Pasta Plus Restaurant

Reviews 3

LO

Logan C

After a couple months of regularly ordering pizza here, we finally reached a point where we will no longer be spending our hard earned money in this establishment. There are probably 20 different places to get pizza in a 5 mile radius... so I dont see this place staying open for too much longer. So long story short, my girlfriend and I had become regulars here. For the last couple months wed order pizza once or twice a week on average. The majority of the time, it was great... possibly the best pizza Ive ever had. However, about a month ago we were given a pizza that was so undercooked that the dough was raw and wet, and the cheese and pepperoni werent even remotely finished cooking. So we brought it back and the cashier gave us a new one, along with a complimentary dessert. I checked the pizza before leaving, and it looked fine, but upon arriving home, we found that while it looked better on top, the dough was undercooked just like the first one. At that point we just finished cooking it in our oven at home. Figuring it was a fluke, we ordered a handful of times since then and the pizza has always been good. Fast forward to tonight... we ordered a pizza and brought it home. As soon as we opened the box, it was clear we were going to have a repeat of the bad pizza experience from before. So we returned the pizza and politely said we would prefer to get our money back since this was now the third pizza in less than 2 months that they had served us which was undercooked to the point of being soggy and literally dripping wet. So the cashier went to get a person that I can only assume was the owner, a short, older Italian man. He looked at the pizza, then came up to us and, with a clearly negative demeanor, said "whats wrong with the pizza?" So I told him that the dough was raw and dripping wet and that the cheese had been pushed off the pizza all over the inside of the box, and that Id like a refund. He then proceeded to tell me that it was properly cooked, followed by some passive aggressive comment which he whispered under his breath, but which I did not catch. When I confronted him about it, he basically claimed that he did not want our business and he wanted us to leave and not come back... all because we just wanted our money back because we were served a raw pizza. Not once did he make any attempt to resolve the situation, nor did he try to keep us as customers, despite the fact that we have been ordering (mostly) happily from them once or twice a week for a couple of months. He had a horrible, crappy, negative attitude from the moment he walked up to us. Ive never, in my life, been treated so disrespectfully by an owner or employee of a restaurant or other business. Its a real shame... because when its good, its great. But I just cannot hand my money over to a business not knowing whether Im going to get a legitimate product in return. As a quick aside: Ive worked in restaurants for about 10 years in a number of positions in front of house and back of house. For the last 4 1/2 years Ive been working as a cook and kitchen manager. So, Im not saying Im never wrong... but I can say, fairly confidently, that I know what raw dough looks like, and I know when a pizza is undercooked... and I surely know a thing or two about how to properly resolve a situation where a customer is unhappy due to an inconsistent, and inedible, product. And Pasta Plus is just absolutely, without a doubt, utterly lacking in even the most basic aspects of quality and service. I will never spend another penny in that joke of an eatery.

A

A Private User

We moved here from NYC last year to a house near family. Our electrician (a lovely guy) told us we had to try Pasta Plus. We first ordered pizza take out. It was great, hot and tasty, good crust - ambience of store with counter service by an obese young man (with no personality or skills for that type of work) was odd and unfriendly - who cared - the pizza and gnocchi we ordered were great. WE decided to purchase some items from their "market." When asked what is the difference between their tomatoe sauce and their maranara he replied theres more seasoning in the marinara. Difference between cheeses (they sell) they are different was his curt reply... IN spite of the lack of warmth of thier service we continued to shop in their market - weekly - always encountering this obese, unfriendly young man - business was always slow and we thought we were supporting the business we had grown to love by buying things in their market we could get elsewhere for less money. After many Friday nights of buying pizza and the like for movie night with our family - again pizza was inconsistent. One day to surprise my husband I ran to their market to buy marinara and cheese, sausage and two bottles of wine (overpriced but again we thought we were supporting the market so it wasnt a big deal). When I got home from an afternoon of shopping (their market and the grocery store) and unloaded my purchases - I opened the bag and saw that the sauce and cheese were missing. I was upset and tired knowing I would have to go back out to get them but I would call first. No big deal right? You call a store like that back and you hear "oh yes we have your items - were sorry come back and get them." What happened was unheard of - I was passed around from a confused employee who kept saying what did you order? I didint order I shopped in thier market - to an Italian man whose command of English was very poor who said "if you dont have it - where is it? We dont have it." Basically he accused me of lying. He implied we had the sauce and cheese (least expensive item we had purchased). We were in total shock that there was no kindness, no attempt to resolve it. I had to drive back with my bag and receipt and when I arrived the teenager at the counter said the manager is too busy to talk to you - get your sauce and cheese. Rather than lead his employees he showed them that it is not important to care for a customer but rather that they are not essential - while its busy on a Friday night at Pasta Plus - the rest of the week is very slow and I dont think they can afford to treat customers as badly as we were treated. We were distressed at their abuse. This is not the owner who was in charge but a bald man who i believe is the manager. He eventually came out and kept saying "well where is it? we dont have it" - I can only imagine it was incorrectly given to another customer or the fat kid ate it! Just discovered the abusive elderly man was in fact the owner of the restaurant!

AL

Alexandra Laub

We visited here last night at the request of our friends who had been wanting to try this place due to the high number of 5 star reviews it received. I, however, will not be giving this establishment that honor. Its clear that this place has a cult area following. To start, our server was incredibly rude. I dont care how many five star reviews you have or how busy you are, being rude to your customers is absolutely unprofessional. Upon sitting, he wanted our drink order before we even looked at the menu. When we asked for a minute to decide, his response was, "I had to chase the last party out of here so you could get seated promptly. You could at least order a soda in the meantime." These types of comments continued throughout the night. The server came back to our table with the drinks and said, "Are you ready? Because I need your order now. We are very busy." No server has ever said something like that to me in my life. A friend asked what type of meat came in an item since the menu just said "stuffed with meat", to which the server responded rudely, "I have no idea, they come pre-stuffed from our vendor so we never know whats in them." When our salads were brought out, we were told they were "complimentary," but if you look at the menu, it said "entree comes with salad and bread." So how is something "complimentary" when we were told we were getting it in the first place? After receiving our dinner, we were never asked how it was, and our drinks were never refilled (only our water was by a serving assistant). Ten minutes after receiving our dishes and digging in, the waiter came by and said, "Do you need boxes?" The whole experience was ruined by this disrespectful waiter. As far as the ambiance, it was extremely cramped, and I didnt feel that it appeared to be that clean. I felt the food was a 3/5 at best. You could tell most of what they served came frozen and was just warmed up with a little jarred sauce and cheese thrown on top. However, we did enjoy some items that you could see were made fresh and with care. Bottom line: there are MANY other Italian restaurants in the DMV that are much more worthy of your money, serve higher quality food, AND are more polite. We will not be returning, and I will never recommend this place.