Good Food Hunting

Chris wanted dinner out tonight, specifically pizza. I’m really not eating carbs right now but I agreed as long as I made myself get a salad first and limit myself to 1-2 slices of thin crust. I just presumed we were going to DeLucas but then Chris asked if I was willing to check out Tony M’s which is much closer to us.

Tony M’s is right across from the Meijer distribution center on Creyts south of 496. I’m sure Meijer, a few other warehouse centers and the GM facility bring in most of the business, particularly at lunch. About 7pm, we pulled in to a mostly empty lot and walked in the front doors. And were promptly confused. Through the main doors, there are two sets of seemingly equal inner doors. I peeked through the window on the left and saw a sign about private party so we went right. There were several people at the bar and perhaps 2 or three tables occupied in the dining room. We ended up standing in the entry for a few minutes, unsure if we could seat ourselves (we could).

After a few minutes, the waitress brought us menus and took our drink order (coke products, +1). I flipped to the pizza section then kind of glanced over the rest before nailing Chris down on pizza. We ordered a 12″ (medium) with half green peppers and onions for me and half onion, mushroom and sausage for Chris. We actually each gave our halves so there was a clear indication that this was half and half. I also ordered a side salad, sticking to my rule.

While we waited for my salad, someone cranked up the music and put on some dance club music. I actually liked the song playing but we were eating dinner, not out bar-hopping. It was really loud. And it took quite a long time to bring out my salad so I had lots of time to get my hopes up. Alas, they were dashed with the sad little plate of iceberg lettuce topped with two cucumber slices and the most absurdly bad tomato I’ve seen in quite some time. The whole plate was ice-cold and had obviously been in the cooler all day so I don’t understand the delay.

About 10 minutes later, she brought out the pizza. It looked great but it also looked wrong. No half and half, the sausage, mushrooms, green peppers and onions were equally distributed. Honestly, if it hadn’t been for the sausage, we would have just eaten it but I don’t eat sausage. Immediately, we pointed out the error and Chris said he would be happy to buy it anyway, if they cut him a deal. The waitress kind of stumbled over this and said she would have to check with her manager. But either way, they’d remake it correctly.

A long five minutes later, she came back to say “no dice” on buying the mistake pie but the manager would cut a few bucks off the total bill. She also asked for a clarification on the toppings for each half.

Um. okay.

Yeah, really not okay and after walked back to the kitchen to resubmit our pizza order we figured out that she had to have lied to her boss and said we made the mistake, not her. Another 20 minutes later, our corrected pizza came out. And it was okay but did not look as good as the first which had really nicely bubbled, browned cheese. Tony M’s is generous with the cheese but they only gave us a serrated knife with the pizza, no serving piece so maneuvering on to the plate without losing half the topping required a deft touch.

When she brought the bill, they had taken $2 off, less than the cost of one soda.

We paid the bill and left ASAP. Throughout the meal, the loud music was randomly repeated as bar patrons fed the jukebox and the smoke was drifting our way. It was time to go. And not return.

I want to make a comment here about the handling of the mis-made pizza. If we had been complicated or changed our order, I would have been more forgiving. But we often order half and half and have devised a little system where I say the size and my toppings then Chris takes his turn. This seemed to have clarified the whole concept, in the past. Tonight, the waitress actually admitted (to us) that she forgot to hit the “Half” button on the order screen. Which really makes the handling even worse. The restaurant’s mistake and we tried to help them out by buying the mistake pizza at a discount along with paying for the corrected pizza and they said no??? At this point I guessed that the boss was going to take the mistake out of the waitress’s paycheck so she decided to blame us. We aren’t happy, the boss has to eat the cost of a screwed up pizza and the waitress is going to suffer by our reduced tip, even if he doesn’t dock her for the night. No one wins. I guess Tony M hasn’t been feeling the heat of the depressed economy yet. Sure hope Meijer doesn’t cut workers or GM takes another shift cut at Delta Township.

We won’t go back but if someone else wants to try it out:

Tony M’s Restaurant
3420 S. Creyts Rd.
Lansing, MI 48917

Other reviews at Mid-Michigan Dining and Restaurant DB which also has a menu.