The Mad Italian

publication date: Jul 3, 2008

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author/source: Tim Altork and John Breech / STAFF

First Impression
John: As I walked into the Mad Italian, I noticed Tim, who arrived before me, chatting it up with our server, which was weird because the server was a guy and because Tim never chats it up with the server. Then the cat came out of the bag.

Tim had worked with our server Mark at another Mad Italian location a few years back. Sure it screams conflict of interest, but if Tim’s good at one thing besides parenting, it’s his penchant for honesty. The guy knows how to tell it like it is. Tim, you may have missed your calling as a judge or an umpire.

Anyway, with me there was certainly no conflict of interest. Not only had I never been there, but I had never even heard of the place. I imagined the restaurant would be some Italian hole-in-the-wall joint, but it was actually the opposite of that. Mad Italian was huge, decorated nicely and it screamed Italian. It felt like someplace that Tony Soprano would have taken his family if he hadn’t been killed in the series finale of the Sopranos (that’s what happened, I am not going to argue about it).

Tim: The Mad Italian has been in metro Atlanta since before I was born, but it only recently made its debut in Alpharetta. Now, I’m not that big on political correctness, but I’ve always wondered how the Mad Italian gets away with its name. Can you really have a restaurant that so blatantly stereotypes an entire nationality? Is that even what it’s doing? Or is it referring to one specific unnamed Italian person who is angry? Someone needs to get to the bottom of this.

I had plenty of time to put all this thought into the name as I spent the last two years of my single life (I was married in 2003) pandering for tips at the Chamblee location. I know the owner. I know the manager. And I thought I knew the menu inside and out. But they have made a few changes and additions since my heyday, some good and some not so good.

Appetizers
John: For an appetizer we started off with the pizza roll, which is more roll than pizza. It’s basically a moist piece of bread topped with cheese and pizza sauce. Tim described it as the Mad Italian’s version of the mozzarella cheese stick. Once I had the cheese stick thought in my head, it made me like the pizza roll creation even more. Anyone can do a mozzarella cheese stick, but Mad Italian was daring enough to offer an appetizer that you won’t find at other restaurants – bonus points in my book.

The appetizer itself tasted as you might imagine – kind of like a cheese stick, but without the fried taste of a cheese stick, which made sense, seeing that the pizza roll wasn’t fried.

Tim: The pizza roll used to be the Mad Italian’s only pizza-related item. It’s been on the menu for a long time, and it’s one of the many items that they have perfected. The bread is tender, the sauce is delicious and there’s absolutely no shortage of cheese to top the whole thing off. To me, this is the appetizer of choice when you go there.

We also had a side of fettuccine alfredo, a nice option for an appetizer or a side dish along with your entrée.

Entrées
John: I was told that Mad Italian had the best cheese steaks south of Philly, which was enough to sell me on one. We also ordered something kind of new on the Mad Italian menu, the pizza.

First, let me talk about the cheese steak. If there are any Mad Italian regulars reading right now, you should know that the cheese steak no longer comes in different sizes. It’s one size fits all. However, don’t let that deter you from trying one of these God-sent sandwiches. They are amazing and priced so that I can eat here twice a week and not go broke. The bread is soft, the steak is tender and the cheese and onions complement the sandwich impeccably. As a matter of fact, this would have been a great lunch visit if not for the minor detail that my feelings for the pizza were the exact opposite of my feelings for the cheese steak. Pizza’s never terrible, but this was something I’ll certainly never be eating again. I’ll test Tim’s conflict of interest on this. Let’s see if he has anything bad to say.

Tim: Unfortunately, I do. The Mad Italian resisted the enticement of pizza for a long time, and they should have done it longer. We had the Italian pizza, which features a variety of meats on a thin, crispy crust.

(It’s going to kill me to write this next sentence, but duty calls.) It tasted a lot like a pizza you would get out of the freezer section at the grocery store. That kind of thing has its place, but for my money an Italian restaurant is not that place. If you’re going out for pizza, the Mad Italian is probably not the place to go.

However, if you’re going out for a cheese steak sandwich (or any sandwich, really) this place should be at the top of the list. It truly is the best cheese steak sandwich I have ever eaten. Anything that doesn’t wear out its welcome after being eaten virtually every day for two years has to be good. They also have a wide variety of pastas and sauces, which make for excellent dinner entrees.

Dessert
John: We ended our lunch with a cream cheese brownie. And when I say “brownie," imagine a chocolate cake without the frosting, topped with a baked cream cheese topping. Anyway, my point is, there is a reason people put frosting on cakes. This dessert would have been a lot better if it had frosting and/or ice cream was served with it.

Tim: It’s a unique dessert and one that you can eat all of. It just leaves a little to be desired in flavor department.

Overall
The Mad Italian is one of those places where if you know what to order you are going to have a wonderful experience. The place is friendly and endearing and there’s a distinct laid-back atmosphere about it.

We went to the Mad Italian for lunch and lunch can be a tricky time of day for a restaurant. Some people are in a hurry, some people are kind of in a hurry and some people don’t even know what the word hurry means, so servers have to act accordingly.

During our visit (we were there just over an hour), two tables that looked to be in a hurry were turned over promptly and the patrons looked happy walking out. The table next to us, who had been there before us and were still there when we left, seemed to be in no hurry at all. The staff never appeared to rush them and everyone at that table seemed to be having a good time.

The point is this, serving lunch customers can be complex, but Mad Italian never looked confused. Maybe they should change their name to Happy Italian, because we saw a couple of those leaving the restaurant.