Made In Italy

This is one of the very few reviews I’ve written in a long while and it’s a relatively technical feedback. I’m a great fan of pizza napoletana and I’ve made some myself. This place is a very good attempt to bring such authenticity to the Bay Area, but falls short in obvious ways. The crust is not baked enough/​baked right. If the baking is done for 2 – 4 mins at 900 F, as claimed by the chef, I would think that it must come out, at the least, with spots of charred black crust, but it comes out more evenly baked, raised slightly more than usual, and more stretchy/​chewy than I would’ve expected it to be. I would expect it to come out far different in these aspects in less than 80 seconds. It might be due to the pizza being placed farther away from where it is 900 F in the oven, due to the dough or owing to the dynamics of the oven itself. Nonetheless, I’m sure the chef knows how to fix it. I do know of restaurants like Terun (Palo Alto) which have intentionally ‘Americanized’ the originally ‘charred’ Neapolitan pizza in response to reviews, while places like Napoletana Pizzeria (Mountain View) have maintained what I claimed is an original process. This is very good pizza which uses real buffalo mozzarella (hence the three stars), but falls short of what I perceive as pizza napoletana, as they claim it to be.

We have been to this wonderful local restaurant for several months now. After having traveled to Italy for 13+ years, months at a time, I have been to hundreds of restaurants from northern to southern Italy. The owner here is from southern Italy (Calabrian cuisine) so it is not as «heavy» or spicy as their counterparts up north, however the ingredients are as fresh as they get. Even the prosciutto, imported from Italy, is sliced by a knife and not a meat slicer to retain its taste when served. The burrata cheese from Puglia is to die for, especially when served with the truffle sauce. I hope to post photos of some of Antonio’s creations (if I know how) of the special dishes we ordered that were not on the menu. I hate to show these photos to the 1 and 2 star Unilocalers who wouldn’t have a clue what authentic southern Italian dishes are just in case they decide to take up my space in this small restaurant. Call it pizzeria or trattoria, it is a special place for us among all the other so called «Italian» restaurants on the peninsula. The pizza, made from red Caputo flour, is unique in our area. The vini selection is also great with Antonio having something new in his cellar on a particular day… from Barolo to Montepulciano, outstanding Chianti and Amarone. We have enjoyed, and hope to continue enjoying, this little part of Italy.

This is a great place to get a hand crafted, traditional pizza. The crust is both crunchy and chewy, and the sauce is very flavorful. There are only a few vegetarian items on the menu. We tried two pizzas: Burratella and Margherita. They were both good, but I would say the Burratella was the clear winner! They have a good wine selection, but most are pricey. The Barbera that we tried was quite good.

Think of this as a local wine bar with awesome small plates. Great ambiance. Awesome wine selection and the best part the food is really tasty. Great place to hang out or have a romantic dinner.
I recommend the Margherita or the Broccoli e salsiccia pizza with a nice Cab pairing.

Okay I just finished changing my rating to four stars from three for one reason only which I will disclose at the end, as the rating of three needs justification first.
The business is in a busy part of San Mateo where parking is a touch difficult to get. There are a couple parking garages nearby but you’ll still walk a block or so minimum. The interior was bathed in a pink light when I walked in; to my eyes, blue or gray, or purple would be better than the pink. The width is small and the tables are designed for two person parties rather than four or six or eight. Definitely not for kids. On this evening, the very nice woman serving and behind the bar was the co-​owner (wife of the chef), and the chef had kindly come to say hi and told me my english was perfect on the phone (although its the only language I know and I grew up here, I take it as the compliment which I am quite sure it was intended to be).
So I called ahead and ordered the burratella pizza, calzone, a tartufo al café, torta ai frutti di bosco, which with tip cost me roughly $ 70.
As a matter of context, my family is visiting San Francisco and staying in the Embassy Suites Hotel near the airport about 12 minutes from the restaurant not including parking, elevator in the hotel, and there ancillary minutes lost. This all becomes important, trust me. Because of these things, I got the pizza to the bed in my hotel room and in hand to eat roughly 20 minutes from when I think it came out of the oven.
The flavor profiles are wonderful. I especially enjoyed the flavors of the calzone. The burrata cheese on the Burratella was so creamy and layered in taste. The ingredients certainly tasted wonderful including the tomato sauce and the olive oil. I could ask nothing more of these.
(Gripe, here you come)
The crust is an issue though. I suspect the time it took to get pizza to my mouth cost me the greatness of the crust. The crust was tough and had a denser quality than I recall when I had pizza in Italy. I am confident it had nothing to do with the cooking but rather the time to eating.
Why should I hold it against the restaurant then? Well, the problem as I see it is as follows…
Made in Italy is a pizzaria that serves wonderfully paired wines in a wine bar setting. The setting is not conducive to eating pizza with many friends and family, but yet the food is made for friends, family, and football (I had to throw that in… pizza is essential to the sport). So you’d think with the environment not being conducive to proper eating of the pizza, you would take it home. Now here is the rub… you can’t park, and get out in time to enjoy the pizza crust as I suspect it tastes fresh out of the oven. This leaves you, the customer, the person for whom all this is intended… with a dense tough crust and great flavors. I almost think I will suck on the remaining two pieces to avoid eating the crust but to maximize the flavors… just kidding of course.
So this leaves me with a three star rating.
Now the true spotlight for me… the tartufo. Tartufo is like a lindor truffle but with ice cream. This is a divine creation of a powdery crunchy exterior, coffee flavored and scented ice cream that is not too overwhelming, and yet is so extremely flavorful and light. The ice cream seems aerated even… it is so light you’ll have to work to keep it from floating off. At the center of this thing is a melted chocolate treasure.
I almost think they should rename the restaurant tartufo.
I would not be unhappy to go back here but I don’t think it will make my list of the best pizza places I have eaten.

Tasty personal pizzas. It is a little bit out of my normal price range, but good for that fancy day you want to go out with friends to try something with flavor. Everyone working here is very nice.

Made in Italy is a quiet little restaurant (at least when I came in on a Thursday night) that gives a classy ambiance.
We decided to order 3 pizzas– the Margherita ($ 16), Reginella ($ 20), and Broccoli e salsiccia ($ 20). Although the prices are pretty steep for personal pizzas (about 11″ in diameter), you get what you pay for in the quality of the pizzas. The first thing I noticed about the pizzas was the delicious crust! It is delightfully chewy, and when reading the description of how they create the pizza, you can tell why it tastes so good.
On to the toppings! margherita was pretty good. I think this is a safe one to get just because its basically a high quality cheese pizza and you can’t go wrong with it! Definitely recommend this one.
The Broccoli e salsiccia was only. okay. The broccoli on top is bitter. At first I thought it was just me. but my friends agreed. Beware of that!
Lastly the Reginella was my favorite by far! The prosciutto on top was delicious, complimented with the arugula and tomatoes. Definitely recommend the Reginella as well.
All in all, Made in Italy was pretty good, but pricy. But hey, you get what you pay for in quality! If you want some quality pizza and wine… this is your place.

Great pizza but pricey though they use quality ingredients for the toppings. The waiter didn’t really know much about the menu though. They need to do a better job training the guys.

This is a very nice pizza and wine bar, excellent food, toni the owner is a very professional and experienced gentlemen .
He also has a very well trained staff, this place is super clean

I’m surprised this place has such a high Unilocal review. This place falls so far short of expectations it’s not even funny. The quality of the ingredients in the pizza is definitely very high. However, you can assemble all the best ingredients in the world and still produce a mediocre pie. That’s the way I feel about the food here. It doesn’t help that the portions seem small relative to the price.
The décor here is totally lacking. We were offered a table back of the restaurant. We started to head towards the rear; I saw the lights. I immediately turned around and asked to sit at the bar instead. It’s totally sterile back there. For a supposed «romantic» restaurant why the bright lights and the TV? It’s garish at best.
On the peninsula, there are far many better choices for Neapolitan pizza that have better quality and better prices.

Food is expensive for the below average quality and taste. I ordered the seafood salad which costs $ 16 but it’s just some cheap frozen seafood mix on top of some spinach. Not worth it in my opinion.
Also, our wait staff was very disrespectful and pressured us to order alcohol!

Just tried the black pizza… and wow! So good!
As simple as great, fresh cherry tomatoes, smoked salmon and fresh burrata cheese. Original and tasty.

In our last night in town we choose Made in Italy, downtown San Mateo, for a night out with our dear friend, Cristiano.
This place looks very beautiful, nicely done with a touch of italian feeling.
The owner Antonio and his lovely (pregnant) wife are very nice and friendly people.
We started with a glass of nice, refreshing Prosseco until our meal came. We choose Pizza Margherita, Capricciosa and the special Panuozzo. What a lovely choice of pizza, amazing taste and put aside a nice bottle of 2012 Supertuscan Ornellaia and you can live to taste a trully Italian meal.
Although i usually don‘t comment other reviews, i think this is not a kids friendly place for a good reason and is meant to be an adult place. Take it on the other side, you can finally have a night out without running all over the place after your kid.
All in all, an amazing last experience of the beautiful San Mateo area.
Until next time, good by dear all.

Great pizza ! Owners from
Italy. Got the margherita pizza. Feels like im back in Italy! Amazing pizza and cool interior. Next time I need to try the wine.

The food was ok, but over priced. There are so many great options for similar menus I do not think this place can make it unless it becomes a bit more inventive.
I would also not recommend the place if you have kids. They do not have high chairs and the owner made it clear when we are here the place is not meant for kids. Maybe his opinion will change after he becomes a father in October.

Great little spot to enjoy Italian food and wine. Calabria and Naples are well represented. The pizza is great — chewy and flavorful. The wines — lets just say, listen to Antonio’s suggestions. He knows his stuff.
Will go back and bring more friends.

Yum. Another great Italian restaurant addition to the peninsula, and another one representing Calabria. This place is notable to me because they have probably the best thin crust of any other place on the peninsula, and the best tasting prosciutto.
We ordered the following: Insalata della casa and the Reginella pizza. They were both really good. While I love tomatoes, for some reason they did not work on the pizza. The owner was very nice and welcoming, and made a great wine recommendation (the 2013 Casa Pasetti, Montepulciano D’ Abruzzo) that worked really well with our food.

I went to this place called made in Italy that I read an article on the newspaper regarding how good these place is .So I had to find out on my own I got pizza Capricciosa a same I saw in the paper was amazing. Bottom line… This place is real real Italian .
Bravo Antonio…

I’ve been stalking the opening of this restaurant, so when I saw on Unilocal that it was open – and getting good reviews – I headed over for lunch.
On reading the reviews, I was most drawn in to the Marinara, which includes capers and olives. The sauce is light, as is the drizzling of olive oil. Flavors came together very nicely, making for a slightly sweet, slightly briny combination. Crust is slightly crisp, but not crunchy, creating the type of thin-​crust pizza experience I most enjoy.
After my pizza, I drank an espresso. It was small but flavorful.
I can’t wait to bring friends here; I think it’ll make for a good, casual spot to meet up for pizza, salad, and a glass of quality vino Italiano.

I wanted to start this review off with a really great quote about pizza but then the Bagel Bites theme song got stuck in my head and I couldn’t get past it, so just pretend I said something clever and know that the pizza here is so much better than the tiny, oven-​hardened, roof-​of-​mouth-​blistering pizza bagels you so fondly remember.
I decided to come here not only because I love pizza and it’s a new joint in downtown San Mateo, but because the photos on their Unilocal listing were all oriented the wrong way and that drives me nucking futs. So here I came… with cell phone camera in hand.
We sat at the bar so we were face to face with the bartender/​server and everything was prompt and friendly. We were introduced the owner, who has a very thick Italian accent and was even able to guess that my dining partner is part Sicilian. He commended our wine choices and told us a little about how Made In Italy came to be.
It’s a decent date setting and for the record, not at all the type of place you should take a family with little kids. It’s def more of a wine bar, there is no kid’s menu, and it’s set up to be more of an authentic, intimate, adult setting. They have a happy hour, though the HH menu could use some work. I know it’s called Happy HOUR, but I feel like it’s pretty standard to make that hour actually last for more than a single hour. The do offer a longer happy hour on the weekends, but I think upping their HH game during the week with extended hours and more specials will really bring people in in the beginning.
For this style of pizza, I think most people look to Vesta in the peninsula, but I like this waaay better and the price is right. Hands down the best pizza I’ve had since moving here from Chicago last year. High quality ingredients and even though I’m normally the type of person to have a pile of pizza crusts left on my plate at the end of the night, Made In Italy makes it right. We ate every crumb on our plates and probably would’ve licked the plates if the setting weren’t so nice.
My dining partner and I each got a glass of wine and picked out two pizzas to share since we’re both vegetarian. I opted for the marinara pizza with no cheese which is never ever a thing I do, I love cheese and believe it belongs on pizza, HOWEVER, the toppings sounded salty and delicious with San Marzano tomato sauce, capers, black olives, garlic, oregano, and olive oil, so I went with it and you don’t have to believe me, but it was one of the best pizzas I’ve ever had… and it had no cheese. I know I sound crazy, but trust.
My dining partner got the Burratella pizza with San Marzano tomato, Parmesan cheese, burrata cheese with basil and olive oil and it pretty much blew Vesta’s burrata pizza out of the water. The Burrata was almost smoky and so flavorful, and while still an otherwise simple pizza, the quality of each component of the pie made it flavorful and perfect.
I plan on making this my weekly jam for pizza and the price is right sooo see you there?