Mellow Mushroom Raleigh — Restaurant in Raleigh

Because the food at this location is fantastic, we keep returning! With that said, the service is questionable. A few examples of this happened Friday night, July 11, about 6 pm. My family and I entered the establishment behind a large family. They were being helped (someone had gone to find them a table), but that was unbeknownst to us. We stood there waiting our turn, while the hostess looked at me several times and proceeded to look highly uninterested/bothered with her job duties. About five minutes had passed (lots of looks again by the hostess) when my husband walked in after parking our car and wanted to know why we hadn't been helped yet. He goes around the family who had already been helped and tells the hostess we're needing a table for four. She grabs the menus and walks us outside. I turned to my husband, utterly confused, as she had made several looks at me but neglected to utter the words, "Have you been helped?" or "Can I help you?" That was just the start of the evening. Queued about 30 minutes later when I saw an angry man come outside and tell his wife, "I just wanted her to help us!" When the hostess suddenly walked out of the establishment, with a sour/upset look on her face, she led them over to a table. The husband had been so upset by the hostess' attitude that he walked back into the establishment (I assumed to find a manager), but then I saw both him and his wife leave, truly upset. I was not shocked at all that he had that experience with the hostess, as our treatment truly turned me off from the get-go. When we received "our" bill, we had received someone else's bill along with their credit card. Yikes! If we had been dishonest, it could have been terrible for someone eating there. Alas, I walked the cc and the bill back into the restaurant, asked the male hostess now at the counter to find my server and trade the bill and cc with my correct items. Great...

In my opinion, one of the most delicious wings in the Raleigh area, which is why I decided to go on a 20 min drive just to pick up some wings. Then why the 1-star, well, only because of the belligerent big bearded guy behind the counter. I ordered a small "cheese only" pizza, and since I know they were EXTREMELY busy, my wife and I waited patiently for 50 minutes for a small pizza. Our ticket was nowhere to be found (i know this to be a fact because one of the young guys looked everywhere and never found it, and the lady manager didn't know where it was either), and after seeing a man who ordered about 15 minutes after us leave with three LARGE pizzas, I asked for a refund because they "lost my pizza," my exact words. So this bearded guy behind the counter got ticked off and starts being belligerent telling me I was not the priority and when I said I'm a paying customer, his response was "I don't give a Fxxx who you are," and made fists like he wanted to fight," now at this point I was still calm, while he kept getting loud, with the lady "manager" next to him telling him to calm down (that didn't stop him). Then another worker approaches me making it seem like I was the one causing the trouble all while I remained calm and explained myself to her so she can see the issue was her co-worker. I thank God I didn't lose it with this guy who clearly has no respect for his customers, and clearly doesn't know what he could get himself into. The lady manager remained calmed and helped me out under such a stressful situation at this point. I may go back just for the wings, but will be disappointed if this man is still serving customers at the register, specially knowing the manager witnessed the entire situation. Hopefully she will be honest with herself and others and not deny how it all went down and discipline...

It was so good to come "home" to the Raleigh location. We had lived in Durham, NC for the past three years, and visited the restaurant in Chapel Hill, but this is the one with the pizzas I remember, and it's good to come home.

Let's get started with the parking. Most nights, the parking can be a challenge, especially so on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. There is parking across the street in a car mechanic's lot, and that's about it. But considering the size of the restaurant and the dual parking, that's about all the store could handle anyway, so it works out. That said, the last few times I've visited, I was able to park in Mellow Mushroom's co-located parking without a problem.

I always order the garlic cheese bread with extra garlic and cheese. I'll gladly pay for that and my son and I usually finish it very, very quickly. While I always ask for extra garlic and cheese, sometimes I don't get it, but that's okay because the bread, as it is originally served, is still excellent.

I usually choose a medium Mighty Meaty pizza for my son and me, but now I skip the Italian sausage (too many caraway seeds), and I ask for a well-cooked pizza. That's no reflection on Mellow Mushroom; their pizza crust is usually firm, thoroughly cooked, and crunchy. But I'm asking for an extra bake to cook the toppings more, especially the bacon and pepperoni.

We usually order Coke for our drinks and they are always super-fresh, bubbly, never flat, and delicious - a wonderful complement to the meal.

We used to order the honey-cinnamon pretzel twists, but now we're just too full on the pizza and have no room for desert.

And now that I've moved back to Raleigh, I expect to visit this Mellow Mushroom a...