Aj's Kitchen — Restaurant in Wilmington

I visited 4/15/25 and was very disappointed with bo the service and food I was served. After seeing all of the amazing looking subs on the Phantom Gourmet, I was excited to try AJs Kitchen. Upon arriving I saw the staff playing on their phones and uneager to help. I ordered a large meatball sub and two large imported Italians. I asked for six meatballs or whatever a side of meatballs was for my kids. They replied with we can only do a tray. I said fine, I'll take a tray of them. To which they replied, we only take advanced notice orders on those. Then I ordered two meatball dinners with as that was the only option to get meatballs other than a sub. I spent a total of $82 and change plus a $5.00 tip although the service was very poor. After quite some time, I received my order and went back to my vehicle. I opened the Italian sub and it was very small and looked nothing like what was on the phantom gourmet. I went back into the store and asked why it looks so different. The staff had no response and was not willing to help. After going back to my vehicle opened the meatball sub and it also looked nothing like what is on your Facebook page and on phantom gourmet. The meatballs were very grainy and had hardly any flavor. They tasted and had the texture like Chef Boyardee meatballs. The presentation of the meatballs also was different. The alleged fresh bread also was unimpressive. The meat from the imported italian sub was very low quality and tasted almost as if it were about to expire. The toppings were also not very fresh as well. After all said and done I am thoroughly disappointed. I also filled out the contact form on their website and expected a response from the owners. After two days, there has...

Everything about this place (except the staff) was a mixed bag. I had a chicken parm sub, a chicken parm calzone, and a pepperoni pizza.

The chicken parm sub, the chicken was a little too juicy, strange problem I know, but the cutlets were too thick, so they held a lot of moisture and made the bread soggy. Their marinara is pretty thin too, not my favorite, but that's definitely a preference kind of thing. The bread is all fresh baked, and the parts that weren't soggy were absolutely fantastic.

The pizza was nice and crispy, fairly thin. good balance of the cheese sauce and greasiness from the pepperoni. But somehow it just didn't have a lot of flavor. It wasn't awful, it just wasn't great. I mostly blame the sauce, it just didn't have a lot going on with it.

The calzone..... well it was inedible by the time I got home. 100% a me thing, but I've got a lot of sensory issues when it comes to food. I hate super greasy stuff on my fingers, and there are certain goopy textures that will induce a gag reflex on me. They do the classic italian style calzones as opposed to your typical pizza place style. It looked great. But they put some garlic butter or oil or something on top of it. So I already don't want to touch the thing, but I used a fork to try and eat it anyways. The top of it has such a thin layer of dough (which is usually a great sign with calzones), which you normally expect to be slightly crispy and chewy. But the butter or oil or whatever it is just turned that thin dough into a nasty soft mushy goop that I just couldn't eat.

I really, really wish that they would ask if customers want that, because it isn't really something I expect on a calzone and it...

Was looking for a place to try and came across AJs Phantom Gourmet review. Got a large cheese pizza and a large meatball sub. The pizza was okay. A little on the greasy side, but the crust was good, sauce was a bit bland. My daughter liked it more than I did. The meatball sub was poor. Absolutely nothing like the reviews. Not on a braided roll. I didn’t see that you needed to ask for one with a large, but even assuming that I needed to request one, the size was puny for a large. The meatballs in the sun few and on the smaller size. Nothing like the portions you see in reviews. Sauce was mediocre, only redeeming quality was the cheese was toasted on the sub. For the size, price and taste, I’ll go up the street to Subway, as even they have a better and larger...