I went in early May with my husband and two friends, so maybe it has improved, since it was relatively new. It was packed, which made me really happy to see such a busy restaurant so close to our home. My dream is for Cane Rosso to move into the Richardson Heights Village center. Since that hasn't happened, I hoped this Neopolitan pizza would be a nice stand in, but none of us were impressed with the pizzas on a flavor-to-price ratio. We ordered 4 pizzas, a Greek salad, and a cup of white bean minestrone and almost every item had something that made it miss the mark. What's worse is for fast casual counter-service pizza, you pay the same price as Cane Rosso, which is leaps and bounds a better pizza with a full waiter experience. Maybe if the pizza were $2-3 less, this model would make more sense to me. The only saving grace were the 2 samples of the gelato, which were really good. I was too full to order some, but I would return for that.
1. Tre Carni on a Gluten Free crust - Since my friend must eat gluten-free, I didn't try this because I didn't want to take away from his only pizza source when I had 3 options. But the crust was burnt around the edges. He says he comes to expect this because apparently no one except (sadly) Dominos can bake a gluten-free crust without burning it. But he said it wasn't burned too badly at Spin. So, that's a half hearted thumbs up.
2. Patate (a white pizza with roasted garlic olive oil, roasted potato, pancetta, roasted red peppers, goat cheese, scallions) - this was the winner in the group. We liked how the potatoes were sliced thinly and roasted until it was a little crispy. The overall flavors were really good and original without being too salty. Maybe I read the menu board incorrectly, and I thought it had roasted garlic on the pizza. But reading the menu on the website, it seems it is just brushed with infused olive oil. That was the only disappointing part. None of us tasted a hint of garlic, except for the single slice of pizza that had one garlic clove that was slightly cooked, but no where near the done-ness of being called "roasted".
3. Sopressata salami and calabrian peppers - This one came with red sauce, and was the most unpleasant pizza of all because it tasted like a salt bomb. I admit I am more salt-sensitive than most people (talented kitchens imbue their dishes with flavor; lazy ones just add more salt), but the other 2 diners who are not salt-sensitive also agreed it was too salty.
4. Pizza of the Month (prosciutto, spinach, onion marmalade) - This was better than the sopressata pizza simply because it wasn't so salty. It was serviceable, but not rave worthy. We actually had a complaint for the manager: no one at the table could detect the onion marmalade. We asked if it might have been left off the pizza. And he said they apply a very light touch of it, so he brought us a little sauce cup full of it to eat on the side, which instantly improved the pizza! This was a weird choice by the kitchen because it might as well not have been on the description if their light touch is practically non-existent. I like to taste my food and not just read about it.
5. White bean minestrone soup - I ordered this for my toddler, and it was disappointing. It was too salty in a suspiciously canned sort of way (or at least not prepared from scratch within the restaurant). It didn't break the bank, but it's annoying to pay $4.95 for a cup of soup that no one wanted to drink, while a cup of the famous mushroom soup at The Grape costs $4.
Spin Pizza needs to re-evaluate their prices for the quality of food they are putting out. There's currently no reason to dine there except for the gelato.
**9/22 Edit** The owner emailed me to follow up on the review, and while I stand behind the rating ("Meh. I've experienced better."), I can tell this is a restaurant with active management who seeks to improve. That is nice, but I don't want to gamble my money to see *if* they've improved when I've had reliably great pizza elsewhere. It is also noteworthy she said all the food is prepared on premise, and nothing is simply heated from a can. read more