LaRosa's Family Pizzeria in Cincinnati, OH: Stuffed Pizza

Basic Information:

Pizza: LaRosa’s Family Pizzeria

Number of Locations: about 50, mostly near Cincinnati, OH

Location Reviewed: 96 Blackburn Lane in Dry Ridge, KY (just east of I-75, exit 159)

Website: https://www.larosas.com/

Date of Review Visit: October 2025

What I Ordered: Small stuffed pizza with sausage, pepperoni, and ham; cherry Coke to drink

Price: $23.72 (includes drink and tax but not tip)

Photo:

Summary Review: 4.5 stars (out of 5)

Detailed Review:

Crust: Like all stuffed pizzas, LaRosa’s stuffed pizza has 2 crusts: one on top and one on bottom.  While the 2 crusts are not identical, both crusts have taken direct oven heat, and both crusts are on the hard and crispy side.  There is also the hard and crispy super thick crust around the edge of the pizza.  Finally, they sprinkle a lot of spices atop the pizza, way too many for my taste.  The spices don't directly have to do with the crust, but I needed to mention them somewhere.  Score: 6/10.

Sauce: There is no sauce in the pizza; they give it to you in small cups for spreading or dipping.  They offer several sauce options, but I chose the standard pizza sauce.  The sauce uses high quality ingredients and has just the right amount of seasoning with spices.  I really like this sauce, but I kind of wish it was in the pizza.  Score: 9/10.

Cheese: This pizza has a 4-cheese blend that makes the cheese more flavorful than their usual provolone.  There is a very small amount of grease.  Perfecto!  Score: 10/10.

Toppings: The sausage is just a little spicy and comes in nice-sized chunks.  The pepperoni is fairly average, but the ham has nice pork flavor and produces little grease.  There are plenty of "toppings" stuffed between the crusts.  Score: 10/10.

Overall Taste: The spices sprinkled atop the pizza combine with the spiciness of the sauce and the spiciness of the sausage to produce too much spiciness for me.  I like my food to taste like what it is, not like a bunch of spices.  Also, the outer crust is too hard and thick.  Score: 8/10.

Pizza Appearance: The appearance is quite pleasing save for the super thick crust around the edge.  

Dining Atmosphere: Most LaRosa’s locations have an excellent casual dining atmosphere, and Dry Ridge is no exception.

Customer Service: I have always enjoyed the service at LaRosa's.

Monetary Value: The price is somewhat low given the quality of pizza and dining experience you get. LaRosa’s stacks up far better than its casual dining competitors in this category.

The Final Judgment:

LaRosa’s is a Cincinnati favorite, but I prefer their regular pizzas over this stuffed pizza.  The stuffed pizza has too much spiciness, plus the crust is too hard and thick.  Score: 88/100.

LaRosa's Pizzeria in Cincinnati, OH: Montgomery Inn Pizza

Basic Information:

Pizza: LaRosa's Pizzeria
Number of Locations: around 60, mostly near Cincinnati, OH
Website: https://www.larosas.com/
Location: 3291 Heritage Green Drive in Monroe, OH (near SR 63, in the same strip mall as Kroger)
Date of Review Visit: October 2023
What I Ordered: small (8") pan Montgomery Inn Pizza with pulled pork, 20 oz. Cherry Coke to drink
Price: $11.75 (includes drink and tax but not tip)

Summary Review: 4.5 stars (out of 5)

The Macro:

Crust: LaRosa’s offers three choices for crust: thin, super crust, and pan.  On this visit, I chose my usual choice: the pan crust, the thickest of the three options.  The pan crust has perfect thickness; it has the crunchy outside but chewy inside texture that makes for a good thick crust.  The pizza is well-baked, and the bottom of the crust has that special LaRosa’s taste that I still have not quite figured out.  Score: 10/10.

Sauce: The sauce on this pizza is Montgomery Inn's standard barbecue sauce.  Although it is a tomato-based barbecue sauce, it is very sweet, sweeter than any tomato sauce I have ever tasted.  I like this sauce on ribs more than I like it on a pizza.  Score: 8/10.

Cheese: The pizza is well-cheesed, and LaRosa’s uses only high quality provolone cheese, the perfect pizza cheese.  Hence, there is a very small amount of grease.  Perfecto!  Score: 10/10.

Toppings: The pulled pork is very tender and has a fresh pork flavor.  The pork comes in large chunks, and therefore it tends to be concentrated on some parts of the pizza and scarce on others.  Score: 9/10.

Overall Taste: The sauce makes the overall taste of this pizza too sweet, a statement I have rarely made in this pizza blog because I usually like sweet tastes.  Eating this pizza is more like eating cheese covered pork on bread than eating a traditional pizza.  Score: 7.5/10.

Pizza Appearance: The concentrations of the pork give the pizza an unbalanced appearance.

Dining Atmosphere: The Monroe location has no dining room, although many of LaRosa's locations have nice casual dining rooms.

Customer Service: I have always enjoyed the service at LaRosa's.

Value: The price is somewhat low given the quality of pizza and dining experience you get.  LaRosa’s stacks up far better than its casual dining competitors in this category.

The Final Judgment:

LaRosa's and Montgomery Inn are both Cincinnati legends, and I make sure to eat at both every time I go to Cincinnati.  But I prefer them separately rather than this combination, and I prefer LaRosa's double sausage pizza to this pizza.  Score: 88/100.

Paisano’s Italian Ristorante in Lexington, KY

Basic Information:

Pizza: Paisano’s Italian Ristorante

Number of Locations: 1

Location Reviewed: 2417 Nicholasville Road in Lexington, KY (in Stone Square Plaza)

Website: https://www.paisanositalianky.com/

Date of Review Visit: May 2017

What I Ordered: Personal pizza (10” pizza) with sausage and pepperoni

Price: $12.66

Photos:

Summary Review: 3.5 stars (out of 5)

Detailed Review:

Crust: The crust at Paisano’s is thinner than average, but it has excellent texture: it is crunchy on the outside and chewy on the inside.  Thus, this crust is kind of a thin version of a pan crust.  The crust is not unique enough to be award-winning, but it works well in my book.  Score: 9/10.

Sauce: The tomato sauce is very over spiced; I could not taste the tomatoes at all.  The sauce does appear in good quantity.  Score: 5/10.

Cheese: This pizza features a tasty cheese blend, and the cheese appears in above average quantity.  The fact that the cheese produces a decent amount of grease is the only turn-off.  Score: 9/10.

Toppings: The pepperoni is unremarkable, but the sausage is better: it comes in thick round tasty slices.  Both toppings appear in good quantity.  Score: 8/10.

Overall Taste: The overspiced sauce is a detraction to what otherwise comes together quite well.  Score: 8/10.

Pizza Appearance: The appearance of my pizza was quite sloppy: the slices were cut very unevenly, and the pizza came in a box that was too big for the pizza.

Dining Atmosphere: The restaurant offers casual dining with a touch of class: metal silverware and cloth napkins.

Customer Service:  The service consisted of one friendly but lonely server: I was her only customer at 5:30pm on a Monday.

Monetary Value: This pizza is quite overpriced relative to what you put in your mouth.  Paisano’s makes good pizza but not good value.

The Final Judgment:

Paisano’s is a nice choice when you want a more refined pizza dining experience.  On the south side of Lexington, I slightly prefer Smashing Tomato over Paisano’s for regular pizza consumption.  Score: 77/100.

Smashing Tomato Pizza in Lexington, KY

Basic Information:

Pizza: Smashing Tomato Pizza

Number of Locations: 2, both in Lexington, KY

Location: 3801 Mall Road, #195 (beside Old Navy and Lifeway Christian Stores)

Website: https://smashingtomato.com/

Date of Review Visit: May 2017

What I Ordered: 12” Americano pizza with sausage and pepperoni

Price: $11.02

Photos:

Summary Review: 5 stars (out of 5)

Detailed Review:

Crust: Smashing Tomato makes wood-fired oven pizza, so the pizza comes with the expected blackened areas on the crust.  This pizza does not have too many blackened areas, so they do not overpower the overall taste.  The crust is thicker than you would expect for wood-fired pizza, and a cornmeal-like coating adds nice texture.  Overall, this is the best crust I have ever eaten on a wood-fired oven pizza.  Score: 10/10.

Sauce: I think tomato sauce ought to taste like tomatoes, so I like this sauce’s fresh tomatoey taste.  The sauce also has a nice thick consistency.  This pizza is slightly undersauced, but what sauce is here is excellent.  Score: 9/10.

Cheese: This pizza is somewhat undercheesed, and the cheese “blend” is just bland mozzarella.  The cheese kind of lets this pizza down.  Score: 5/10.

Toppings: The pepperoni is nice (not too spicy with a little flavor), but the sausage really makes this pizza.  The sausage comes in nice large chunks with a fresh unspiced taste.  Both toppings appear in excellent quantity.  Score: 10/10.

Overall Taste: The sausage and tomato sauce really steal the show, and they work great together.  The overall taste may be a little on the sweet side, but I like sweet tasting pizza.  Score: 9.5/10.

Pizza Appearance: The pizza appears like the high-quality wood-fired oven pizza it is with plenty of toppings.

Dining Atmosphere: I ordered carry-out, but the restaurant features a nice casual dining area with TV’s showing scenes from Italy.

Customer Service: The service was helpful and friendly.  If I gave bonus points, I would give a bonus point for the restaurant’s name.

Monetary Value: The price is a little expensive for just a 12” pizza with no drink, but it is pretty reasonable when you consider the pizza’s high quality.

The Final Judgment:

Smashing Tomato is a smashing success in my book.  If I lived in Lexington, I would smash the accelerator to come here often for a smashing good time.  Score: 90/100.

Gondolier Pizza

Basic Information:

Pizza: Gondolier Pizza

Number of Locations: 19 locations across 4 states; based in Cleveland, TN

Location Reviewed: 6901 Lee Highway in Chattanooga, TN

Website: https://gondolierpizza.com/

Date of Review Visit: October 2013

What I Ordered: 2 small pizzas, 1 with sausage and pepperoni, and 1 with sausage and onions

Price: $11.84 (includes tax but not drink)

Photos:

Summary Review: 4 stars (out of 5)

Detailed Review:

Crust: The crust is a nice, thick crust baked to a perfect golden brown.  The crust does not have a lot of taste, but it does its job without being bulky or distasteful.  This is not the best crust ever, but it is pretty good.  Score: 8/10.

Sauce: You hardly notice the sauce thanks to all the cheese (see below), but that is not because the pizza is undersauced.  The sauce does not have a strong taste, and even though it may do little to add to the pizza, it certainly does nothing to detract from it.  Score: 8/10.

Cheese: This is probably not the tastiest blend of cheese I have ever eaten, but the quantity more than makes up for any blandness.  The cheese covers the pizza from crust to crust with a thick layer of off-white goodness.  Memo to the national chains: this how you cheese a pizza.  Score: 10/10.

Toppings: As good as the cheese is, the toppings are almost as bad.  The sausage appears as tiny ground balls, and the thin slices of pepperoni add only a little flavor.  The quantity is decent but not excellent.  There is room for improvement here. Score: 5/10.

Overall Taste: The cheese and crust make a nice combination, but the taste of this pizza is held back by the quality of the toppings.  I do like the taste of this pizza, but it could be better. Score: 8/10.

Pizza Appearance: The appearance of the pizza is satisfactory except that the cheese looks too white to me.

Dining Atmosphere: The dining room has a casual family atmosphere with big screen TV’s.

Customer Service: The service was quick and attentive.

Monetary Value: Now here’s an odd case.  Gondolier sells their pizzas buy-one-get-one free.  If you only buy 1 pizza, the value is probably average at best.  Buy two and the value/quality ratio starts to tip in your favor.  Thus, you should bring a friend or take one home for tomorrow whenever you come to Gondolier.

The Final Judgment:

Gondolier makes a pretty good pizza, and it is significantly better than the national chains.  I will come here again the next time I am in the Chattanooga area.  Score: 84/100.

LaRosa’s Family Pizzeria near Cincinnati, OH

Basic Information:

Pizza: LaRosa’s Family Pizzeria

Number of Locations: about 50, mostly near Cincinnati, OH

Location Reviewed: 5130 Camelot Drive in Fairfield, OH

Website: https://www.larosas.com/

Date of Review Visit: October 2022

What I Ordered: Large pan pizza (14”) with extra sausage and extra cheese, cherry Coke to drink

Price: $23.32 (includes drink and tax but not tip)

Disclaimer:

LaRosa’s Pizza is my first love among pizzas.  It is the pizza that got my entire pizza passion started.  Having grown up in Cincinnati, I still remember the special occasions that always involved my family getting a LaRosa’s Pizza.  I tried to be objective with this pizza review, but you can imagine how that went.

Summary Review: 5 stars (out of 5)

Detailed Review:

Crust: LaRosa’s offers three choices for crust: thin, super crust, and pan.  On this visit, I chose the pan crust, the thickest of the three options.  The pan crust was perfect thickness; it has the crunchy outside but chewy inside texture that makes for a good thick crust.  The pizza was well-baked, and the bottom of crust had that special LaRosa’s taste that I still have not quite figured out.  Score: 10/10.

Sauce: LaRosa’s sells its pizza sauce separately, and for good reason: it is a fantastic sauce.  The sauce uses high quality ingredients and has just the right amount of seasoning with spices.  I really like it.  Score: 10/10.

Cheese: The pizza is well-cheesed, and LaRosa’s uses only high quality provolone cheese, the perfect pizza cheese.  Hence, there is a very small amount of grease.  Perfecto!  Score: 10/10.

Toppings: The sausage is high quality, but unfortunately the pizza lacks somewhat in quantity unless you order the double sausage as I did.  This potential for skimping leads to a deduction here.  Score: 8/10.

Overall Taste: As you might expect given the above, the taste is fantastic.  I almost never give perfect scores in taste (just what does a perfect tasting pizza taste like anyhow?), but for my first love in pizzas....  Score: 10/10.

Pizza Appearance: The appearance is quite pleasing save for the low amount of sausage.  

Dining Atmosphere: LaRosa’s has a casual dining atmosphere, but some of their newer locations are carry out only.

Customer Service: I have always enjoyed the service at LaRosa's.

Monetary Value: The price is somewhat low given the quality of pizza and dining experience you get. LaRosa’s stacks up far better than its casual dining competitors in this category.

The Final Judgment:

LaRosa’s is a Cincinnati favorite, and it remains my favorite pizza even though I have not lived in Ohio since 2005.  If you find yourself in Cincinnati, stop by LaRosa’s so that it can become your favorite too.  Score: 94/100.