The pizza is just the right amount of cheesy and greasy for my taste. Friendly service, and a clean restaurant.

I’ve been to Josie’s Pizza and Wings dozens of times. The pizza is always great. While I always get the 2 slice lunch special, I would only imagine a fresh pie to be even better. I’ve had their wings a couple times, and while not bad, they’re nothing special either. The wings could use more sauce, and could stand to be a bit larger for the price. The service is great, and it’s never hard to find an open table.

With so many pizza places to choose from in the Orlando area, it’s a wonder places like this stay open. The pizza and toppings were bland. My friend and I finished a large pizza with 2 toppings with little effort. The meal cost about $10 each with drinks. At most other pizza places, we would have gone home with leftovers. The experience is very inconsistent with the pricing. You order at the counter, get your own drinks, grab paper plates and napkins from a common area, and I assume you bus the tables yourself too since no one else had. Skip Red Brick Pizza, and eat at any of the many good pizza places in town.

The pizza at Mama Mia’s has a different flavor than a lot of other shops in the area. I had the 2 slice lunch special, and the slices were fresh out of the oven. It’s pretty good pizza, and reasonably priced. It’s not the best pizza in town, but I would definitely grab a couple slices if I were hungry and passing by. There’s not much room if you plan on dining in, a few bar stools against the front window and a table or two. If you do want to dine in, I wouldn’t bring a party bigger than 4 people.

The 5 participating restaurants were Pizzeria Valdiano, Anthony’s Pizza of Altamonte Springs, Mellow Mushroom, NYPD Pizzeria, and Carlucci’s Pizza Restaurant of Winter Park. Everyone offered a variety of pizzas, and some very unique ones for the crowd to sample. Pizzeria Valdiano offered a pizza, with feta, salmon and capers, which wasn’t for my taste but definitely something the crowd enjoyed. One that I really enjoyed was Carlucci’s onion ring pizza with ketchup instead of tomato sauce. While I don’t see myself ordering it often, it was unique and fun to try, as was their peanut butter and jelly pizza (which I assume was a dessert pizza).

There were several awards given out for the evening. Pizzeria Valdiano picked up the first award for most creative pizzas, which I would attribute to their salmon and capers pizza. Anthony’s Pizza won the Kid’s Choice, which may not be the most prestigious award, but I really enjoyed their pizza as well. Pizzeria Valdiano picked up another award with the People’s Choice, and both Pizzeria Valdiano and Carlucci’s Pizza shared top honors with judges choice.

There were also games and activities, including a hula hoop contest, and some group dances. While Pizzeria Valdiano is far from my favorite pizzeria, I have to give them credit for their participation. If there were an award for most fun or most entertaining, it would go to those guys. They really had a good time with the activities, and made me rethink my opinion of them.

I’d like to thank Julie Varkonyi and Crystal of the Jewish Community Center in Maitland for inviting me to judge the contest. It was a great time, and I hope they continue the tradition next year. I’d also like to thank Donna Wilhelm, publisher of Life in Altamonte Springs City Magazine, and Jason Freed. While we didn’t always agree on pizza, we still had a great experience.

Brick & Fire serves up brick oven pizza, as well as the usual fare of Italian cuisine. Their pizza is cheesy, really cheesy. I normally like extra cheese, but I didn’t even ask for it here, and it felt like a ton of cheese. It was too much cheese to enjoy the pizza. It might have been better if the pizza was cooked a little longer making the cheese crispier. One thing I found odd about the restaurant is that it is a sit down restaurant, you have a server take your order and bring your food to you, but the drinks are self serve. I guess you could look at it as nice that you don’t have to wait for refills, but the mix of service and self-service creates an inconsistent experience. The food here wasn’t terrible, but not my cup of tea. I wouldn’t tell someone to avoid this place, but I wouldn’t recommend it either. There are plenty of good pizza places in Orlando that you don’t have to eat at this one.

Carmela’s serves up pizza and the usual Italian fare. The food is alright, but nothing special really. The restaurant is quiet, and mostly empty at lunch time. I found it odd that the restaurant was so empty, yet we were sat at a booth with a giant rip in the middle of the seat. There were plenty of empty tables, and even other empty booths. Also, the rip wasn’t even taped up. Otherwise, the service was good.

Overall, I wasn’t really impressed with Carmela’s. I wouldn’t recommend them, and there are plenty of pizza places in town, and plenty that are better than this.

Panino’s Pizza is located in the heart of downtown Orlando. They have generous portions, a friendly staff, and great deals. On Mondays and Tuesdays, they offer $1.50 slices of cheese pizza, and discounts on slices of all their specialty pizza. Their slices are big too. One slice should leave you satisfied, and after two slices, you should be stuffed. It’s definitely a great place to grab lunch downtown.

I wasn’t really impressed with the pizza. You don’t have to wait long for it, since it bakes in about 4 minutes in the coal fired ovens, but the pizza wasn’t anything special. It didn’t have a unique flavor that I expected from the coal fired ovens. The wings on the other hand were excellent. They don’t come with any sauce, but they’re seasoned to perfection. They’re topped with a huge pile of grilled onions which were some of the most flavorful onions I’ve ever tasted, and the wings also come with 2 slices of garlic bread.

The service is good, nothing out of the ordinary. The place is clean, and the atmosphere is enjoyable. I would recommend skipping the pizza though and going straight for the wings.

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