Cuchi Guidos was not too crowded at six o’clock on a Tuesday evening. The staff greeted us warmly and as my friend and I climbed the spiral staircase, we were reminded of the downtown Luigi’s that was here before. It’s quite different now. There was a small stage and a very nice looking bar area.
We found the menu a bit hard to read, probably because of the script-y font. One item jumped out at me: the pizza fries, part of the “All American Sides”. French fries topped with mozzarella and marinara sauce…like a pizza (definitely an American invention). We had to try this.
One can order pizza by the slice, which is really convenient, as most places only offer full pizzas. A slice of pizza is a reasonable two dollars and toppings are fifty cents each. I tried a piece of plain cheese pizza and a slice of cheese topped with sun dried tomatoes, mushrooms and, black olives. My friend ordered the Fresh Tuna Salad with cheese.
Our waitress was incredibly nice. She was very friendly and was able to answer all our silly menu questions. It took a while for our food to arrive, but that may have been because we were the only ones there. Here, food is served on paper plates and, in the case of the salad and pizza fries, in a pie tin. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a pie tin full of fries ever before in my life, much less one with pizza ingredients melted on top.
The pizza was good. It didn’t have too much cheese and the sauce was pleasant (it’s homemade apparently). The crust was very hard and crunchy, which could turn some people off, but wasn’t a problem for me. My friend enjoyed her salad. It had a lot of vegetables, from tomato to cabbage, so it wasn’t just fish.
The pizza fries were surprisingly good. The fries were crispy on the outside, due to the extra baking, and the sauce went well with them. The only problem was that the cheese kept falling off before we could eat it. Forks helped. We weren’t able to finish them though because, as stated before, there were a lot.
When we asked our waitress about dessert, she said she wasn’t sure they did that anymore and went downstairs to check. We looked through a menu at our table, but didn’t see any. She came back upstairs with word that they only had cheesecake. We didn’t try any because cheesecake is so rich and we were pretty full.
My friend wanted to take the remaining half of her salad home with her. We learned that the carry out container is a clear plastic lid that snaps on to the top of the pie tin. By the time we left, the restaurant was getting busy, which was nice to see.
We had a good time. I had heard bad reviews of this place before, but I have no idea why. I found it to be pleasant with a nice staff and good pizza fries.
