My second trip stopping at Papa Dels while traveling through Champaign. First time.I ordered…read morestuffed spinach which definitely is 5 stars. This time ordered large pan pizza with the works. Excellent, only reservation is that the l leftovers do not reheat as well the next day. Place was clean and staff friendly and efficient.

We had a delicious large Greek salad and medium thin crust sausage and pepperoni pizza. The sausage…read moreflavor was delicious and it's homemade. Our server Elizabeth was attentive and knowledgeable about the menu. Ambiance was relaxed with TV's showing sports and early 1990's music playing. We will come to Papa Dell's again!

This place is AMAZING! Excellent authentic Italian and excellent service! I visit every time I'm…read moreback in Illinois. The ziti and lasagna are outstanding!

From the service to the food and drinks everything was excellent. Even the to-go pizza we ordered…read moreand warmed up hours after we got home was still great. We will definitely back. Their rolls are sooooo good.

It was a busy graduation weekend but the owner was able to accommodate our part of 9 at a large…read moretable out of the main dining area. Our server was super busy but yet prompt and attentive. The pizzas were perfection. Amazing crust. Delicious toppings. We had the Italian salad to share. The basil dressing was incredible. The cheese plate was better than we expected. Delicious cheeses. What I think was soft, warm pizza crust, fig preserves. Soooo good! We thoroughly enjoyed it and highly recommend it. Apparently I lived in the moment and did not take a single photo!

4 star food, 1 star service…read more The food is great, no doubt. The pizzas are cooked in a super hot oven and are prepared in minutes. But the service, good lord. To start, there's never anyone in the hostess area to even acknowledge your arrival; it's a crapshoot as to how long it will take for your presence to be known. Next, the waitresses don't even know their own basic menu. The restaurant offers a low carb option in which your pizza is served on a bed of arugula instead of the typical dough, but each time I try to order this, they're unaware that this is an option, despite it being prominently displayed at the entrance of the restaurant. I eventually photographed this clearly listed option to show the dull servers that such is available, and thus avoid having to provide a verbal explanation each and every time I make this order. Again, this isn't some special, esoteric request; it is offered by the restaurant and listed on the signage overlooking the front counter. If this place hired servers who possessed some semblance of competence it would be a solid 5 out of 5. But they won't, and I'll still keep coming back because I'm an idiot who loves good low carb food, even if I have to suffer through stupidity to get it.

We took a spontaneous day trip to Champaign, IL and tried Jupiter's on the recommendation of Dave…read morePortnoy's Pizza Review. It was delicious! We shared a Greek salad that was chock full of black olives and feta cheese. We also shared a large Chicken Fajita specialty pizza and it was so tasty! Lots of chicken and fajita vegetable hidden under the cheese. Our server Justin was attentive too. Ambiance is relaxed and it's a bar with six pool tables. We will come here again!

With everything changing in Downtown Champaign, this unfortunately hasn't improved. I went there on…read moreFriday night and while I understand it gets popular, the service was non existent. I was told to sit anywhere and was not acknowledged for 10 minutes. I then moved to the bar and had to wait 5 more minutes before flagging down a bartender to order a beer and pizza. The pizza seemed worse than the past, like it was thrown together. I have defended this place, but clearly I had blinders on. I would skip this place moving forward, especially with all the other food options

We often get a pizza at Padano's on Friday nights. It is always fresh and tasty. We get a large…read moresausage and mushroom pizza and it is a real treat

It's a shame when you try to support your local pizza restaurant but the owner is rude when you…read moretry to order then he hangs up on you. I decided to go into the pizza shop to ask him why he told me "I don't understand I can't make that" in an agitated tone and then hung up when all I asked was for a sausage pizza and cheese pizza. He looked startled that I questioned him in person and he stated that the phones weren't working (he always uses this as an excuse for being rude to customers over the phone). Even if your phones aren't working, then you need to tell me that instead of being rude and hanging up. We have lived in this town for a long time and the town has always talked about how the owner is very kind or very very rude to his customers. Padano's, we will never order from you again. I will always pay more for professional service with kindness. Monicals it is!

This is the most amazing Italian restaurant in the United States. It is very hard to find authentic…read moreItalian food for some reason, but this this was an experience can't thank you enough for your attentiveness to us. Either visiting from out of town is always hard, but Nando nailed it. The food was amazing pictures to follow.

Nandos is one of my favorite places in Champaign. However, this visit was different than most--…read morethey have started doing a set menu with appetizer, entre, and dessert for about $65 per person. The one caveat is that menu items off of the set menu can not just be ordered. For exampl, you cannot just order the arancini balls anymore-- which is one of my faves. This was a smidge disappointing if you don't want to order from the set menu portion. The regular menu has some options but not all that they used to. The food was good per usual just this change up threw us off!

The best pizza at its price point in CU, and it is not even close (since Antonio's closed years…read moreago). I have never liked their empanadas, but who cares; it is a pizza joint, and I am reviewing their pizza. Having tried an embarrassing number of their pizzas in the last ten years, the only skippable pizza is the curried chicken, which is bland and tastes more like "yellow" than anything related to India. Every single specialty pizza besides this one is worth the splurge. The spotted goat, of course, is transcendent, but do not sleep on their premium toppings like balsamic chicken. The BBQ meats pizza will cure your hangover, and some of the veggie options like the sweet balsamic modena veg are fantastic, especially considering how few decent veg places we have in town. I don't even want to consider how much money I have spent here. Is it top-tier NY/NJ quality, no, is it five stars as in "the best pizza I have ever had," not even close, and in NJ this would be just ok... but we are in CU. By CU standards, this is five-star pizza, and I would literally cry if they closed. Even by Chicago standards, this is good pizza. If Papa Del's sauce is too sweet for you, if Patricio's and Vinny's basic toppings get boring, and if Rosati's thin crust seems bland, you might appreciate the NY style tangy crust and creativity at Manolos. High quality ingredients and tasty pizza.

Delicious walk-up counter NY pizza. I did the build-your-own with sausage, pepperoni, onion, and…read morered bell pepper. I liked the wide variety of topping choices! I liked that you could choose red vs green bell pepper, since I prefer red and it isn't usually an option. The toppings seemed quite fresh, the crust was soft like typical NY pizza. Even with these positives though, I felt it was expensive for what it was. I don't think a large, even with this number of toppings, should be over $30. Regardless, I probably will return! Good pizza!

The $6 dollar slice and canned drink has saved me as a college student. Also very lowkey place to…read morestudy if you want something nice and quiet.

This was, without a doubt, the worst deep dish pizza I have ever eaten. The cheese was flavorless,…read morecheap, and far too packed to where each bite was nothing but cheese with the tiniest hint of crust and sauce (and I ordered extra sauce). The crust was stiff and lacked any sort of taste. The sauce was the only part that I would consider to be average. I'm very confident that there are multiple grocery store frozen deep dish pizzas that are far superior to what I ate at this place. It feels disrespectful to include this on a menu and charge $28 for such a disastrous glob of tasteless garbage.

So, the pizza and the bread sticks were great. $4.00 for that salad was to much. Also, the state…read moreof the store was horrible, old and needed a deep clean and a refresh! There was on one person working in back, I had to wait 30 extra minutes for my food.

This place used to be the place to be, with five locations throughout the area, but now they're…read moredown to just one. It's been a while since I've visited this establishment, so I thought I'd stop in while I was in town for a short visit. There's definitely room for improvement. The place still holds a lot of nostalgia for me, and it looks pretty much the same as I remember. However, it could definitely use a deep cleaning, especially in the dining room, bathrooms, and kitchen. The employees were nice, but they seemed tired or as if they were just there to get through the day. I ordered the slice special, which came with a slice of pizza, two breadsticks with spicy tomato sauce, and a fountain drink. My slice of pizza and breadsticks were cooked in the TurboChef, which I'm not a big fan of. Good pizza takes time, and cooking it too quickly isn't always the best approach. It definitely changes the quality of the pizza. The spicy tomato sauce was a dark burgundy color, which tells me it was being heated at a high temperature. The sauce heating unit also looked like it needed a good cleaning. There was sauce on the wall and all around the dispenser. Not very appealing. They also served my pizza in a Styrofoam to-go box. If the plan is to operate as a sit-down restaurant, then maybe consider serving the food on something more appealing than a to-go box. Overall, I would give the food quality 1-2 stars. I wish they would go back to their old way of making pizza by the slice. I'm just not a fan of the TurboChef, so I won't be ordering a slice of pizza again. However, I might give them another chance and order a whole pizza since those are cooked in an actual oven.

Everything about the Esquire Lounge is fabulous. We just hosted our son's wedding there and it…read morecouldn't have been any better. Service was impeccable, food was great, and it's got such a warm comfortable feeling. Many people commented that the chill atmosphere made everything warm and comfortable. From drinks for two, to a party for 100, Esquire always nails it.

Had a quick to go snack from Esquire and opted for the bacon cheese tater tots! The tots were a…read moreperfect amount of crispy and cooked perfectly! Though the cheese/bacon/tot ratio was optimal, the cheese definitely tasted like the slightly worse version of the fake cheese you get at concessions stand and the bacon was not crispy. I think next time I would just get the plain tots! Would love to come back and have a full meal here. Very old timey vibes! Pool costs $1 every 10 minute.