Roma Ristorante Italiano - Staples Mill Rd — Restaurant in Virginia

Going out of my way with this review because this restaurant is worth knowing about. I will just save time for the reader reading. I eat out almost every single day, and it's at sit down restaurants, not drive-thru restaurants. So, here is my honest Simon Cowell-style review.

It's the best Italian Restaurant I have ever been to, period.

Incase you're wondering the full experience I had, read on!

So, today I was craving mozzarella sticks before i entered because, well, they taste awesome. As I entered the building, I was kinda floored by the extremely nice atmosphere, and was greeted by our Server, who was wearing a very professional uniform, tie and all. His pleasant personality matched his outfit, by the way... As I followed him to our table, I was impressed with the statue I saw, very neat so I thought... forgive me for the details, but hey, this is a review, right? :) I looked at the menu, and low and behold, there was the words "Mozzarella Ssritti" directly under the word "Appetizers". Sweet! After we ordered our drinks, the server said he'll be right back with some bread... Sweet, times 2. I was halfway into eating my first piece, and the server came with my appetizer, and was thinking, man that was fast!! They looked incredible... first bite with their marinara sauce and I was shocked once again of how great they were. So, the review of their Mozzarella Ssritti [for the unknowing, they are fried mozzarella triangles] is that they were the best, most satisfying ones I've ever had. To top it off, they make them from scratch in-house... very, very sweet. Speaking of sweet, I ordered a sweet tea, and, again, best sweet tea I ever had [no exaggeration... just pretend I am Simo Cowell for the fun of it]. It had a great balance of sweetness. Bravo Roma!

The Spinach Salad I ordered was excellent and tasted fresh, and the balsamic vinaigrette was excellent as well. Will remember next time to ask for the red peppers to be uncooked (personal preference!) :)

For the record, no I don't work there, and no I'm not getting paid to write this review. I know what tastes good, and this was worth writing an elaborate review so others know about this hidden gem restaurant here in the greatest city in Virginia. Highly, highly recommend this place to whoever is reading. Me and my mother both agree that it was better than Maggianno's. Prices were very reasonable as well... yes, another shock I had.

May be too much detail with this last experience, but we both wanted a glass that our drinks were served in for a souvenir, pretty cool that they even sold us them :D

Thanks for reading my review. Definitely looking forward to trying other foods they make, will be back soon....

The food we received was good. But there were some issue with our visit. To start we had a couple of under 10 kids and we had to ask if there was even a kids menu, none were offered. No big deal. The kids were late and not seated when the first of the party to arrive were. Drinks, order taking, salads all went fine. Then, when the entres started coming out, they came out one at a time. We had a group of 10. 8 plates made it out quickly enough, but slowly enough for me to notice they were coming one at a time. Then we started to wait. After a minute or two, our waitress let us know that a personal pizza we were waiting on was entered as a large pizza. We'd be charged for the personal, but the large would come out. Ok good enough, no big deal. Then the 10th plate, manicotti, "the kitchen is making it now". Another minute goes by, large pizza makes it out then, "oh the kitchen is making lasagna, did u order lasagna?" No manicotti. The manicotti was already brought out, but given to the person that ordered the lasagna, who was already a third of the way through it having mistaken it for lasagna. I think that's an honest mistake for a customer to make, but no the staff. We said bring the lasagna, and the original manicotti orderer took what was left of the manicotti and would eat a slice of the extra pizza too. So like I said, the food we got was good. Oh, the pizza, the person that prefer the pizza, said it was delicious while eating the first piece. The crust was crisp on the outside but soft in the middle. But when he got to the second piece, he said the crust was soggy. So evidence that it was rushed? The manicotti orderer agreed. This was a Saturday evening. After all this, no visit from the manager, didn't even see one. And to top that off, the waitress got an auto 18% tip because of...

My wife and ordered a large pizza. It took an extra long time to get it. When we started eating it we noticed that it was overcooked and the entire crust was hard underneath and it gave the taste of being slightly burned. We ate on it (we were both so hungry) while waiting for our waitress to check back on use so we could tell her. She never once checked back on us, to even to fill our water glasses, until we were finished eating the pizza. We left some of the crust, from the entire slices and just ate the toppings. When she finally did show up I told her about it and showed her the crusts. She said we should have said something about it before eating, even though she could see the crust. To make it short, I requested half off the total and had a difficulty time getting that, but finally did, after she went through the manager. I had also requested to have my water refilled, but she never brought that either. I reminded her that she never once came back to check on us until we were finished and she said, "but I was walking around through the restaurant and you could have gotten me". I'm not in a habit of having to "call out" to my waitress in a eating establishment. I kinda laughed to myself when I saw the place to enter a tip on the check. I paid the half that was due and we left. I'm surely not one to try to get "something for nothing", but when I pay for something I expect it...