Giovanni’s

I moved to the area almost a year ago and my wife and I have been trying to find an authentic tasting, quality Italian restaurant and this is it! The experience was amazing from beginning to end. The service was above average and the food was perfect! We will 100% be back!

Food is fantastic. All the meats are straight from their deli, which is located inside the restaurant. Pizza is a gamechanger! You won’t be disappointed

In town for a week of work. Stopped by Giovanni’s for dinner! Menu looked typical Italian, but great. Settled on the Pizza because the Italian sausage was homemade and the dough is made in house. Thin crust was awesome, sausage awesome, pizza awesome. Service was a little slow but server was hustling as they were very busy. I recommend it for sure!

Tried their steak sandwich at GarlicFest 2015. I was disappointed. It was on a typical, store bought hamburger bun — the cheap kind. The bun was not prepared in any way and the bottom was hard. Ick. The amount of steak was not enough for the hamburger bun — had more icky bun than steak. The steak itself was okay. It was tender, but not sure if it had any taste on its own. Not worth the $ 5. The only good thing about the sandwich was the aioli. It was very good and most definitely garlicky. I would love to have a jar of that. Overall, I am not motivated to try anything else.

The food was horrible and didn’t taste authentic at all. The olives are cheap olives from a can. They are not even Mediterranean. I noticed the dirty kitchen on our way out so I looked up the health inspection review… See for yourself… It is posted publicly on
.

Been here four times now and the pizza is really, really good. Several of my Dayton friends say this is the best pizza in town. I highly recommend it. 15 bucks for a large three topping, worth the extra money over the chain pizza places for sure.

The best pizza in Dayton if you like thin crust and flavorful sauce with fresh meat. The best is a meat lovers with extra sauce on top. The atmosphere is more family oriented for small town regulars rather than a quiet night out or date night. Be prepared to wait for a table on Friday or Saturday if you don’t make reservations.

This establishment produces a very good pizza THROUGH the WEEK ONLY. Honestly avoid this place on the weekends. They seem to be so busy that their quality we have come to expect disappears on the weekend. The ingredients are minimal (I might say cheap), and the quality is just poor (frequently the pizzas are burnt). This poor consistency has caused us to frequent less and less (in fact this was our first time back since September). So, weekdays (M-​Th) are good; Friday-​Sunday are just BAD.

Love love love this place! Me and my boyfriend get carry out from here every now and then. Seriously, the pizza is delicious!

Calamari was good but it’s served with sauce on it. I’d rather have it on the side. The oil wasn’t hot enough because it was overly greasy.
Gnocchi was wrinkly, which was weird because if it’s fresh it should be smooth. Looked/​tasted frozen. Red sauce was super bland, tasted like warmed tomato sauce from a can. Meatballs lacked flavor but were cooked well.
Cesar salad was super small and either the dressing was watery or the lettuce was wet. Chicken was unseasoned.
We went on a lunch break and 30 minutes after sitting down we just asked the server to make our order to-​go.
I probably wouldn’t go back here except to maybe try the pizza but even that’s unlikely.

We just went to Giovanni’s on 23 Feb. They have recently changed their pizza and it’s terrible!!! They are very stingy with the toppings. That was the only positive thing about their pizza before so it looks like we will look for a new pizza place

Went in thinking it was an Italian restaurant… left knowing it was just a pizza place. Ordered spaghetti and meatballs with Italian sausage. Noodles were very rubbery and sauce was very bland. Caesar salad was completely covered in dressing so it was hardly edible. Service was slow. Waited about 10 minutes for a refill of water and decided after that to go up to the bar to get a refill just to find out that the bartender was kind of rude. The 2 stars are for the pizza. Which is mediocre to decent.

I love pizza! All kinds of pizza… & when I’m looking for thin crust, I go to Giovanni’s. I usually get extra pizza sauce on the bottom because my family and I like it saucy! Their Tiramisu is authentic and delicious and Carl (one of the bartenders) makes a tasty Choclotini.

We called ahead on Christmas Eve, they said they could accommodate our party of five and they would put our name down for a fifteen min arrival. We arrived and they acted like they had no idea we were coming and it was obvious they had a big party incoming and we were unwelcome, they acted like they didn’t have a table available but the restaurant was half empty. We didn’t get our menus until a big party had been sat and they had placed their orders, approximately 15 min. Luckily I placed our appetizer order almost as soon as we sat down. It took approximately 45 – 50 min to get our entrees. Service was very slow. The food was good, we had a cheese pizza for the app and for the entrees the wife had fettuccine alfredo, which was excellent and I had the spaghetti with meat sauce that was very good, my daughter especially liked it because she kept stealing bites off my plate. We didn’t get any bread with butter and the salad that accompanied the meals was very dissapointing. The cheese pizza was good. My daughter’s had the minestrone soup, which they commented, was improved from our last visit.
Overall the food was good, gave the 3 stars due to the service, it needed significant improvement and was very slow. I’ll try to make it back in the next 6 months to write another review.

Good food, quick service.

Bleh its just mediocre. The baked spinach dip was so watery, they could have squeezed some of the water out when they dumped it out of the can. It was obviously not fresh spinach. The house wine is Franzia. The pizza was ok. The ravioli was over cooked. Our server didn’t bring parmesan or crushed red peppers. Nothing special to warrant a return trip. This was my first and last visit. Bartender Chrissy was not the friendliest.

Service was great and the restaurant was very clean. Very impressed with the new expansion to add a bar. I had the ½ spaghetti and ½ ravioli with meatballs. Loved the meatballs themselves, but the sauce is mediocre. I may be spoiled by Mama DiSalvos.
My friend got Eggplant Parmesean. It was tasty but the eggplant was mushy and the breading wasn’t crispy. Very different than other places we’ve tried.
We will go back but will probably stick to the pizza.

Ahhhhhh, you’ve gotta love the smell of an Italian kitchen as you walk in their restaurant! Full bar and complimentary wine selection are a nice touch for a «pizza shop» that is much more than that in scenic downtown Fairborn.
We started with a Peroni on tap — very nice as opposed to a bottle. Then we proceeded to the Campania salad for two. It was a wonderful bread salad with melted cheese, tomatoes, onions, kalamata olives and seasoned to perfection. Really a very nice app. Next we tried their Italian sausage and onion pizza. Very good with their thin crust. As someone Unilocaled earlier, like Casanos, but for me, much less saltier — which I prefer. Good combinations of flavors along with their sauce. Finally, we ended with a good old fashioned glass of Spumoni! A nice ending to a nice meal! Thank you Giovanni’s

This is one of my favorite pizzas in the area! Great little hole in the wall spot!

Giovanni’s tends to leave me somewhat frustrated. My gamer friends and I tend to head there fairly often, usually after a trip to Bookery Fantasy to pick up comics and other nerdity. But, very rarely do I ever feel like I’ve had a *good* meal at Giovanni’s.
First up, the service. For whatever reason, Giovanni’s always seems to take forever when we visit. Usually, we end up there around 4:00 on a Saturday, well before the dinner rush, so there shouldn’t be too much delay in service. This actually became a point of contention within our group at one point, as my wife and I refused to go to Giovanni’s for fear of missing a movie showing. While service is cordial, it’s outright slow.
The food at Giovanni’s is reasonably good. Their pizzas are crispy and covered with delicious toppings. Their house salad dressing is particularly notable, as it’s pure garlicky deliciousness. Seriously. I will eat that stuff just spread on crackers.
Entrees themselves, though? More hit or miss. Their gnocchi is a bit doughy, and it’s swimming in their watery marinara sauce; you just can’t dump enough Parmesan on it to make it taste good. I’ve seen others complain about Giovanni’s sauce as well, and I can’t help but wonder if it’s homemade or not. It certainly doesn’t taste like it.
I like to support family owned restaurants, but the key thing there is that you have to do a good job to stay in business. Giovanni’s feels outdated and bland, especially when there are so many other good Italian restaurants in the Dayton area. I’ll take Tony’s in Englewood or Mama DiSalvo’s over Giovanni’s any day of the week.