Maria's Lounge And - Reading

This is my go to spot for pizza when I 'm in town. We had the large pepperoni pizza for the table and I ordered a Philly cheesesteak to go. Both the pizza and cheesesteak were great! I give three stars because of inside decor and the type of crowd that comes through. The back of the restaurant is the lounge and always makes me side eye a bit because of the type of crowd. But overall no issues. They have tables you can sit at but know that space is limited. The pizza is priced good and the guy talking my order was very nice and made sure we had what we needed.

First let me say that don't judge a book by its cover. Our group ordered everything from a sausage, pepper onion sandwich, fish and chips, Italian hoagie, chicken parm sandwich to pizza and everything was outstanding. Ask for Mark. He was the best.

Ehhhhhh, Maria 's is a place I 'd go to once every four months or so. Yeah, that 's about right. It 's perfectly average. They have their pros and cons just like all the other million bajillion Italian places in the Reading area. For example, good layering of ingredients in their Italian sub. Bun was firm, robust even. It had the right amount of give. A good bun needs the give factor. But for all the layering expertise, there just wasn 't enough stuff in there to layer. Not enough meat. Not enough lettuce. I 'd eat this sandwich and be hungry in half an hour. I mean, come ahnnn *gestures in Italian wildly* Now I have to do my star of the show. In this case, it was the chicken parm. Big, thick slices of chicken. Lots of gooey, melted mozzarella, heaping portion of spaghetti. Pasta was grossly overcooked, so it resembled the spaghetti you got in your school lunch back in '93. But everything else was decent. Mad deece. And now the shrimp scampi. Again, totally average. You weren 't skimped on the shrimp (you got about 10? , so it wasn 't six shrimp, but it wasn 't 16 shrimp. I don 't know how many shrimp is ideal for a dish like this, but ... just look at the picture. It definitely doesn 't seem like a good shrimp-to-everything-else ratio. A pound of pasta in a weak scamp sauce topped with 10 little shrimp. And oh yes, shrimp size matters. If they were jumbos, a few would do. But these were tiny little fellows. It almost looked comical how little shrimp there were compared to the standard serving of pasta they were served over. If you like quick, filling, passable Italian food in a pinch, Maria 's is for you! I think the niche is going to be young parents with young children looking for a quick, convenient dinner. And that is a wide audience indeed! And in that case, Maria 's is truly a lifesaver.

I gave this star not because of the food. it everytime they make us wait almost two hours for food while we get ticketed or have kids needing to use bathroom and I definitely won't let my kids go in that bathroom their loyalty versus giving your pizza away should be to the first payor. Crazy all that money they have made for years get extra ovens like very disappointed. 2hrs

Best pizza around Berks and love that they have an extra large pizza 24 at an amazing price.