Zio's Italian Kitchen

Wow, this place was not even up to par with olive garden! A cheap take off of macaroni grill with pizza and lasagna that compares with a "good value" brand at the supermarket! i love food of all sorts, and have never felt compelled to write about it to a buch of strangers! please stay home for dinner.......

The first time we visited Zio's, we were unimpressed with the appetizer, entree and salad, the wine was horrible, but the free bread and tiramisu were some of the best we'd had.

We received a coupon in the mail and decided to go back and try again. Without the coupon, we would not have done so, since (except for the items named above) Zio's is essentially Olive Garden quality at higher prices.

First off, we asked if our coupon would be honored during the lunch hour. Our waitress said no, and that we would have to order off the dinner menu. She then criticized our choice of drinks, saying we wouldn't spend enough to validate the coupon unless we bought more expensive ones. When she said that, she hadn't heard our food order yet, and since we had to order off the more expensive dinner menu, we easily met our "minimum price" even with the our cheap drinks.

She then brought out the bread and herbs (hot and flavorful) but neglected to provide us with any napkins or silverware. Fine--it's easy to eat by hand, but the oil did get on our hands. When she came back, she saw that our hands were oily, and said she would bring napkins "right away". She didn't bring napkins and silverware until our entrees arrived, long after we'd finished the bread. I ended up wiping my hands on the butcher paper on the table.

Next, my order had been prepared wrong, made with Alfredo sauce instead of marinara sauce. I prefer marinara, because I think Alfredo is too rich and greasy, but I don't like sending food back, and I didn't want to wait for them to cook another one, so I said it was fine. My husband's food was very salty.

Finally, since we couldn't finish our overly salted, greasy, heavy meals, we stopped eating that and ordered tiramisu, because it was the only thing left I felt was good about Zio's. The tiramisu also took a long time and when it came, our waitress told us she had *had* to make it herself because, she explained pointedly, "nobody orders dessert at lunch".

At this point we were feeling very full because the heavy food had started "settling" in our stomachs, but we felt we could not request any more effort on our waitress's part regarding the tiramisu (such as making it to-go). So we forced it down (it was still really good) and it felt like after-Thanksgiving for the rest of the afternoon. The last straw was when she came to pick up the tiramisu plate. She took it and then asked, "Oh, sorry, did you want to lick the bowl?"

I don't know what the **** her problem was, but we were polite to her the entire time. We didn't complain about our food, and we ate most of it. The only thing we did was use a coupon and not order drinks. If that makes us the sort of value-grubbing animals that would lick a bowl to get the last scrape of food off the table, then fine, but we won't be going back. In summary, food - mediocre; service on our last visit - horrendous.

I have been there twice and was not impressed with the food or service either time. Spend a few extra dollars and go to Carraba's