Antonio’s Flying Pizza — Restaurant in Houston

My company has been ordering take-out from Antonios for nearly 6 years. We usually ordered from here when we wanted a quick and tasty pizza lunch. Never again.

Last month my family home was destroyed by the Hurricane that hit Houston. We had 40" of water in our home for 10 days and we have no idea when we will be back if ever. After 3 weeks of misery I decided to take my wife and 3 kids to dinner to cheer them up. Because we are displaced the home we are staying in is near the restaurant so we decided to give it a shot. The hostess was kind and knew our situation after asking. We ordered a few drinks, an appetizer and then our meal. When the meal came the waiter completely and totally disappeared. We completed our meal with no refills, no check-ups and no consideration. I finally asked another waiter to give me the bill which she did with a smile on her face. We got up to leave and I walked by someone who I thought may have been the owner, but spent most of his evening tossing dough for entertainment. I told him I was disappointed in the service and rather than asking me why he told me the waiter was bad and "things happen". Then the manager on duty got involved and also repeated the "things happen" line. She said if it was that bad we should have found her to complain. My family was in our booth for 1 hour and the manager never once stopped by to check on us. Never asked how our meal was. Never even looked over to see how we were doing, even as a new table with new faces. She was very poor at her job, and her snarky responses to us were not welcomed.

Was the food here good? Yes it was. But the service was horrible and the way management treated us, after the few weeks we had just gone through, was inexcusable. We will never ever eat here again and my company will never order take-out from these people. If you have a heart pass on this place, there are many other wonderful restaurants to choose from just a few...

Ambiance and service are both like old Italy. Not that I’ve been to Italy, but I’ve studied it and heard plenty of stories from travelers. Right as you walk in, a man is preparing handmade pizza and flipping the dough up in the air (hence the fun sign). They start you out with bread and butter. Oil and balsamic vinegar are available on request to dip your bread. The bread is warm and flaky. Very good. We got calamari for our appetizer. It is served with warm delicious marinara sauce and fried well. It was good, but needed a hint more seasoning. We ordered the chicken fettuccine alfredo and lasagna to share. The lasagna is wonderful. Arrives at the table still bubbling. The meat and sauce are spot on and perfect! The chicken fettuccine alfredo was very good noodle and sauce wise, but the chicken itself was a little dry and had very little seasoning. The sauce helped a lot to make it tastier. $65.79 (before tip) for our meal (no alcohol). It was a very good night and I’m happy we settled on this restaurant. I hate to only give 4 stars, but my reviews are always very honest. It might have been an off night, which I understand happens. I would definitely recommend this establishment and will be back to try other dishes. The pizzas looked fantastic. Maybe we will try that next. Arrive early, especially on the weekend. We were seated right away at 5:30, but people lined up shortly after us and the wait was long. That says something. They have carry out available, if that...

I wanted to like this place so much. The historic sign made me think of all the great Italian places I'd been to as a kid on the East coast. Unfortunately, it did not.

1. Food Quality: Everything we had seemed to be made fresh---which is wonderful. However, the dishes we had were completely lacking in basic seasoning and the overall flavor profiles were muted and uninspired.

2. Value/Pricing. Fresh and homemade costs more. I totally understand that and am more than willing to pay for it. However, the finished product has to justify the cost and nothing we ate came even close. $10 for six very small mushrooms stuffed with breadcrumbs is ridiculous. $14 for a 12" square pizza with a few slices of mushrooms is pushing my limit. The fact that it was bland and slathered in overly acidic sauce made it unacceptable. The best thing we ate was the complimentary bread rolls. (And that is despite them being served with butter that was too cold to spread)

3. Service: No actual issues here but the waiter had zero energy and I'd hate to think how he would handle things if it was busy. (We were there around 4:30 on a Saturday)

I can deal with sub-par food and mediocre service. But not at those prices. I could have gone to Olive Garden for half the cost and had no worse of an experience.

All the ambiance and fresh ingredients in the world don't matter if the execution by the kitchen and service team doesn't match...