East Side Mario's Pickering

Super family friendly! We recently visited this location 3 times, since my 3yo daughter discovered it at the mall and every time had been a good experience. First off, the internal mall entrance had been closed off, so if you 're shopping and want that short-cut, it 's no longer there. You need to exit the mall and use their external doors. Food choice 5/5: their menu is quite extensive for the usual family italian fare, and they offer the all you can eat salad/soup on some of the entres. You get a fresh bread roll to start. The kids menu is pretty decent with actual meat in some of the dishes. Kids meals come with a drink and a dessert choice. Food taste 4/5: we 've tried several entries now, and some are definitely better than others. The most recent kids meal (pasta meats broccoli) really didn 't taste that good (really just boiled/steamed pasta, broccoli, chicken breast, and tomato sauce on top but didnt seem like a well thought-out dish with cohesive flavour), and my daughter didn 't eat any of it. She tried the Cheese Cappelletti before and she gobbled that up. Everyone enjoyed my husband 's Linguine Chicken Tetrazzini though! It was creamy and very well done. I had the Ultimate Canadian Pizza on our recent visit, and it was better than I expected. The crust was soft and pillowy, the flavours were delicious although I think they should add more mushrooms. The tilapia was very fishy and soggy and I wouldn 't get it again, but I 'm eyeing to try one of their sandwiches next visit! Service 5/5: everyone has been spectacular each time. There was one occasion where our server was very overwhelmed/exhausted dealing with another table (it appeared their young infant spilled a lot of the soup everywhere and mopping was needed), but she took a deep breath to collect herself and continued on with service. We really appreciated her efforts, and our service was great! Family friendly 5/5: I love that the backside of the kids menu has some colouring and activities for the kiddos! They also give new crayons that are sealed along with it. My 3yo loves picking out her dish and colouring in the princess character. The kid 's drink comes with a lid on the cup; I 'm not sure if it 's totally antispill but definitely helps minimize any accidents. My kiddo always looks forward to her gelato pushpop ice cream. It 's a good small serving size in a convenient tube shape, squeeze the bottom to push it out.

So East Side is a basic chain restaurant with mediocre food, I always enjoy their salad and home loaf. They had two young men that were at the pizza service area so you can watch them cook. I ordered a pizza this night and very shortly after it arrived, I was watching the too young men joking around. One young man would wipe sweat off his forehead with his forearm and also his hand the other touched his face and mouth. No gloves and no washing of their hands where they proceeded to make other meals. Never again. I did let our host know and asked them to wait to correct them till we had left which he did not. Cleanliness is really important to us especially when we eat out, this needs to be corrected.

We were going to go to a different place but it was closed so we came here. The food was not bad but not great. Everything seemed bland and unseasoned. But I think this is the common refrain for most chain family italian restaurants. The service was very good and they were very attentive. The food came promptly and it is a good place to eat if you are coming with your family. I would reccomend this as a solid place to bring your family if you are looking for a reliably decent unadventurous place to eat.

Very good food and bot too had of a price! Gotta try it!

Went here for a friends birthday! Absolutely enjoyable experience, Customer service and food spot on. A host at the front named milo made the experience good, he had a friendly attitude and a welcoming voice, our experience was just overall good