Geno's Pizza, Wings, and Fingers in Scottsboro, AL

Basic Information:

Pizza: Geno's Pizza, Wings, and Fingers

Number of Locations: 1
Location Reviewed: 23780 John T. Reid Parkway in Scottsboro, AL (north side of US 72 just west of SR 35)
Website: https://www.facebook.com/p/Genos-Pizzas-Wings-Fingers-100063895276304/
Date of Review Visit: March 2026
What I Ordered: 9" pizza with pepperoni, Italian sausage, and ham
Price: $17.42 (includes drink and tax but not tip)
Photo:

Summary Review: 5 stars (out of 5)

 

Detailed Review:

Crust: The crust on Geno's Pizza is a true southern-style thin crust.  Like most crusts of this type, it has a nice crispy texture but not a lot of taste.  This type of crust is hard to bake the right amount, but mine was baked perfectly.  This is not my favorite style of crust, but this crust is pretty good for what it is.  Score: 9/10

Sauce: This pizza has a fair amount of sauce, and the sauce has a nice fresh tomatoey taste.  Score: 9/10

Cheese: This pizza is well-cheesed, and it has a pleasant taste if you sprinkle on some parmesan.  Score: 10/10

Toppings: The ham and pepperoni have a nice fresh pork taste.  The Italian sausage is fairly spicy and doesn't fit the rest of the pizza.  All toppings appear in high quantity.  Score: 9/10

Overall Taste: There is too much spiciness from the Italian sausage, and the crust makes too small of a flavor contribution.  But the fact that I noticed those 2 things says that the flavors mostly blend rather well.  Score: 8.5/10

Pizza Appearance: This pizza looks like a nice thin crust pizza with the toppings dominating the appearance.

Dining Atmosphere: Geno's has a sports bar atmosphere with plenty of TVs.

Customer Service: The service was quick and friendly on my visit.

Monetary Value: Above average quality plus average price equals above average value.

The Final Judgment:

I was pleasantly surprised by this small town pizza place.  Geno's makes a tasty pizza with a solid dining atmosphere at a fair price, and if you drive US 72 across northeast Alabama you should stop and eat here.  Score: 90/100

Cutter's Pizzeria in Oxford, AL

Basic Information:

Pizza: Cutter's Pizzeria
Number of Locations: 2, both in east-central Alabama
Location Reviewed: 1781 Hamric Drive East in Oxford, AL (at the corner of US 78 and Coleman Road)

Website: https://cutterspizzeria.com/
Date of Review Visit: March 2022
What I Ordered: handtossed small (10") meat lover pizza, Dr. Pepper to drink
Price: $13.18 (includes drink and tax but not tip)

Photos:

Summary Review: 3.5 stars (out of 5)

Detailed Review:

Crust: Cutter's Pizzeria offers several pizza/crust options.  Because I was by myself and had no way to store leftovers, I chose the handtossed, which is the only option the menu lists with a small size.  The handtossed crust has a fantastic chewy texture.  It is thick on the outside but not thick enough on the inside to support all of the toppings.  I'm not really a fan of handtossed crusts, but I liked this crust more than I thought I would.  Score: 9/10.

Sauce: This pizza is somewhat undersauced, and the sauce that does exist has little tomatoey flavor.  Score: 4/10.

Cheese: This pizza has plenty of cheese, but it produces a decent bit of grease.  Score: 8/10.

Toppings: This pizza has plenty of toppings, but none of them carry a lot of flavor.  The sausage is only spicy, and the pepperoni is unremarkable.  My favorite of the three meat toppings is the ham, which appears in large lean slices.  Score: 8/10.

Overall Taste: Except for some spiciness in the sauce and sausage, nothing really excites the tastebuds here.  Score: 7/10.

Pizza Appearance: My pizza had an evenly cut topping-dominated appearance, as you would expect for a meat lover pizza.

Dining Atmosphere: Their Oxford location offers a rather plain dining experience with only some TV's for decor or entertainment.

Customer Service: The service was poor: the servers seemed more interested in talking to their friends than serving customers.

Monetary Value: The quality is not great, but the price is fairly low.  Therefore, the value is not bad.

The Final Judgment:

Cutter's makes a passable if not excellent pizza.  I would like to try some of their other crust options.  At this price point, it belongs as part of your pizza rotation, but it probably won't make the top of your pizza list.  Score: 75/100.

Heat Pizza Bar in Tuscaloosa, AL

Basic Information:

Pizza: Heat Pizza Bar
Number of Locations: 1

Location Reviewed: 2250 6th Street in downtown Tuscaloosa (east side of the Transit Authority parking garage)
Website: https://heatpizzabar.com/
Date of Review Visit: December 2021
What I Ordered: Meat Lovers pizza (10"); Dr. Pepper to drink
Price: $15.66 (includes drink and tax but not tip)

Photo:

 

Summary Review: 2.5 stars (out of 5)

Detailed Review:

Crust: Heat Pizza Bar makes wood-fired pizza, and hence this pizza features a thin blackened crust.  My pizza was baked the perfect amount.  This is not my favorite type of crust, but it is pretty good for what it is.  Score: 9/10.

Sauce: The sauce is where the heat is, and it overpowers any tomato flavor in the sauce and pretty much everything else on this pizza.  I prefer sweet sauces to hot sauces, so this sauce does not score well on my taste palette.  Score: 5/10.

Cheese: The cheese is 100% mozzarella, so the taste is fairly bland.  Also, this pizza is somewhat undercheesed.  Fortunately, the cheese does not produce much grease.  Score: 5/10.

Toppings: Toppings are usually the centerpiece of a meat lovers pizza, but that is not the case here.  This pizza has plenty of toppings, but they have no unique flavor, or maybe the toppings' flavors get overpowered by the spiciness of the sauce.  Score: 7/10.

Overall Taste: The spiciness of the sauce overpowers everything else, so the overall taste is uninspiring.  Score: 6/10.

Pizza Appearance: This pizza has the usual bare and blackened appearance you would expect from a wood-fired pizza.

Dining Atmosphere: Heat Pizza Bar offers a nice cozy but modern dining area.

Customer Service: The service was a little slow, and I was the first person in the door on a Monday evening.

Monetary Value: Even for wood-fired pizza, this pizza is way too expensive for what you put in your mouth.

The Final Judgment:

Based on the number of people who were there on the Monday evening I was, Heat Pizza Bar is popular, but the "heat above everything else" taste is not for me.  Score: 68/100.

Red Elephant Pizza and Grill in Dothan, AL

Basic Information:

Pizza: Red Elephant Pizza and Grill
Number of Locations: 2, one in Tallahassee, FL and one in Dothan, AL

Location Reviewed: 3108 Ross Clark Circle in Dothan, AL (on the west side of Dothan near US 84)

Website: https://redelephantpizza.com/index.php

Date of Review Visit: December 2020

What I Ordered: Individual (8") pizza with Italian sausage and pepperoni, Dr. Pepper to drink

Price: $11.96 (includes drink and tax but not tip)

Photo:

 

Summary Review: 3.5 stars (out of 5)

Detailed Review:

Crust: The crust at Red Elephant is a true southern thin crust.  It has a nice crispy texture, and my pizza was baked just the right amount.  I like it.  Score: 9/10.

Sauce: There is not a lot of sauce on this pizza.  What sauce there is has a pasty texture and does not offer much flavor.  Score: 5/10.

Cheese: This pizza has a moderate amount of cheese, and it does not produce much grease.  Therefore, I like this cheese more than moderately much.  Score: 8/10.

Toppings: The sausage appears in tiny crumbles; it is spicy but provides no real flavor.  Likewise the pepperoni adds little flavor.  Both toppings appear in high quantity.  Score: 5/10.

Overall Taste: This pizza leaves spiciness but not much else on the taste palette, so this score leaves somewhat to be desired.  Score: 6/10.

Pizza Appearance: The pizza looks like the nice thin crust pizza it is.

Dining Atmosphere: Red Elephant has a nice dining area with some video games for younger patrons or young-at-heart patrons.

Customer Service: The service was quick and attentive.

Monetary Value: The quality is decent, and the price is relatively low.  Therefore, the value is pretty high.

The Final Judgment:

There are some things to like about Red Elephant (even if you are not a Crimson Tide fan), but in Dothan I like nearby Mama Rosa's a little more.  Score: 76/100.

Mama Rosa's Pizza in Dothan, AL

Basic Information:

Pizza: Mama Rosa's Pizza
Number of Locations: 2, both in southeast Alabama
Location Reviewed: 3074 Ross Clark Circle in Dothan, AL (beside Office Depot, near US 84 on the west side of town)
Website: https://www.mamarosaspizza.com/

Date of Review Visit: December 2020

What I Ordered: Medium (12") pizza with pepperoni and sausage, Dr. Pepper to drink

Price: $17.32 (includes drink and tax but not tip)

Photo:

 

Summary Review: 3.5 stars (out of 5)

Detailed Review:

Crust: The crust at Mama Rosa's Pizza is on the thinner side of medium thickness, as you would expect for a southern pizza.  The crust has a nice crispy texture.  I would prefer a true thin crust, but this crust is not bad for what it is.  Score: 8/10.

Sauce: This pizza has a nice thick sauce with a strong tomato taste.  The sauce appears in moderate to high quantity.  Score: 10/10.

Cheese: The cheese is fantastic: it appears in high quantity and produces little grease.  The cheese blend seems to be 100% mozzarella.  Some cheese even spilled over onto the crust.  This is the best cheese I have had in awhile.  Score: 10/10.

Toppings: The toppings are horrible.  The sausage comes in tasteless pellets, and the pepperoni is equally tasteless.  Both toppings do appear in high quantity, which might be a good thing.  Score: 3/10.

Overall Taste: Thanks to the terrible toppings, the overall taste is rather bland.  The crust, sauce, and cheese work pretty well together.  Score: 7/10.

Pizza Appearance: The pizza looks like the thin crust pizza with plenty of toppings that it is.

Dining Atmosphere: Mama Rosa's has a good-sized dining room that featured lots of Christmas decorations on my visit.

Customer Service:  The service was friendly and attentive.

Monetary Value: The price is not particularly cheap, and the pizza is not the best quality.  Therefore, this pizza does not provide the best value.

 

The Final Judgment:

Mama Rosa's is OK but not spectacular.  I could see it as part of my regular pizza rotation if I lived in Dothan.  Score: 78/100.

Salvatore's Pizza & Pasta in Birmingham, AL

Basic Information:

Pizza: Salvatore’s Pizza & Pasta

Number of Locations: 2, both near Birmingham, AL

Location Reviewed: 1594 Montgomery Highway in Hoover, AL (on the west side of US 31 between I-65 and I-459)

Website: https://www.salvatorespizzeria.com/

Date of Review Visit: March 2018

What I Ordered: personal (10”) pizza with sausage and pepperoni; fountain drink

Price: $13.71 (includes drink and tax)

Photo:

Summary Review: 3.5 stars (out of 5)

Detailed Review:

Crust: The crust at Salvatore’s is crispy and thin but not too thin.  My pizza was slightly overbaked, thus making the texture of the crust a little too hard and crispy.  This crust is not the best, but it is at least as good as average and maybe better.  Score: 7/10.

Sauce: The sauce is applied with sufficient but not too much quantity.  It has some spiciness but not too much to overpower the tomato taste.  Excellent!  Score: 10/10.

Cheese: The cheese appears in sufficient quantity and has some flavor, but it produces a decent amount of grease.  Therefore, the usual mandatory deduction applies.  Score: 8/10.

Toppings: Both the pepperoni and the sausage were just the right amount of spiciness, and they appeared in excellent quantity.  Some extra spices sprinkled on top may have been a bit too much.  Score: 9/10.

Overall Taste: This pizza seems to have just the right amount of everything, so the overall taste is pretty appealing.  I do wish the crust was not as crispy.  Score: 8.5/10.

Pizza Appearance: The toppings really dominate the appearance, which is pretty attractive except for the uneven cut.  This pizza is served on a metal tray with a paper covering, which is a problem if you try to cut the pizza with a knife because you will also cut through the paper.

Dining Atmosphere: The small dining area is merely functional with some nice TVs, but I did notice some water-stained ceiling tiles and what appeared to be a pile of dirty dishes near the restrooms.

Customer Service: The service was counter service, and the man behind the counter did not even greet me when I walked up to the counter to order.

Monetary Value: The price is pretty high for a personal pizza and a drink.  Mitigating factors are 1) the quality of the pizza, 2) this is a 10” pizza rather than the usual 8”, and 3) the counter service saves on the tip.

The Final Judgment:

Salvatore’s presents an interesting mix of good pizza but poor dining atmosphere.  While it is a notch or two below the elite pizza levels, I would sanction coming here regularly.  Score: 79/100.

Papa's Pizza-to-Go

Basic Information:

Pizza: Papa’s Pizza-to-Go

Number of Locations: about 20 locations across 4 states

Location Reviewed: 3064 US Highway 76 in Hiawassee, GA

Website: https://papaspizzatogo.com/

Date of Review Visit: June 2017

What I Ordered: Small Piggystix (cheese bread with bacon topping); medium fountain drink

Price: $9.33

Photo:

Summary Review: 2 stars (out of 5)

The Macro:

Crust: Not to be confused with the big national chain Papa John’s, the crust at Papa’s Pizza-to-Go comes in medium thickness.  This chain used to have a location near my home in Athens, GA, and I used to order the Piggystix regularly because I thought it was their best product. (Aside: I also liked their Hundred Pounder pizza: 100 slices of pepperoni and a pound of cheese on an 18” crust.  Unfortunately, I had nowhere to store the leftovers from such a pizza on this visit.)  My Piggystix were baked the perfect amount.  The crust is fresh, but it has no other real distinctive.  This crust is not offensive but not commendable either.  Score: 5/10.

Sauce: For the Piggystix, the tomato sauce comes on the side for dipping.  The sauce is not overspiced, and overall it has a nice tomatoey taste and a nice thick consistency.  Score: 7/10.

Cheese: The Piggystix are somewhat undercheesed, and what cheese there is has little flavor.  Score: 4/10.

Toppings: The bacon used to come in nice juicy chunks, but now it comes in thin too-crispy pieces that have little flavor.  The bacon appears in decent but not stellar quantity.  Score: 4/10.

Overall Taste: I used to eat the Piggystix all the time and enjoy them, but the thin crispy bacon makes the taste very pedestrian now.  Score: 5/10.

Pizza Appearance: The Piggystix have a somewhat bare appearance.

Dining Atmosphere: Most Papa’s Pizza-to-Go locations have no frills sit-down dining areas, though the drive-up window is a nice convenient touch.  The lake view from the hillside Hiawassee location adds some scenery to the dining area.

Customer Service: The service is counter service, and it was fine on my visit.

Monetary Value: Below-average quality plus below-average price equals average value.

The Final Judgment:

Papa’s Pizza-to-Go’s Athens location closed almost a decade ago, and the quality this pizza exhibits today makes it easy to see why.  Most people can find better pizza elsewhere.  Score: 62/100.