new customer.

Ate a few appetizers then ordered pizza to go. Dishes from appetizers were never removed by server, had to flag down server for beverages, etc.

Waited over 40 minutes for pizza to go and had to take more time to find out if the server (who had her hair on a bun) even ever submitted the in person to go order to the kitchen.

Had the opportunity to speak with other customers also who were waiting for their order and they proceeded to say that unfortunately poor service is normal at this place!

One Gentlemen said he stopped going there for lunch because it would take an hour for his lunch.

Only one who saved the day (hence 2 star review plus the food was decent minus the server mistakes) was Rico who apparently it was his his first day there and who saved the day at the end.

Even using the restroom as a customer, had to fight through the staff who were congregating and didn't even move out of the way!

Truly disturbing especially since they expect customers to pay good money for their food (which is actually decent) but unfortunately the servers expect a gratuity for POOR service, wrong!

Good Luck with that!

*PLUS TO GO PIZZA ORDER WAS WRONG!!!

Definitely NO need to return to Cafe Pizzaola because obviously MANAGEMENT is CLUELESS that their staff needs SEVERE training if you expect...

Usually I'd give this pizzeria 4 stars. THIS REVIEW IS BASED ON ONE EXPERIENCE ONLY. In Italy there is a saying that when the food is too salty the chef is in love.... This restaurant must have made its employees drink gallons of LOVE POTION. . . A beloved neighborhood pizza spot for young families.... We had always eaten well here a few years ago. On a nostalgic visit to Alexandria June 12th was a surprising change. While the pizza was delicious, the beef au jus, and the two order of chicken and broccoli for children all were inedible. They were not just a little bit too salty. It was as if a box of salt had fallen into the pan unnoticed by the chef and served up into the take-way cartons any way. Could it be that because we had very kindly asked for no added garlic to anything ....[ We are from a region of Italy that does not cook w/garlic.] .. The cook thought extra salt would add extra flavor?... We are not the type of people to storm back demanding our money back. We pondered calling the manager up to let him/her know about the mishap.... But we had just flown into DC, our flight had been delayed 4 hours.....and we ate the pizza and broccoli and fell into bed exhausted. Manager.... Do an inventory on the salt. You'll find quite a bit missing, tho there may be wedding bells soon...

I was really looking forward to trying this pizza out. I had read reviews that it was one of the best pizza places in this area. I was really disappointed. I am 64 years old and started making pizzas at my 1st job at 14 years old here in the northern Virginia area. I mean I had to roll out the dough and make the pizzas. The pizza was a little greasy and oily. When I tried to pick up a slice out of the box the topping slid off. It probably could have used about another 30 seconds in the oven to bake the cheese to the crust. Most certainly not a whole minute or would have burned it. It was also very salty. I had ordered feta cheese on top of the pizza. I know feta is salty, but not that salty. I also ordered the fried zucchini. There was no salt ironically on the breading. They ignored my request for ranch dressing and gave me the marinera. The way they packed it into a box, they put the marinara container on top of the zucchini smashing it into the bottom of the box. A relatively small box. I want to wish you good luck if you try...