Monte Cello’s Downtown

Always have a decent lunch here. The pizza is ok… but not my favorite… I enjoy the chicken parm hoagie… the specials are nice in an affordable way… and quick too.

Server said chicken parm sub was whole white meat — it was just a breaded mushy patty. Yuck. My friend got an italian sub that was OK. Skip this place — there are other decent cheap eats downtown.

Very close to work for me and the others in my office. Was excited about getting a steak salad, which I found is a staple here in the Burgh. The first one I got in July 2012 was good. I don’t know if the method of cooking or person cooking the steak had changed or the meat supplier is different, but after that, I’ve had two steak salads where the meat was just too tough! Haven’t been back since. Probably won’t go back to get a salad until the meat is cooked tender and not left to become shoe leather. Not getting a salad again unless someone can convince me that the meat was just cooked and juicy!
Pizza’s are yummy and pizza lovers will like their small but adequate pizza buffet which has about 8 different types of pizza.
The restaurant is always crowded at lunch time. There is a large turnover of pizza so it’s always hot.

Monte Cellos is located fairly close to my work, and so I’ve gone a few times. Each time, I ask myself, «Why am I going back?»
Mediocre dish after Mediocre dish, somehow I think it will get better next time.
Last time I had a Grilled Chicken Salad that they’re known for — at least that’s what the cashier said. It was grilled chicken, french fries, a little cheese on chopped lettuce. Can you say B-​O-​R-​I-​N-​G?
Today I had a steak hoagie. Enough places in Pittsburgh do these that comparing them is easy. While the bread is fresh, and the hoagie buns are huge — it’s all downhill from here. Enter three slices of steak-​ums and the contents of the hoagie are just flat. The bread is 90% of the meal. Unmemorable.
I was happy with the pizza I had there, but for salads and hoagies? Not so much.

I don’t know what some of the other reviewers ate or where they went, but towards the end of last week while waiting for a bus to work, the aromas of fresh dough and sauce being prepared overtaxed my stomach. Hunger pangs consumed me, almost completely breaking down my willpower. Yet, I somehow found the inner resolve to fend it all off and punch in on time.
My brush with a great pizza still haunted me, however, so I vowed to return the next day. After all, Monte Cello’s opens at 10AM, believe it or not.
I marched towards the Italian eatery the following morning after picking up a lunch for later at Yimmy’s and ordered up two sizeable triangles of sausage-​and-​onion laden felicity.
The distinctive crust crepitated when coming in contact with my teeth. The resonant sauce tasted of tomatoes harvested and newly picked from within a 10 mile radius. The seductively milky cheese did its naughty work on my palate subtly, like a nimble, curvaceous harlot wearing nothing but white lace.
And for $ 6.63 including a fountain beverage, the twins may have come cheap, but each one behaved like a baroness.

My office often gets Pizza delivered from Monte Cello’s. The crust is thin and the pizza is decent. I have gone there a few times for lunch to grab a few slices of pizza (with others). I agree that the small fountain drinks with no refills is annoying. If I am going to eat in, I prefer Villa Reale on Smithfield. You can get slices during lunch if you sit at the counter.

Aren’t there times when a good solid three star performer really fills the bill? O’believe me it does! I’ve been out of town for two weeks on business (San Antonio) and it feels so good to come home to the basics.
I got a mini 4-​cut pizza with pepperoni, capicola, and roasted red peppers on it. I could only eat half of it, so I took the other half home for my husband. My pizza really hit the spot.
So for me, three stars doesn’t mean the place is mediocre. It simply means the place does the basics very well and they’re good, solid, dependable performers.

I snuck in here around 10:15…early for lunch. I had a doctor’s appointment downtown so I wanted to kill some time. He told me I lost weight and lowered my blood pressure so I felt obliged so eat something I probably shouldn’t.
They had a handful of specials. One caught my eye was a ½ steak or Italian hoagie, chips and a 12 oz. soda for $ 5.95. I ordered the steak. Just like every place in this silly little town, they tried to pile a bunch of lettuce and tomatoes in it. I ordered it with just cheese, steak and onions.
I got a 6″ sub on crusty, crispy, crunchy bread. The meat was fresh-​sliced steak. The cheese was bubbly-​brown mozarella. And the onions were potent. The only complaint with that one piece of the bread was soggy from the juicy steak. Other than that, it was a good sandwich.
Another Unilocaler complained about the size of the soda cup. It is small…12 oz. I didn’t have a problem with this. You also have the option of getting a large fountain drink or a can of soda. If you really need to chug down that much soda, get a large one.
Oh the service… the cashier was super friendly. She even offered to let me have a free refill. As I arrived pretty early, there were alot of employees just shooting the breeze. They all seemed nice and friendly with each other.
All in all… just a normal pizza shop in the Burgh. Nothing special. It wasn’t awful. It wasn’t great. I’m sure their other subs are pretty good… the bread’s good and that’s the most important part to a good hoagie.
If I’m downtown again with time to spare I wanna check out their pizza.

This is a solid downtown lunch break spot. They run a special between like 11 – 2 where you can get 3 cuts buffet style (with lots of different types) with a pop for 6 or 7 bucks. Perfect for those days when you oversleep and don’t get a chance to pack a lunch. The pizza is nothing that you’d fall asleep dreaming of, but definitely hits the spot at 1PM on a workin’ day.

I’ve eaten here several times. Their pizza is good. The only annoying thing is the small fountain drinks that come with the lunch specials (and no refills). But the best thing, that brings me back time after time, is their chicken salad. Its topped with crisp fries — Pittsburgh style — plus melted mozzarella cheese. Divine. Just a warning — don’t make a mistake thinking the steak salad is just as good. The steak has a musty taste.