Wendi and I recently joined Jon and Linda Hall (of Walking Ohio with Jon and Linda Hall fame) on a trip to Cleveland where we spent the day at the Cleveland Museum of Art and part of the night in Little Italy, where we ate dinner at Mama Santa’s Restaurant and Pizzeria. We settled on the restaurant thanks to a Facebook group to which I belong. The group caters to foodies in Northeast Ohio.
I was looking for a nice, traditional Neapolitan pizza. (Truth be told, I am always looking for a nice, traditional pizza, see these stories for more.) So, I asked the Facebook group if they had any recommendations in Little Italy. A number of people said they enjoyed Mama Santa’s, though Mia Bella and other establishments received recommendations, too. One of the members told me I would not find Neapolitan-style pizza in Little Italy. Still, we ended up at Mama Santa’s because it seemed to have a good variety of dishes to accommodate the four of us.
Wendi decided to get things going by ordering a basket of garlic bread. When the bread came out, I was surprised to see how thin the slices of bread were. The garlic bread was more like crispy garlic toast. I wondered why we didn’t get any bread and butter when we sat down. I am from an Italian family and grew up in a pretty much Italian city, Revere, Mass., and you always get bread and butter at an Italian restaurant. I read an article one time that said Chinese restaurants in the Boston area started serving bread and butter just to get the Italians to eat there. And, yes, you get bread and butter at Chinese restaurants in Boston to this day. I wondered if they didn’t serve it, but I noticed other tables were getting baskets of bread and butter. Now, I realize we were going to be loading up on carbs any way and we had garlic toast, but there is something incredible about a slice of great Italian bread and butter. (Luckily for me, I got a loaf of Italian bread at nearby Presti’s Bakery and had some bread and butter later that night).
When it came time to order, I placed an order for a cheese pizza. Whenever I order, that’s all I want is cheese; why mess it up the pie with other toppings. I purchased a large pizza so others could try it. Wendi and Linda wanted me to cut them a bite … neither wanted a slice. The pizza was pretty good. The sauce had a good taste. It wasn’t too sweet. The cheese is supposed to be brown and bubbly, and it was. As I had been warned, Mama Santa’s did not serve a true Neapolitan pizza. The pizza dough was OK. It was a little too dense for my liking, and it didn’t have enough salt for my liking. However, the crust on the edge of the pizza was crispy and good. Something to keep in mind if you go to Mama Santa’s: The pizza and dinners are cooked in different kitchens. After we ordered, our waitress let us know the pizza was coming from a different kitchen. While they try to make sure the pizza comes out at the same time as the dinners, there are times when one will be delivered earlier. On this day, my pizza came out first.
Wendi ordered the veal parmigiana. She was going to have the veal with a side of spaghetti, but I had to interject. Wendi makes very good spaghetti with meat sauce. As an Italian, I do not like ordering spaghetti at a restaurant. So, I told the waitress to make her side the homemade fettuccine noodles with alfredo sauce. Wendi didn’t want to spend the extra $3 to substitute the pasta, but I was more than willing. Wendi eventually agreed, and she had the veal with fettuccine alfredo.
After we started eating, Wendi cut off a big piece of her veal for me to try. I took one bite of it, and it was incredible. The veal was pounded thin, breaded and fried. It was very tender and tasty. Wendi liked the veal, and she was glad she ordered the homemade fettuccine noodles. Wendi sometimes makes homemade noodles for chicken-and-noodles, and to me, Mama Santa’s fettuccine noodles had a similar taste.
Linda went with the cheese raviolis and liked them. Jon went with the T-bone steak with french fries. We gave him a hard time for ordering steak at an Italian restaurant in Little Italy … until he reminded us of his dietary restrictions.
Jon liked the steak, but it was a little overcooked. When I broiled steaks at a restaurant, I always hated broiling bone-in steaks. There is something about the bone that sort of impaired my judgment when it came time to trying to determine if the steak had reached the proper doneness. When Jon ordered his steak, I was reminded of the time Wendi and I were at an Italian restaurant in Massillon when Wendi asked the waitress if there was anything on the menu she wouldn’t recommend. She said she wouldn’t order the steak because customers seemed to send them back a lot because they were not cooked properly.
While the steak was a little overdone, it looked really good … and humongous. The french fries looked amazing, too. They were fresh-cut fries, and there were so many of them. It was hard to keep my eyes off them. Perhaps Jon saw me spying the fries, but he asked if anyone wanted to try them. I jumped at the invitation. They were as awesome as they looked.
Overall, Mama Santa’s was a good decision. We declined dessert, because we were already settled on going to Sweet Moses (you read about our visit here). I am glad we chose Mama Santa’s, but I am also interested in returning to Cleveland’s Little Italy to try some of the other restaurants. While I might not be able to get a true Neapolitan pizza there, I’m willing to see what the others have to offer. After all, it’s still pizza.
