Gino’s Restaurant

Gino’s will hold a special place in my heart for as long as I live. My parents and in-​laws shared stories of dining at this establishment for a long time. It was a weekly stop for my wife and I while it was open. Because of this, we had our wedding rehearsal dinner upstairs. No one was disappointed. I will never appreciate another lasagna.
Now that we have a son, I am missing Gino’s magic even more. Though I know that it is nearly impossible, I hope that Gino can carry on his tradition somehow. Someway.

Oh Gino! Why did you leave me!
I was only able to experience your lovely pizza once, but oh how I miss you.
I deeply miss the excessive heap of crust, the copious amount of cheese, and the tremendous layer of tomato sauce, which you so wonderfully crafted.
Deep dish pizza is now a pastime in Madison, something on which I nostalgically reflect.
The Chicagoan in me deliciously craves this concoction that is currently nonexistent in this here county, much to my chagrin.
Please come back.

Gino’s is closing their doors later this month. If you are thinking about dining here before they close for nostalgic purposes… DON’T!!! They should have closed their doors on a good note instead of staying open with minimal staff and stale ingredients.
I got tortellini with Alfredo sauce and the sauce was SO watery! It was literally dripping off the noodles. What’s worse is that the sauce was way too salty and almost inedible.
My mother-​in-​law got the chicken parm. Oddly, it didn’t come with noodles. It was just a sad piece of chicken on a plate. It was obviously frozen and reheated because you couldn’t cut it (sort of like an overcooked Lean Cuisine).
We ordered a pizza to take home with us (before we ate our meals and realized how bad everything was) and the pizza wasn’t much better than everything else. The toppings were tasty, but the bottom crust was really tough to bite through. I’m guessing it was frozen at some point, like the chicken parm.
I’m sad this place is going out in such a bad note. I remember really enjoying it back in the day.

Great stuffed pizza, feels like you are in Chicago! Excellent jukebox with alternative tunes, Neil Young, Bob Marley, r.e.m. and many others.

Great pizza. Bad waitress. Enjoyed a Monday afternoon labor day visit. Adequately staffed but we weren’t well served. Had to ask for refills on soda (rather than being offered). Wife had to order her side salad 3 times to get served. Our deluxe thin crust pizza was very good, as was the spinach-​mushroom-​potato soup. But given the service, this review goes to 3 stars

Nice dark atmosphere, fast friendly service, and good tasting, good size potions all at a low price.

Gino’s is one of my favorite Madison restaurants and not only because I was the first waitress hired in summer of 1967 at the «new» location! Saturday night while visiting from Milwaukee, we enjoyed a small deluxe pizza and the Greek salad. The pizza crust was just the right thickness and the fresh and delicious ingredients went all the way to the edge unlike other places that leave large amounts of empty crust. Gino has always made his own Italian dressing from scratch and it includes lots of diced vegetables like celery, carrots, broccoli and chickpeas. This dressing complemented the Greek salad very well. My friend and I love anchovies and, even though they are not on the menu, the waiter was able to put excellent-​quality anchovies on bot the salad and the pizza.

I haven’t found a lot of good budget and group-​friendly options for carb loading in the Madison area, but Gino’s is one I would return to. Maybe there’s just a dearth of reviews in Madison, but most items that come up in a search are chains or bars with bar food.
Our party of 14 was immediately seated at the front of the restaurant at a long table for 14. I can’t comment on what the rest of the place looks like, but the front restaurant area is a mix of booths and tables and kind of dark — lots of dark wood and dim lighting. Our server quickly came around and took drink orders.
I ordered the Ravioli Capriccio, but subbed out the ravioli for fettuccine. The pasta was served with garlic, olive oil, crushed plum tomatoes, spinach, and artichokes and was quite tasty. It wouldn’t win an award for the best Italian food I’ve ever had, but it was solid. Dinners also came with a choice of soup or salad and french bread. I can’t recall the other soup choice, but I found lentil to be unusual for an Italian place. The salad was your average side salad and the rolls were warm and gigantic.
I rarely get deep dish pizza in my hometown and never when I travel (I know, I know — bad Chicagoan), but if I were to have a hankering, I would order it from Gino’s. If their deep dish tastes anything like it looks, they’ve nailed it.
If I had one complaint about my meal at Gino’s, it would have to be about the service. While extremely friendly, it was extremely slow. We waited what felt like ages for our bread without explanation for its absence. There were other noticeable lulls during the course of the meal, but overall it wouldn’t deter me from returning unless I was on a tight schedule.

Great place for a pie on the strip in downtown Madison. Esp love the outdoor seating on a warm night.

Really disappointing food. The service was slow but polite.
It seemed very inefficient to have four different servers attending to the same small area — but even worse was that only the one assigned to us would actually acknowledge us, so we ended up waiting for every little thing.
For the food, my companion had chicken parm, which was ok but not flavorful at all. It didn’t even come with pasta. I had a Greek salad that was barely edible — overcooked, dry chicken, wilting lettuce, and huge chunks of unripe tomato and cucumber and onion. All the veggies were in enormous pieces that had to be cut several times to fit inside a mouth. The ‘Italian’ dressing was just a plastic cup of oil with some giardiniera in it.
We only drank water, but the meal still cost $ 35. Ridiculous for a basic chicken dish and an old salad. Will not go back.

Gino’s is the only restaurant in Madison that serves an authentic Chicago-​style deep dish pizza. Because if Uno’s counts as Chicago style, then Taco Bell must be traditional Mexican cuisine. This is a significant achievement in Wisconsin, or really anywhere outside of Chicagoland.
It’s not as good as your average Chicago-style…but at least it is proper Chicago-​style. Thick crust, thick and gooey mozzarella, tomato sauce on top, meat and veggies on the inside. At no less than 2 inches thick, two slices are a large and filling meal. To a homesick Illinoisan, it’s an acceptable stand-​in.
I think that their tomato sauce’s spices could use a little work, and I’ve always gotten pizzas that felt like they were in the oven just a couple minutes too long. The crust is a little grainy, and lacks the subtle pillow-​like quality found inside a great Chicago crust. Gino’s has gotten the cheese right, though, and they understand that a Chicago-​style can and should be stuffed with veggies. They’ve honored my requests to stuff it with spinach and mushroom before, which would indicate that they aren’t pre-​made. It’s a little weird they don’t offer a spinach-​stuffed pizza, but some places have the nerve to write Chicago all over their menu and not even keep spinach in their kitchen.
Which, by the way, Gino’s does not. The Chicago-​style is humbly hidden under «stuffed pizzas» on the Gino’s menu. No mention of our fine city can be found anywhere on Gino’s menu, website, or advertising.
You cheeseheads should consider yourselves in a debt of gratitude. We’ve provided you with the blueprint for the closest taste to heaven you’ll ever find on a pizza. I hope one of you gets the bright idea to put all that good cheese to proper use, using Gino’s commitment as a guiding principle. Legit Chicago pizza is a very rare find outside of Chicagoland. Most Americans unfamiliar with the area will never know what it is actually like to bite into the heavy crust of the finest style of pizza in the world.

Went here a while back for dinner with a bunch of co-​workers. We’re from San Francisco, and yes, we’re food snobs*.
Not one of us had a disappointing dish! The only thing that puzzled us, were the huge sized servings, that’s not a complaint, however! :)
The bread was good, the pasta was fresh and I think (IMHO) my Eggplant Parmigiana (which is and Should be sauteed and topped with melted cheese, not breaded in Kraft shaky cheese –_​-​) was one of the best I’ve ever had. Sorry, mom, grandma.
Eggplant Parmigiana was perfectly cooked, nice slices, creamy on the inside with just a wee bit of crunch on the outside and delicious cheese topping as is most appropriate.
Our waiter was a really nice and helpful guy, made it a fun night out while away from our homes.
On my next trip back I’ll definitely hit Gino’s!
*Most of the group were food snobs, the others are just freaking nice people.

The lasagna with alfredo & marinara mix sauce was great! The bruschetta was fresh. If you like Chicago Pizza, don’t go here for it. Go for the rest of the italian stuff. Including the Garlic salad dressing… yum! Tiramisu was alright as well!

Do NOT buy the house red wine. The bartender took our order and disappeared and came back with the wine. It was worse than Franzia out of the box!
The meatballs are pretty good…

Pretty legit Chicago style pizza in Madison. Affordable and the waitress kept the beer flowing through the duration of the 45 minute wait. It’s a cozy place and they make a mean Brandy Old Fashioned.

I wish there was a way to give less than a 1 star review. Last Friday night’s dinner was arguably one of the top three worst things I’ve ever put into my mouth.
First of all, the menu online is totally different from the actual menu in the restaurant. We went in ready to order take-​out based on the online menu and then had to sit down with the «real» menu to figure it out.
I ordered an eggplant parmesan sandwich. My husband ordered an Italian sausage sub. We also ordered an appetizer of stuffed artichoke hearts.
Here’s the breakdown: the eggplant parmesan on the sandwich was not parmesan’d. It was four slices — very thin slices– of eggplant that looked like they had been broiled to death. They were actually black. There was no sauce on the sandwich. The eggplant was not breaded or fried. Wtf.
The Italian sub consisted of one Italian sausage, very little sauce, one onion strip and one green pepper strip. I kid you not. It was almost hilarious. No cheese.
The stuffed artichoke hearts… madone. They looked (and tasted) like they were stuffed with Stouffer’s breadcrumb stuffing. They were so salty that they were inedible. The artichoke hearts themselves tasted like they came straight out of a jar of marinated artichoke — vinegary. The sauce was passable but why bother?
The pity is that the girl who helped us was great; so friendly and helpful. She said the owner still comes in every morning and cooks so we were pretty excited. It’s hard to find good Italian food in Madison. Well this didn’t come close. Now in order to get my eggplant parm fix, I have to just kill two days to make it myself. So disappointing.
Gino… clearly whoever you have in the kitchen is killing your business. It would take a total overhaul to get me back into this restaurant. Wondering why we didn’t just go to the more upscale Italian joint directly across the street…

I started out thinking of eating inside (why would you, though, with all the people watching on State St). The booth was pretty tight so I asked to move outside.
My server was very friendly — as was everyone else that worked there. As they passed by, they flashed big smiles. I’m from New England and I’m not used to that. It was great!
I got a pizza that was pretty good, but I enjoyed the atmosphere the best.

My wife and I went to Gino’s a few nights ago and we both decided it would be our last time. Gino’s gives you filling meal, mostly thanks to the big hunk of (admittedly very tasty) garlic bread and soup or salad that you get with any entrée. But the flavor is completely lacking and the execution is lazy– I’m no great chef, but I can make a much better chicken marsala than theirs and the sausage in my wife’s pasta was mushy and clearly intended as a pizza topping.
When the waiter came to ask how everything was I gave a very deadpan «Ok,» waiting for him to ask «Just ok?» or something like that. Didn’t happen.
It’s amazing how poor the restaurants on state street can be.

As I’m paging through my Unilocal reviews, I realized that I hadn’t put in a review for Gino’s. I was a little shocked because Gino’s is by far one of my absolute favorite restaurants.
First off, the owners and employees of Gino’s couldn’t be any friendlier. I’ve been here probably a good 10 – 15 different times over the years and I’m always treated with fantastic service. Heck one time they misheard me and made the wrong pizza and they were immediately apologetic, made a new one on the spot, and discounted my bill. But it’s the small things, always carrying a genuine smile, promptly getting to refills, good casual conversation, that Gino’s has always excelled at.
And the food. Holy Cow the food. It is heaven on a plate. You can order pretty much anything on that menu and you will be more than satisfied, but there are certainly ones that shine above the rest. For starters, I would absolutely order Garlic Bread or Garlic Cheese Bread (the latter is worth it). Both are easily the best Garlic Bread I’ve ever eaten in my life. As for a main course, they’re homemade lasagna is plentiful and scrumptious, the ravioli is a nice lighter meal, the Fettuccine Alfredo with chicken and broccoli is gratifying, and their deep dish pizza is easily on par with some of the best Chicago joints.
Prices are pretty good considering the quality and quantity of food you get. Generally main dishes range from $ 7 – 15, and appetizers are $ 3 – 10. If they don’t bring marinara sauce with your garlic bread, be sure to ask for it as it’s also one of the best items in the restaurant.
The mood is great too, cosy booths, low lighting, and sequestered nicely despite being on state street.
A MUST for any Italian lover in Madison.

Now THAT is a freakin pizza. Far and away, the best pizza I’ve ever had. Ever. The crust is fully stuffed and just over three inches high.
We were told, when doing research on Chicago, that when it comes to pizza. screw Chicago. Uno, apparently, has gone downhill since they became a larger chain. (We have an Uno near us in Connecticut, for instance.) «Go to Madison,» we were told.
For over 40 years Gino’s in Madison has been cranking out these monsterously delicious pies. Since we decided against stopping in Chicago on the trip (due to a lack of hotel rooms) we dove into this Gino’s when we found it. I will never regret it and always want to make a trip back.