The cheese is tasty, the toppings are fresh, the sauce is neither sparse nor overpowering, and the crust is crispy but still delightfully fluffy. When it all mixes together on your tongue, it practically tickles your taste buds with pure joy before filling you with deliciousness. Indeed, the pizza is great. Now if only the rest of the experience measured up to what is some of the best pizza available in Sacramento.
This particular experience at Roma's II took place on a Wednesday, around 5 pm. The restaurant was not particularly busy; there were maybe fifteen patrons. When I walked in I was greeted by a waitress, and I escorted myself to the table where my companion Kyle sat. Sadia joined us within a few minutes, and we were ready to enjoy some tasty food.
The menus were simple and easy to understand, and the group decided on a pizza, with half pesto and half olives and pepperoni. Side salads were ordered for each person. It was a painless process, and the waitress was nice and accommodating, smiling at us as we ordered.
While waiting for the food to arrive, the atmosphere made its impression. The Italian music playing throughout was nice and audible over the large group of young girls who had just finished a soccer game, and the windows had green and red curtains. There wasn't much decoration, or really much to the restaurant besides the open kitchen, enough tables to sit perhaps 50 or so people, and a television hanging in the corner with nothing on it. I was told that football games are generally aired when available.
In all, there was nothing strange of off-putting about the restaurant, but a native Italian would not feel like they were back home if they stepped into Roma's.
After about five to ten minutes, the side salads arrived. Consisting of green lettuce topped with tomatoes and salami, the salad was a nice beginner, although it was a tad small and slightly watery. The salami helped make up for the size, and the blue cheese dressing was nice. Overall, a good starting salad, but not enough for salad lovers to go crazy for, especially for the price of around $3.50.
Roughly fifteen minutes after the salads were served, the pizza came.
It was incredible.
The pizza was warm and had an incredibly fresh feel to it. The cheese stretched when you pulled it off the tray in a most satisfying way. The pesto pizza had a pesto sauce/spread instead of the typical tomato sauce. The quantity was just about perfect. The pesto added enough flavor to the pizza to give it a great taste, and the cheese still made its lovely impression. As a pesto fan, I could not have been more pleased.
The olive and pepperoni side was just as delicious. The tomato sauce was not too light or too thick. It was simply full, providing the right amount of heft and taste sauce should have. It provided a great base for the plentiful cheese and toppings. The olives were as good as olives could be, not too big, not too small, not too soft, not too firm. The pepperoni was evenly placed, and not overly greasy as many pepperoni pizzas tend to be. The olive and pepperoni pizza provided near perfection, with every element having just the right amount of consistency and taste that makes a great pizza great.
While the pizza was already delicious, it was the crust that turned the pizza from amazing to downright heavenly.
The crust was crispy on the outside, but soft, warm and fluffy on the inside. Like a freshly baked roll of bread, right out of the oven. It was a full and thick crust, the best possible on a pizza. It truly completed the taste of the pizza, making for one of the best pizzas available in the area.
As good as the food is, the service, at least this particular night, was somewhat lacking. The only time the waitress visited our table was to take our orders, and once or twice to fill our water. I didn't even know the name of the waitress.
Perhaps the lack of real service had to do with the huge group of soccer players, but either way it wasn't too impressive. Ultimately though, the lack of service didn't affect the experience too much, as the experience really centers around the food. If you go expecting to be treated like a king, you're going to the wrong place. If you go to have some good food, you will not be disappointed.
In the end, Roma's offers some absolutely delicious food. In addition to the pizzas, Roma's also offers different types of pasta. A large pizza costs around $20, but it is so thick and full that you can get full on two slices, making it possible for a large to feed four to six people. A small group could eat a large pizza and split the cost to about five dollars a person, not including drinks or salads.
Roma's offers great food for relatively cheap costs. The pizza is absolutely amazing, and for a group of college students out for a bite to eat, there isn't a place better than Roma's Pizzeria II.
Roma's Pizzeria II is close to Sac State, at 8491 Folsom Blvd, Sacramento, CA.