Caruso’s

I’m from just outside of Boston and this Italian is as close to north end as it gets! I had the Lasagna/​Chicken Parm combo. Very well done. The Chicken was not overcooked and was very tender. The layers of lasagna was great and moist, not to dry. The sauce is wonderful as is the garlic bread… Nothing says authentic Italian like the bread! Priced very well. Service solid as well. The interior needs to be updated just a little bit but other than that, good stuff! There is also an outside seating area that is great if the sun isn’t beating on you.

Came here after visiting Tucson for the day from Phoenix and everything was spot on. We had the lasagna with meatballs and salad. Our server brought extra garlic bread without us asking and our water never went empty. We thought the prices were in line with the food quality, will definitely be back next time we are in town.

I can’t believe that it took us this long to try Caruso’s. I usually make our Italian food at home, so honestly, we don’t usually patronize Italian restaurants. We are so glad that we did. The Italian Salads with Caruso’s homemade dressing are delicious. I appreciated the cold serving dish very much, as many places seem to have dropped this practice. Two of our meals included salads and they were big enough for all four of us to share. The garlic bread was toasty and full of great garlic flavor. Onto the entrees, first daughter ordered the Half and Half. Half cheese ravioli and half spaghetti with marinara. She loved it and like us all, had leftovers for lunch the next day. Second daughter got the Cheese Manicotti, one of her favorite pasta dishes, and it did not disappoint. Lots of cheese and a great filling. Husband ordered the Shrimp and Clams with White Sauce over linguine. He said that it was good, but the seafood didn’t taste as fresh as it should. That was the only complaint about the entire experience. I had Eggplant Parmigiana and it was truly the best I’ve ever tasted. The sauce listed was red sauce and it was unlike any I’ve ever had, in a good way. The eggplant was peeled and broiled, not dredged in bread crumbs and fried, which I loved. There was also lots of delicious, melted cheese covering the dish. I think that I’ll hang up my apron on preparing Eggplant Parmigiana! We ordered Tiramisu to have later and it was easily in the top five we’ve had. Last, but not least, our server Karen was fantastic. We didn’t have to wait to order, receive drinks and refills or to have used dishes removed. She also had a great, warm personality. We will most definitely be back soon!

Consistency in delivering meals it will taste the same if you go once a year, but why only go once a year whats a matter with you! The wine selection is great and the prices are good. Overall they have a good handle on delivering you the dinning experience, thanks guys!

We made a reservation a week ahead of time for a large group (12 people). We all met in the lobby, and had to wait 25 minutes until after our reservation time because they didn’t have the tables set up yet.
Once we were seated, the server took our drink orders. It took 25 minutes to get the drinks on the table! Then the server took our food order. Another 45 minutes for ½ of the food to arrive. The rest of the food came about five minutes later. I ordered lasagna and meat balls. It was luke warm, and had a bland sauce. My wife enjoyed her plate of chicken parm and shells.
When the server brought the check, he stood and waited while we counted out the cash and figured out the tip. That was a little unnerving.
One of the biggest problems was finding parking. We finally found a spot three blocks from the restaurant.
We may try it again with a smaller group to see if the poor service was just a fluke

Disclaimer: This is a non-​Native Tucsonan review. I heard lots of jibber jabber about Caruso’s but I was sceptical after having a disappointing experience with Argenziano’s (don’t bother, btw). I must say that I was pleasantly surprised.
The house salad was very tasty and had a little taste of everything in it. Great house dressing. Served on a cool aluminum tray that keeps everything ice cold to the last bite.
The complimentary garlic bread was outstanding and just what I expect when dining at a generations deep Italian-​American restaurant. Crisp exterior cradling a soft fluffy interior with the perfect amount of garlic butter and a gentle dusting of Italian herbs. Perfect!
I went for the Caruso’s Special to test their mastery of the fundamentals. I selected spaghetti, meatballs and meat ravioli in their marinara. Everything was very good. The meatballs were incredibly tender and seasoned to perfection. The ravioli were clearly handmade, not the frozen massed produced crap that’s often pawned off as fresh at other establishments. And the sauce, the gravy, was expertly prepared with a delicate subtle flavor that allowed the pasta and meatballs to shine.
While it was a good amount of food I didn’t find myself overly stuffed and bloated. Dessert was imminent. We decided on a cannolli (how could you not) and some spumoni. Both were excellent but the cannolli stood out by far. Absolutely delicious!
Since our server was friendly and talkative we learned that Caruso’s makes their own sausage in house and we really wanted to give it a try. So, we ordered a half pepperoni and half sausage pizza to go. I’m happy to report that the pizza was legit as well.
There’s definitely a reason people are still talking about and recommending Caruso’s after 70+ years. It’s a tried and true fabulous representation of old school classic Italian-​American food. Mangia!

I’m not big on Italian food so it’s hard to give more than 4 stars but we’ve been coming here for 20 years and the food is good. It’s always hot and fresh. The chicken parm is my fave.

Came here a couple of months ago to visit my younger brother at school. When our food came out, everyone else food was hot but mine was not hot at all. Was almost cold to the point where they didn’t even bother cooking my pasta dish. Had to send it back but by the time it came back, everyone had finished there meals already. Very disappointed.

I’ve been to this place atleast a dozen times now and I love it! My boyfriend and I head over there for any occasion, any day any time. It’s definitely a family style restaurant where you are encouraged to drink, eat and take your time, the Italian way. Except for tonight and tonight I am writing a review because we had such horrible service it warranted being written about. Our server literally would ask us a question and walk away before we answered! And he did that to us two times! There are many bad details to fill in here and I am doing so just to alert the management, that you have a great family restaurant but if your servers treat the customers bad, we don’t feel like family, we don’t feel like tipping well and we don’t feel like coming back! So let me fill you all in on tonight’s experience and hope that you never experience any of this. We got to our seats after the typical 30 min wait (usually we don’t mind because we have loved this place and it’s worth the wait) but tonight we arrived and it took the server maybe 10 min to get to us. When he did, he took our order and then walked away. I didn’t hear his name, he didn’t say hello, it was very unusual. A bus boy brought us waters and bread then a few minutes later the server brought us more water glasses, noticed we already had water but left his glasses as well saying now you don’t need to ask for more… Totally uncool, I don’t need two water glasses per person, we also ordered a bottle of wine… I mean it just looks silly to sit at a table with 2 glasses of water and a wine glass. Anyways… We ordered 2 dinner salads and a large pizza and that service was fine, he brought it set it down and left… He never came back though to check on us to see how it was! To Carusos favor the pizza was great, the Italian salads were great, no complaints on the quality it just would have been nice to be asked. The large pizza was for sure too big for 2 people and so the server noticed and asked us if we’d like a box but before we could answer he literally walked away to another table. Two minutes later he peeked around the corner and again asked if we would like a box! If he would have stopped a few min before and paid attention to us he would have known that we already answered his question as he was ignoring us for another table! My partner and I chatted about dessert and I was against it because of the way the server had been treating us but I was swayed because well their tiramisu is fantastic so when the server came back to ask us we did say we would like a tiramisu, but literally as we were saying that he started walking away and we had to stop him and also ask for two espressos… He left an order on the table and to his luck we asked for more but he could have cared less! We ate our meals and the food tasted great but that server totally ruined our experience. This has been a restaurant we have gone to for awhile and have been treated much better. Tonight we asked ourselves if we will ever come back and if we do we will move if that waiter is in our section… Please please remember service is ranked even higher than quality, it’s the experience consumers are after and Carusos did not deliver in that department and you totally ruined my overall impression of the place. I hope this message is read by management and you take note. Service is key and I won’t be paying my hard earned money to be treated like I was tonight any time soon.

Disaster! Avoid! Restaurant is extremely dated & service poor. Food is mediocre a best. Chicken parm was dark brown around edges & sauce had a weird after taste, almost like it had come from a can/​tin. Instead of spaghetti, I had penne. Penne was terrible, pretty much crunchy with same strange tasting sauce as chicken parm. Would never go back! Avoid this place!

Not impressed at all. The pizza took over 45 minutes to come out and in saying that it’s not bad if the pizza was hand tossed ect. The pizza was burnt and had pre made dough. Tasted like the $ 5 Little Cease pizza with slight upgrade to the pizza sauce. Will not come back.

This was a hard review to go between either a 2 or 3 star rating because the food at the price point is solid.
Service was atrocious. We were in a corridor of 4 tables and witnessed our Tasmanian tornado waitress have egregious errors with each table. Everything from messing up food allergies, wrong orders, following up bad orders, and consistently flagging her down for every foundational need like asking for water, bread, and check. We had to ask for every minute thing – but we weren’t the only ones. We got there at 7:10, were seated at 7:50, left at 9:20 because we were waiting the entire time. Our order consisted of two entrees and water. So that whole dining experience was nearly an two hours for two people. I can’t imagine the patience of other patrons with larger parties.
The only positive thing I can add was that the food was solid for the price. If you’re willing to go through terrible wait times before being seated, even worse wait times in between ordering and getting your food, then yes – come here and order. Unfortunately for my husband and me, I don’t have the patience to come back.

I enjoy the creativity this place has. Combining spaghetti noodles with ravioli was really great for someone like me who can never decide on what to get. However their sauce had always either been really watery or way too garlicky.
The service is really terrible and our server this time couldn’t have made it more apparent that he wanted to go home instead of taking care of us. We also all ordered beer which our server attempted to pour into a glass for us, but instead of pouring it correctly along the edge, he just dumped it in the glass-​obviously causing a huge head of foam to develop that didn’t go away throughout all of dinner.
Just a personal preference that I didn’t like here, they don’t really have any appetizers!

I’m not impressed.
I have to say that since the Albuquerque Carusos is one of my favorite places but I was not impressed.
The restaurant is located in what I would call downtown university but since I don’t live here it’s hard to say.
Being disabled I always hope for easy access and parking and that’s not the case.
We went on a Tuesday night and the whole area was busy and active. There is no parking on its own instead you have to park on the street and the handicap parking is a block away from the place.
After finally finding parking we headed toward the main door which has large over sized steep stairs. In order to get inside you have to hold the side rail for dear life and pray you don’t fall while someone else carries your wheelchair up the stairs.
We got inside and were not greeted at all the hostess seemed frazzled and didn’t care. After signing up on the list (like a doctors office) we had a short wait.
We were finally seated and being disabled you normally hope for a close spot but the hostess walked us clear across the building and sat us in a tiny area my wheelchair could not turn around in without blocking the table behind me.
The waitress was very rude and not friendly at all. She had a serious attitude and half paid attention.
We got our order and food and it was a disturbing display of slop.
Veal Parmesan looked like cat food strips with red sauce all over it.
Sampler had very inedible ravioli you couldn’t even cut it. The spaghetti was too firm and crunchy slipped in watery sauce. The only thing edible was the meatball and garlic bread.
When we another lady showed us how to get out using the handicap way. This way is longer than going to the door and takes you behind the kitchen, through the patio and no where near the handicap parking as its locked with a key and let’s you out in an alley.
Ended up spending 40.00 on inedible food and bad service.
So not happy. :(

Ah. Dining outside is always such a pleasure when the weather is so nice. Pleasantly lighted. A wonderful setting. My favorite here is Cheese Manicotti And Meat-​filled Cannellone! My friend had that and I was able to delight in tasting it. This time I had the Marcella chicken. Sauce was nice. Maybe a bit much flour. The chicken was a breast and very very dry. Very dry. The spaghetti was cooked nicely. Dropped on the plate without thought. So ok. I was disappointed in the meal. Yes. Wish I had my favorite! Service was good! I will return again… and have manicotti and cannelloni

Honestly, I’m kinda bummed that my visit to this iconic restaurant didn’t live up to the hype. And it started from the moment I walked in — alone — and the hostess just kind of stared at me with a questioning look, as if expecting me to explain my presence there — ALONE, ya know. I get this a lot, and it’s really annoying. «Yeah, I’m here to eat. It’s a restaurant, no?» Yeesh.
I was seated in a dark, grim room with a handful of tables and pinned my hopes that the Carbonara I had come for would make up for the almost creepy ambience. I also ordered a bowl of the Caruso sauce to dip my garlic bread in, mainly because the way its described on their website is charming. I really didn’t care for the flavor at all though. As to the Carbonara, it was good, but it really wasn’t a traditional Carbonara. I’m finding that to be the case with many Italian restaurants. They’re souping it up way too much.
My final complaint would be that the service was dreadfully slow. It was a full thirty minutes from the time I ordered until my plate was in front of me. I did appreciate that my garlic bread was replenished to tide me over though.

In my humble opinion, the best Italian restaurant in Tucson by a long shot. Sure it may not be the fanciest, newest, most modern place in the world. They aren’t doing all these super interesting dishes that are some sort of fusion, or getting super fancy with squid ink or something, but they do OLD WORLD Italian better than anyone else around, just as they have been for a hundred years. I think their longevity speaks to just how good their food is.
Every little detail about their food comes down to flavor first and foremost. There’s no real fancy plating or anything, just food that’s attractive because you can see how good it’s going to taste when it comes to you.
You can smell the garlic bread literally from blocks away. They bring you as much as you want. I always recommend getting a salad of some sort with your meal because the house dressing is phenomenal and a wonderful thing to dip your bread into as well.
I have tried many many things here from manicotti to chicken parm to spinach raviolis. They are all wonderful. I don’t think you can really go wrong on their menu. But one dish tops them all: Lasagna. Their traditional meat lasagna is frankly the best I have ever had, and at the moment its the only thing I order. I think if I were to eat here for breakfast lunch and dinner on a single day, I might venture away from the lasagna for ONE of the meals, but the other two would still be lasagna.
The meat sauce is their house sauce and it is wonderful. Back when I was a veg, I had their marinara as well, and it was very good. But the meat sauce is where its at.
The feel of the place is that you’re back at a family member’s home, and I always love to sit in their large back patio with its pomegranate trees and fish tank with a fountain statue of a boy peeing into it when its cool enough outside.
This establishment is a Tucson family tradition that should be held onto very tightly and cherished for generations to come. I had my wedding rehearsal dinner here, and many romantic dinners. I’ve even had a few work lunches here. It is one of the brightest stars that Tucson has to offer and I look forward to many many more hearty, delicious meals.

Historic Italian Food in Tucson. One of my favorites for intimate meals or for family gatherings. Kind of a dark atmosphere in the front. The soups are excellent. The important thing is good family Italian cooking. A Tucson Icon.

Early April I called to make a reservation for Mother’s Day, May 10, 2015. Plan was to treat my Mother, Wife, and Daughters to dinner. We arrived 20 minutes before to ensure good seating. Low and behold, we were given a round table next to a Bussing Station.
Maybe 15 minutes before we see our server. Before we ordered drinks, I asked for a cheese pizza. Waiter comes back with our waters maybe 5 – 10 minutes later. At that time a group of 3 sit down close by. 30 minutes into the visit we get our beverages.
After noise and ruckus from the bussing station haunting our conversations, it bothered me a bit. I confronted a manager after visiting the wash room. Asked how is it, that we were not given any options to sit in the patio or more accommodating seating for my family. She apologized, and asked if there was anything she could do. Little does she know, my wife would go ape ish on me if she had known I was upset and speaking to a manager. So I avoided that all together. Since I was the only person quite bothered. I kept it that way.
Over an hour goes by, the table who sat down after us. had already received their pizza, and our pie was still a no show. I went to inquire about our pizza’s where about’ and it still took over 15 minutes for our pie to arrive after that.
We drove from Phoenix to enjoy a dire disappointment. My mother nor Wife would complain, I know for the reason of the gesture made to celebrate their day. They definitely were annoyed and hungry, but they handled the upset gracefully, like the beautiful woman they are.
Lesson learned; Caruso’s not a genuine customer service oriented place to eat. The food was good, but the whole experience was quite demoralizing.
I’d like to give it another try, and change my review. Until then, I must write exactly what we experienced as a family and consumer. The place was not that busy, being it was 4:55 pm when we came in. After we sat down, the restaurant started filling up more, and it’s more obvious now, that we became less of priority to the establishment. I’m extremely disappointed and hope nobody else drives hundreds of miles to this place to get treated the way we were. The hostess, server, and front staff was nice, but the whole experience was way below typical standards.

Dear Caruso’s,
I love you, and I want the world to know. You have been a part of my family since before I was a part of my family. My mother has always come to you for her birthday dinners. I have come for a number of birthdays to consume your fettucini alfredo and your lasagna.
You have the best lasagna. I’m not sure if you know that I was a vegetarian for 14 years. Then, one day, my father was reheating some of your lasagna in the microwave, sending that amazing smell throughout the house. I couldn’t resist. He offered me a bite, and that was the end of that. It is perfect. The flavorful sauce, the perfect meat mixture, the tender noodles… it was enough for me to end my meatless ways (though I still don’t eat meat much).
You know how to throw a party! I had the rehearsal dinner for my wedding here. I had my friends and family put into your backroom and you set up everything, and my rehearsal dinner went off without a hitch. Everybody got something delicious, were they meat eaters or vegetarians, and your servers made sure that everyone was happy.
I LOVE your funky little patio! The peeing little boy fountain has been a huge part of my childhood, and I remember, as a little child, begging my parents to take me to see him and the goldfish that live in that cool water feature. I love how the lights have not changed my entire life, and I love that you play Italian, kind of reminds you of Life Is Beautiful and Il Postino music.
You have my heart forever.
Ever yours,
Alana J