Pizzeria Pezzo — Restaurant in Woodbury

I really wanted to like this place, but the experience I had here was extremely disappointing.

TL;DR: Good servers, nice atmosphere. An undercooked, barely any topping, TOO much Sauce, Deep Dish Pizza. I attempted to fix it twice, including speaking to the manager. Manager ignored the issues, & also handled the interaction poorly. My stomach is still reeling, & I'm pretty sure that I got food poisoning from here.

Full story - Found this place had some very positive reviews & Chicago Deep Dish. The Server/host were very friendly (They get 4 stars) Ordered the Wrigley. Everything was going pretty well...

...until the food came. I was expecting a 45 minute wait, but I think it came in about 28-30 min. The server (wisely) said that I should let it sit for a while, since it was right out of the oven.

After letting it sit, I lifted the slice out of the pan. Immediately, I saw a pool of water/juice collecting in the area where I had taken a slice. There was no cheese pull, instead, just gloopy tomatoes

I'm not a novice when it comes to Chicago Deep Dish. You expect to have a little bit more sauce, but not this much.

Instead of a flaky, buttery crust, the bite was a soggy, clumsy, pile of pizza. The water from the sauce had leaked into the crust itself. (this shouldn't happen)

To be fair ---- It tasted pretty good, but proportions were all wrong. It was WAY too much sauce, & nothing like you'd get at a Chicago Deep Dish places. I scrapped about 1/2 of the tomato sauce off, & then the server came over.

"How's the first bite?" - Server

"I don't think it's done? It's really soggy. You see the pool of water here? (Points to the pan, oozing with tomato water)

She apologizes & says she can throw it back into the oven for a little while. (Again, server was great)

After getting the pizza back, I scrapped the sauce off & saw the toppings...

There was barely any toppings on the pizza. On one slice, I only found 2 slices of pepperoni, 3 tiny bits of sausage, & a thin film of an onion. In addition, there was barely a layer of cheese on the pizza!

(When others make these pizzas, they put a SIGNIFICANT amount of cheese/toppings to make a barrier that sauce cannot get through. This is why Chicago Deep Dish usually has a great cheese pull/lots of toppings)

I flag the manager down. Me - "I've eaten a lot of deep dish, like some places in Chicago... there's WAY too much sauce here"

"Oh really? I guess that's just the way it comes. Some people ask for EXTRA sauce when they order it."

"Yeah, but the proportions are wrong, there's not enough cheese here."

"Oh, no, there's lots of cheese on it, we use 16 ounces of cheese."

I point to the pan, dripping with tomato water. "Well I mean, look, it's soggy, there's water in the pan."

He reinforces that they use a lot of ingredients, restating quantities, even though there is evidence to the contrary in front of him.

It's clear he was unwilling to address the issue. We go back and forth for a minute. I say, "Alright, well, I just wanted to tell you." Then he smacked me lightly on the shoulder, "We just want you to be happy."

You should never touch a customer, especially when they're clearly unhappy with their food. This is basic managerial training.

Honestly, I should have pushed harder to address the issue, but I've always been taught to be polite. I was pretty livid at being ignored. I quietly scrapped off all the excess sauce, had another slice (since I was still hungry) boxed up the leftovers, paid, and left.

The pics show the pizza & result. It was so soggy that it left dimpling in bottom of the thick cardboard box (3rd Pic).

Everyone can have a bad day. But, a fumbled managerial interaction with a disappointed customer, & poor cooking makes it so this place should be steered clear of, until they get their house in order.

Also, the pizza was $33. Also, I think that since it didn't get cooked for 45 minutes, that I might have food poisoning. I've felt awful since my meal there. I want to say more, but there is a character limit. Very...

This was a first time experience and we weren't disappointed.

My wife and I chose the outside patio for seating and despite being rather close to one of the busiest intersections in Woodbury, it's remarkable how little noise there was during the Wednesday evening rush hour. Everyone dining was talking in comfortable conversational tones without having to speak over any traffic noise.

Paper menus were offered along with an ample list of adult beverages that were available. Reading the menu outdoors is a bit of a challenge since it's black print on both sides of a white sheet of paper and you can see both sides at the same time. With this being our first visit we needed a little extra time to look at all the selections. Our server, Dan, was very helpful and when I informed him this was our first time visiting he graciously explained the menu in detail and made some excellent recommendations that we ended up trying. The cipollini mascarpone cheese dip with homemade focaccia was a great starter and exceeded our expectations. Our hot coal fired pizza arrived just before finishing our starter.

Our service was phenomenal starting with the person that seated us, our server Dan who treats everyone like a good friend, and the others that stopped by the table to check our needs. The servers were busy with many customers but never appeared rushed and treated you as if you were the only person there while speaking with you. The food was good with portion sizes that would allow you to share a meal, but the service was the real star of the evening.

The only critique, the bunched up plastic tarps or banners against the building and shrubbery detract from the patio esthetic value. I'm guessing these might be tarps used for covering the wood used to fire the coal ovens. Maybe if these were stored behind the wood rack that is next to it (and occasionally clean up the wood debris underneath the rack) it would add even more charm to the patio.

If you've been holding out on trying this pizzeria, do yourself a favor and...

Date Night - Hubby and I went to PP - which is our favorite deep dish pizza place. We were seated immediately and promptly ignored for 10 minutes. When another table of 4 came in and was served before us, I asked a passing person who our server was. A server who had passed us by a couple of times showed up shortly. We asked her to put our pizza order in right away before the other table as we know DD pizza is 35-40 minutes which she said she did. She came back then and took our drink order and reminded us of the 35 minute oven time. We acknowledged her. At the 40 minute mark from when she took our order, she came and told us our order was up and it was "setting" - something I hadn't heard before but also said our food would be out in a minute or two. To our surprise, the table of 4 that came in after us received their DD pizza, and then a table of 2 that came 15 minutes after us received their DD pizza. We flagged down the server who told us all of our pizzas went in at the same time - which was blatantly a lie as she had told us 50 minutes earlier she had put it in at 6:30. I asked about the table next to us that had their pizza already and they had arrived at least 15 minutes after we had ordered ours. She finally delivered our pizza at the 55 minute mark which was now 15 minutes after she told us it would be 2 minutes. Rather than tell us the truth that the kitchen had screwed up or they hadn't put our pizza in when they should have or told us,. she lied and said they had put all 3 in at the same time. i hate being lied to - just tell the truth that you or someone messed up. Further our pizza was luke warm as well as the extra pizza sauce that I had ordered. I showed her evidence of it being luke warm and she walked away. We will not be going back to this Pizzeria Pezzo - we will drive the extra 15 minutes to the one in White Bear Lake where we don't get lied to and they have more help on staff and appear to be better organized. Nothing was offered to us for our extra wait. We were not happy about...