Il Pomodoro Pizzeria

This Friday afternoon I was walking by the ll Pomodoro Pizzeria, and decided to try a slice or their pizza. The door was open, and I checked the hours 11am to 11 pm, I walked into a very dark room, some guy was seated, and I asked for a slice of P Pie. He shouted «were not open». Some what surprised at his reaction, I asked when they were open, he shouted back, «were not open» I turned and as I was leaving I heard someone laughing.
After reading several reviews of this dump, I’m guessing my first reaction, what a ass, was correct, and knowing after this interaction, I will not be setting foot in ll P P, again.
Greg R

I’m actually from NY and the slices here are very authentic. NIce thin crust, salty cheese and plenty of it. Grease running down your arm. Yes!
I’ll be coming here over the other «NY style» places in the future.
We had cheese slices, garlic knots & the chicken roll, all were great. The meatball sub looked amazing. I’ll be trying that next!
I thought the pizza was better in the restaurant than it was when we got take out.

The time has come to review Il Pomodoro, and it looks like my review will agree with the current 3-​star average rating.
The Owner was running the place on his own this evening, so I chatted with him a little bit. He seemed like a nice guy, who’s working hard to run his business, and has been hurt more than he was helped by making a deal with Groupon. I started off by asking what the Groupon covered. As reported on Unilocal,he states that it only covered entire pizzas. I politely mentioned that the Groupon didn’t seem to list any restrictions. I could tell from his face that he was already braced for the responses he’s been getting, so I didn’t press the issue and told him I’d just take a regular pizza.
He then started telling me about how Groupon wouldn’t stop running the offer, for months, even though he thought he’d signed up for a three day period. (A story I’ve heard from other business owners too) He explained that he’d lost so much money from the deal. But then he seemed to change his mind, and said: «You know what, just order whatever you like, I don’t mind if you just get the slices.» Very nice of him! I understand the hardship new business face though, especially when tricked into running Groupons they don’t really understand, so I ordered the whole pizza anyway, plus garlic knots and pepperoni rolls.
The pizza: The way I see it, there are four major categories of pizza:
— Vera Pizza Napoletana (the only kind I really care for)
— New York Pizza (thin crust but distinctly American)
— Deep Dish Pizza (Chicago)
— American pizza (the gross, thick crusted, oversauced stuff you usually get in Oregon)
Il Pomodoro definitely has New York style pizza, and it might be the only locally owned place that does (is there a place by campus maybe that does NY pizza?). That said, it’s very mediocre NY pizza. Not as bad as (in my opinion) West Coast pizzas, but not as buttery and rich as NY pizza either. The crust was a little underwhelming, the sauce made it a little bit too soggy, and the cheese wasn’t as flavorful. However, it was an okay pizza, and I would certainly prefer it over what usually passes for pizza in Eugene (except for La Perla obviously, which may be the only place in Oregon to serve Vera Pizza Napoletana).
The garlic knots: They were awesome, really delicious! Crunchy on the outside, soft and doughy on the inside, with the perfect amount of garlic/​seasoning. Very nice!
The pepperoni rolls: Similarly fantastic. They’re made of rolled up dough with cheese and pepperoni, and they’re excellent. We would definitely get the pepperoni rolls and garlic knots again.
Overall, I thought Il Pomodoro is better than many reviews here claim, but they seem to have hurt themselves a bit with the groupon deals, which have led to dissatisfied customers. Perhaps not everyone here cares for NY style pizza, but I thought it was better than most other pizzerias in town, and I haven’t yet had a chance to try the Margarita made with homemade mozzarella (they were out). Since that’s their specialty, I suspect it’s better than the pizza I had tonight, so I’ll come back to try it!

Only tried this place because I bought 2 groupons. The first time was OK and we used the groupon for slices, which were just okay. The next time I went back to get slices with my kid, they claimed you can’t use the groupon for slices, just overpriced whole pizzas and entrees. We went somewhere else. This «no slices» nonsense was not part of the terms of the groupon (which actually says «slices») and is technically a breach of contract.
I’d give 0 stars if I could for their dishonest business practice. This is the second business that has pulled something like this. The first time I requested my money back out of principle, and groupon was happy to refund it. Am doing the same with this business and will not be patronizing them again.

THIS REVIEW IS BASED ON POOR MANAGEMENT DECISIONS, NOT THE QUALITY OF FOOD.
My experience with this establishment was based on a purchased Groupon. I walk in and look at the pizza-by-the-slice’s they have — and they have what seem to be some very interesting pizza combinations: buffalo chicken, white pizza, etc. The garlic knots also look good.
Says management, «The Groupon is not valid for anything within the show case (that is, anything that you can actually see: pizza by the slices and garlic knots).»
Well, that restriction was not on the Groupon itself, but fine, I’ll put it towards something else on the menu. Maybe a meatball sandwich or a panini?
«We don’t make panini’s or the hero sandwiches anymore.»
Well, then why is it still on your menu? So I have to use it towards a $ 28 pizza (the prices have since been manually jacked up from what the picture on Unilocal shows)? Listen, the pizzas sound good, but because they’re so different I don’t know if I’ll like them — that’s why I would have bought a pizza SLICE, not a whole pie. And I’m certainly not paying $ 28 for it. So I end up just getting pissed and ordering an overpriced salad (or rather, what would have been overpriced at the stated $ 11 but was worth it for the $ 6 I ended up paying with the Groupon).
The purpose of Groupons is to get people who wouldn’t normally go to your restaurant in the door, then WOW them with your customer service and/​or your food so that they will return multiple times. I had SUCH a bad experience with their inflexibility and limited AND overpriced menu that not only will I never return, but I was frustrated enough to write this review. I would highly discourage people from going here.

Yesterday seven of our girlfriend’s group met for lunch at Il Pomodoro Pizzeria. It was delicious and fun. This place is not fancy but the food is wonderful. Most of us had salads and they were so delightful to look at you almost wanted to take a picture before eating them. I ordered a cheese calazone appetizer and it would have easily fed three people. Yummmm. We all agreed that we had a wonderful meal and we will all be back again and again. The staff was very nice and they also serve a great cup of coffee to. So when you have a chance why not give Il Pomodoro a try, it is new and they are still ironing out a few things but it is going to be fantastico.
Thank you for a wonderful lunch, Noelle, Karen, Ellen, Natalie, Vicki, Barbara, & Rita

I thought I would give this place a try since its close to my house. I was very impressed, and will be going back again. It seems to be more of a good take out place, all though there is seating for dine in. (Perhaps it may be a bigger lunch crowd as I had take out for dinner.) Its great Italian style with great flavor. I had excellent customer service, and will be a repeat customer for sure!

Marks for trying, and for the friendly staff… But something isn’t quite right with their ovens. The pizza’s crust had a very metallic taste. If they could straighten that out, it’d be a really good NY style pie. PS: Biggest pizza I’ve ever seen.

Hubs and I tried some pie in Southtown (e) this week, and were pretty disappointed.
We ordered the Margherita, and what the menu notes is a «brick oven style crust» was actually quite weird. It seemed to both of us that, although the crust was very brick-​like, oven-​style must really mean previously-​frozen. Maybe the specialty pizzas* don’t get handmade crust?
At any rate, the other unforgivable sin to me was the use of, as you can see from my photo, pretty anemic tomatoes. It was bad enough to learn that the tomatoes in Pomodoro’s sauce come from a can, but to see that the fresh ones on top didn’t even appear to be vine-​ripened? Well, it’s just a crime to not have local greatness on the menu at this point in Eugene’s exceptional autumn harvest.
So yes, I’m picky and OCD, yada yada. But, I still can’t recommend this place to friends. Thus, a deuce.
*An interesting sidenote, why is the originator of all pizza called a «specialty pizza?»

I actually read other reviews betore trying this restaurant. I tried it based on a friend’s recommendation. Sorry we didn’t go to the old standbys. It is really just a pizza place and not a restaurant. The food was terrible, my daughter ordered fettuchini alfredo and added shirmp. The alfredo sauce was separated and not cheesy at all. The shirmp were hard and inedible.. .she sent her meal back and ordered the eggplant parm which is what I had. The eggplant was barely okay, the edges were hard but overall it was probably the best thing we had. We ordered an antipasto which was adequate but then we never got our salads that were supposed to go with our meals! Another guest ordered the lamb couscous and was told they didn’t have that dish today.. .perhaps we were lucky! Overall we can’t speak for the pizza, the garlic rolls were great so maybe the pizza is a different story. Don’t go for dinner, that I can say with confidence!
OH and I forgot to mention the slow service on top of everything. I agree with the other reviewers on the prices also.. .If this is supposed to represent NY/​NJ Italian food then they better take a trip back to Jersey and take some pointers.

The best part of the meal was that my girlfriend and I took it to a park to eat it.
My girlfriend purchased a couple of Groupons for this place. I sorry to say that she’ll have to come back for lunch and get something here to get her money’s worth for the other Groupon.
When we walked into the store, there was not a single customer despite being there at 5pm on a Wednesday evening. There were pizzas arranged on the counter showing what the different styles of pizzas look like. I’m sure if I had ordered a slice of pizza, the people working behind the counter would have just cut a slice off the cold pizza (the cheese was already hardened, there were no heat lamps) and put it in the oven to warm up. This is basically what happened with the lasagna that we ordered. I watched as the cook made our meal which was a half-​dozen garlic knots, and lasagna. The total came out to $ 18.50. It looked as if the cook had an already piece of lasagna made up and had refrigerated it. Then slapped a couple pieces of mozzarella on it and placed it in the oven. The garlic knots were sitting on the counter as well and were placed in the oven to warm up.
The lasagna was very dry, just about no sauce, the noodles rubbery, and the meat unrecognizable. The garlic knots were pretty good, however I felt that there was just too much garlic in them. And I love garlic. Unfortunately the salad that came with the meal was a mess of iceberg lettuce with two wedges of tomato, and a peppercini. However, on the menu it states that «All dinners are served with spaghetti and salad.» And missing was the spaghetti! Now I understand not giving spaghetti when you ordered lasagna, but if you;re not going to include something in the meal don’t put it on the menu as such.
I will not be coming back for pizza or anything else here. The menu is sorely overpriced and the fare isn’t very good.

Mr. Pomo, I was ready to give you a fair shake — I really was. I dismissed all the negative reviews and decided, «hey, you know what, I love pizza. oh and i love groupons. ok, fine, fine you have a groupon, i’ll buy one and take a chance.» And basically after this experience, it was a solid reminder on why i shouldn’t go to Vegas.
So I go to pomodoro and I couldn’t help but noticing the white-​out stains on the menu… guess what? Whoever put the menu pictures on Unilocal should really delete them because they are no longer valid… ownership has tactfully white-​outed many of their already inflated prices and increased them on an average of $ 2. No biggie though, I was just getting 3 slices of pizza. 1 cheese ($ 2.50), which is reasonable and 2 slices of Spicy Buffalo Wing ($ 4 each). After ordering, I was asked if I wanted my pizza hot… which I have never been asked before in my life. The only time I want my pizza cold is the morning after when it’s been sitting in my fridge.
So after saying yes, I sat down and just surveyed the environment. It wasn’t really busy, there was a family of 7 in the back and then two ladies enjoying a dinner. I then watched the waitress go over to the counter and whisper, «the two women have been waiting for their food for a long time, do you know how much longer?» Maybe this would be acceptable if it was busy, but it wasn’t. I don’t blame the waitstaff because she was waiting patiently the whole time by the counter for the food to be ready.
Then as I was paying, the cook from the back came out to ask the person working the register a question, and immediately he was greeted with a hand in the face and an abrasive, «stop, wait, not now.» It just seemed like all the stuff that should be happening behind the scenes was happening in front of all the customers to see. My total came out to $ 10.50 and I showed the guy my groupon, who then responded with a disappointingly caustic tone, «fine, it’s free, take it.» I asked him if he was sure he didn’t want the 50 cents and he said no. First of all, it’s not «free,» I bought a groupon and if I was running the business I wouldn’t let 50 cents slide — just not good business practice. 5 cents is one thing, but 50 cents is another. It was unfortunate the way he reacted to my groupon. Good business practice dictates that you should always have good customer service, BUT especially great service to new patrons (such as those presenting a groupon) because that’s how you build a loyal following; Pomodoro doesn’t approach it this way though.
So, I took the pizza home and just when I thought I was done being disappointed, I remembered that as a lifelong Phoenix Suns and Arizona Cardinals fan that there is always room for more disappointment. The cheese pizza was lukewarm and the cheese was more rubbery than anything else. It wasn’t really all that greasy, but it was an average cheese pizza and nothing I would ever go out of the way to get again. The issue with the slices were that they were excessively crispy and lukewarm — not what i was expecting from «NY Style» pizza. The buffalo style pizza had so many things wrong with it that it would be better if I just listed what they did right…
Oh sorry, they didn’t do anything right with it. First of all, like I said… too crispy and not warmed appropriately. The sauce wasn’t spicy at all, it was bland. Seriously, the pizza had NO KICK. The chicken, I can’t believe I’m saying this, didn’t taste like chicken. It tasted like some freezer flashed unchicken, which I know well from my college days. Every inch of the pizza was filled with chicken, but that wasn’t a good thing. I could only manage to finish half a slice. James L, I’m sorry to say that I pretty much had a duplicate experience that you had. I thought I was being too rough on it, so I gave the extra slice to my roommate, and he looked at me after the first bite and wondered what the hell I gave him. I told him to be honest and he said he didn’t expect such a lack of flavor from a buffalo chicken pizza. So basically, I can rest assured that he’s going to have a bowel movement in my bathroom and not flush the toiler since I put him through this Fear Factor of a dinner.
Let’s sum it up, this place has poor service, poor food quality, (i didn’t even touch upon how much of this place looks like an Italian Harrah’s casino) and inflated prices. The only way I would end up back here is if I was going to make a home cooked meal for my guests but wanted them to have a subpar meal before hand in order to lower expectations. I was contemplating not Unilocaling this place because by writing this review I have to give at least 1 star, which lets face it — is being generous.

I really hope they can figure out a way to stay in business. Their Margherita pizza is great, the chicken this or chicken that is not so good. It seems they only top their pizza with chicken chunks or cheese. The crust needs major work, it is stiff as a board by the time you get it and if you get a pizza topped with an inch of dry chewy chicken chunks you’ll get to enjoy a nice layer of uncooked dough even though the pizza has been cooked into submission twice. The prices have gone up and are rather high for the quality. Very convenient hours and location if you live in the restaurantless south hills.

Went here for dinner tonight after my last attempt was unsuccessful due to the place being packed. Decided on the meatballs and spaghetti which came with a dinner salad. The salad was fresh, romaine lettuce with blue cheese on the side. All was fine with it, with the exception of the salad being in larger than bit-​sized pieces, thus, would recommend they cut it a little finer. Good flavor with the dressing. Had some of those great Garlic Twists and those are a hit, crammed with lots of garlic taste. The meatballs are fantastic with lots of spices and flavor, very lean. The spaghetti sauce was a little too sweet for my liking. The spaghetti is thinner than most places and not quite to Mazzi’s or Bepe & Gianni’s caliber. Good, but not great. My daughter had the Fettuccine Alfredo and had four shrimp added ($ 1.00 each). The sauce is probably more the way it should be made, not like a lot of places where it is floating in butter with tons of spices. She prefers it floating in butter, I think that is not only bad but bad for you. Kids! The service was very good and the waitress did a good job and was very attentive. The only rub came when I got the bill, eyed it and found they charge for refills (dang kid got me again). I would suggest they charge like three dollars for a soda with a refill rather than two dollars and hit me another two dollars for a refill. I did not have a refill and there probably are others out there that are the same, thus, charging for a refill is a no-​no in my book. The place is a welcome to the area (40^th and Donald), staff is friendly and it’s nice they are there and I do plan on going back and trying their pizza. I think I will just have water, however. Have I told you what I think of charging for a refill on a soda lately?!?

I’ll give Pomodoro another try because I think the Margarita pizza with homemade mozzarella was the tip of a yummy iceberg… I’d like to try other promising menu items, like the baked ziti I read about in another review.
But the service, ay yi yi. I don’t know if the wait staff was new or just incompetent but they seemed to have trouble with every table. I’ve never heard so many, «sorry, sorry, so sorry» apologies coming so rapid fire from a bunch of servers ever. (At least they know their service is bad?) Sometimes a kitchen is at fault and the wait staff has to bear the brunt of it but not in this case. Simple things like bringing water, silverware, the right orders to the table, doing the back haul when going past a table (lots of wasted steps) – they have to own it. I really want this place to be great because it’s one of only two restaurants I can walk to in my neighborhood.

Ever since Bene went out of business, South Eugene pizza has been something of a barren landscape mostly consisting of the Market of Choice deli counter (one cannot include «fast food» pizza places in this category, obviously). When I saw a new place going into the plaza by Safeway and saw that the sign promised New York Style Pizza I grew instantly excited and eagerly awaited the opening.
Now that I’ve had a chance to check it out, it’s a bit of a mixed bag. I think, however, once the kinks are worked out it could be a solid offering. I hope so at least, because I want a good pizza place and I want a small business to succeed in a spot where there has been a string of failures over the years.
First off, it does seem like the employees are still trying to get up to speed here so I won’t be too hard on them. When I was in the place was pretty crowded and it seemed a bit hectic. Ok, it takes time to get a new business running smoothly, no problem. But be aware if you go in that it may not go as smoothly as you want at this point.
For food, I had a slice of white pizza, a slice of margherita pizza and a garlic knot. The white pizza was above average, nice fresh ricotta and sprinkled with garlic. Was it too cheesey? One does not order a pizza made with 3 kinds of cheese including visible dollops of ricotta and say it’s too cheesey… Personally I am of the opinion that there is no such thing as too much cheese, but clearly if you are the type who does not like a lot of cheese on their pizza the white pizza would be one to avoid.
Next up the margherita pizza. This was not so great. The guy makes his own mozzarella, which is fantastic, however my slice I would say was not really a classic margherita. Notably there was a lack of basil and not enough tomato goodness spread out over the slice. Overall it was just a bit bland.
The garlic knot, however, was perfect. Nice crusty outside, super soft and steamy inside, just the right bit of garlic (though as a garlic nut I could always use more). I could be happy with a dozen of those and a bowl of marinara.
Now, the biggest problem I have here is that the pizza I received was not actually New York Style. The hallmark of New York Style pizza is a big slice with a thin yet bready dough that is soft and can be folded in half. You fold it up and head out eating it on the go as New York street food. My slices were, however, very crisp in the crust department. The margherita was borderline overdone, with the crust a bit hard and dry. If you like really crunchy crust this will probably make you happy. For me, expecting a true New York style crust, it was a let down. I do strongly suspect this may be due to reheating slices, however. It’s probably quite hard to bake pizza, have it sit around a bit and reheat it in an oven without over crisping the crust.
Overall I’m a bit undecided on this place. I think if the crust is fixed, the pizza will rank above average, though perhaps not exceptional. I do plan to go back and order a fresh pizza to see how it compared before I pass final judgement.

This place ain’t changing shit in Eugene.
Experience it: step out of your car in a big parking lot and step into a small joint in a strip mall. Enjoy the ambiance — the plastic tables, the acoustic tiles overhead, the guy behind the counter twirling dough right over a garbage can. See the dirty plates and food piled up on top of the ice cream cooler which they have conveniently fashioned into a pass-​through. It looks like a smoker’s paradise there’s so much of it coming out of the ovens and festering in this tiny space. Under all this fluorescent light, it looks like hell and makes you feel a little dirty.
The garlic knots look terrific and have a lot of garlic but a rubbery texture. As you eat them, watch the guy dump some more on the pile from a 3-​gallon bucket he pulled from the back. You know, just like Momma would make.
I still can’t figure out the crust here. It’s somehow thin and bready at the same time.
We both tried the buffalo chicken pizza. Way, way too much chicken on top, a little dry from it hanging out on the counter all day waiting to be thrown back into the oven when someone orders it. Speaking of, did all this poultry, pork and dairy really rest on the counter at room temperature since before you opened at 11am, or was it just the last couple of hours? The chicken was bathed in a mild buffalo sauce and topped with a thin blue cheese dressing. Verdict: ate half.
I had a slice of plain cheese, and it was decent. Doesn’t hold a candle to Sy’s mind you, but decent in its own right. Verdict: I ate it all, minus the crust which was hard and sharp.
We tried taco pizza too. Looked good with fresh tomato and lettuce, but again, too much stuff on top. The mexi-​seasoned ground beef was okay at best, tasted like something your mom throws together after a very long Thursday at work. Verdict: half-​eaten.
We didn’t try the pizza blanco, but it looked like a bloated mess.
All these slices are served on cheap plastic plates smaller than the slices themselves. If yours arrives too hot to handle from the oven (and it does), try cutting it with a fork and knife and experience that cheap plastic plate bang against the table with each stroke of your knife.
The one good thing about this place is that it’s right next to a Safeway, so you can stop off on your way home to buy some coffee and tampons.

Il Pomodoro was worth a try. The possibility of awesome pizza in Eugene makes my heart race, and I was intrigued by the three possibly-​fake-​maybe-​solicited-​who-​knows-​they-​could-​have-​been-​inspired-​to-​join-​Yelp-​just-​for-​this-​place reviews.
Meh, meh, meh.
I was lucky to get a slice of cheese as it was coming out of the oven – didn’t even need a reheat. The cheese was thick and just too much. The best description I can give for the crust is ‘bready’ — even though it wasn’t thick, it wasn’t a nice crispy thin crust like I was expecting.
I also had a slice of white pizza which sounded good with three or four different cheeses. Just too much, though. Again, the crust didn’t do it for me.
You order once you walk in the door and it’s unclear exactly what you are going to pay. (It’s $ 2.50 for a cheese slice and $ 4.00 for a speciality slice, or at least the one I ordered.) A scan of the menu suggests that they specialize in full pies and have a variety of Italian dishes as well.
The garlic knots look very impressive, but that isn’t reason enough for me to return. The pizza wasn’t awful, but I wasn’t really crazy about finishing the slices I had, and wouldn’t head back to try any more.

I’ll be honest, I was a little skeptical about this place but I decided to try it anyway. And I was more than pleasantly surprised. Il Pomodoro is fantastic! Easily the best pizza in Eugene.
It’s simple pizza. The sauce is made from plum tomatoes, the crust is thin but not too crispy and the cheese was a nice blend of mozzarella and presumably ricotta (perhaps something else as well, I’m not sure). But it all comes together to make an incredibly delicious pizza.
I also tried the baked ziti, one of my favorite Italian comfort foods. I’ve only found one place (in Denver) that could make good baked ziti. And I can now add Il Pomodoro to that short list as well. Often with baked ziti, the pasta tends to be overcooked and the sauce is either weak or too light and watery. But this baked ziti was cooked perfectly al dente and the sauce was flavorfully mixed with just the right amount of ricotta and far from watery. I was literally scraping up the last of the sauce with my fork after everything else was gone, it was that good.
It’s an absolute gem of a joint.

Edit 6÷25÷2013:
Farewell, good pizza in SE Eugene… I just stopped by, this place has gone out of business. Peering in through the windows, you can see that everything is being packed up.
In retrospect they should have:
1) Kept the menu more simple, not all those crazy novelty «Oregon style» pizzas with insane overloaded toppings (like penne pasta). They should have stuck to doing what they’re good at: awesome, classic NY style pizza with the standard dozen or so toppings.
2) The owner should have kept his verbal disputes with employees out of earshot of the customers. For awhile, every time I went in he was berating someone, other people told me they heard/​saw the same thing.
— — — — — — — — -
Il Pomodoro is a game changer in the Eugene Pizza landscape. Their «Round» (thin crust) pizza is the closest relative to the pizza I used to get in New York during college. Furthermore, the whole pie is only $ 15 ($ 18 for the «Sicilian» — square — thick crust). The cheese is topnotch and the sauce is flavorful.
I was excited to try this pizza and was not disappointed. The garlic knots were also great; garlicky throughout and soft, not hard and dense.
My main concern about this place is that it will go out of business. If you like pizza, give this place a chance! We need to make sure it sticks around!
The place is SUPER clean. Someone even dusted/​cleaned the phone while we were there.
Their menus also say they offer delivery! Their hours are great as well:
Mon — Thurs 11am-​10pm
Fri — Sat 11am — 11pm
Sun 11am — 10pm