Ratsies Terrapin Eatery

Ratsies has not only been closed down, but the building was torn down. Another long-​time area gathering place bites the dust — literally.

Ordered large cheese pizza for delivery at 5:45 on Friday. Pie was delivered at 5:05! It smelled good, looked good but when bitten into the pie was uncooked! Raw dough! If this was done because it was a Friday night I would recommend that you order it well done. 16.95 + 3.00 tip is too much for pizza that you could get with DiGornio frozen.

Eww.
Take a look around you when you walk in this place and it will tell you everything you need to know about ratsies. Dirty… Dingy… Greasy… Old as the hills. Gross with a capital G. This place looks and smells ratchet. Unless you’re coming at a busy time, you best believe that pizza slice you’re getting has been sitting there alllllllll day. If be shocked if I don’t get food poisoning after this… After seeing the lobby area I can only IMAGINE what the actual food prep/​cooking area looks like. And the employees don’t seem like the type to worry too much about proper food safety, temperatures, storage times and handling. The only reason you should ever go to Ratsies is if you’re 1) broke 2) starving to death AND 3) too drunk to notice how disgusting the food is. AKA, a college student after midnight.
I haven’t even mentioned the poor quality of ingredients and nasty smell of the «been sitting under a hot lamp all day» food… But like I said, taking a look around Ratsies will already tell you everything you need to know.

A College Park institution (but only between midnight and 2 am). I have never remembered what the pizza actually tastes like but I know that it has saved me from many a hangover.

The only reason Ratsies is well-​known is because the restaurant has been around for 20+ years and has long been the only pizza option. The food is well below average, the wait is often ridiculous and the price is embarassing. Now that there are other pizza options I don’t think it’ll be long before Ratsies goes out of business. I recommend trying absolutely nothing because Ratsies is not worth the trip, I would recommend some of the nearby pizza places like slices or the new blaze pizza. Pros I do have to say about Ratsies is its late night hours, delivery option, and the Greek salad is surprisingly good.

Welllll we ordered on grubhub and we
Got an email saying they were on there way… they were 45 minutes late. After calling and wondering where our food was, it finally came. From ordering to delivery the wait time was an hour and a half. The chicken wings we got were dry, small, and tasted like they had been fried several times. There was barely any meat. They got one out of two calzone orders correctly. JUST PEPPERONI is not a difficult order for a calzone. Mine came filled with different meats. This is my second time eating at this establishment and it will be the last. If I could give this place zero stars I would. Waste of money.

A good place for either delivery or pickup. They do have tables to eat inside, but they cater more for the To Go crowd. Their pizzas are big and tasty and their calzones are fantastic. Wish their pizzas had a little more variety, but what they offer is pretty good.

This place is a frat boy’s dream come true. They have beer pouring out of every wall of this store and advertisements for beer. Pizza, wings, and calzones galore. They have a long list of greasy frat boy apps to cheddar stuffed jalapeño poppers to pizza fries. There’s like two pizza joints on every block on UMD’s section of Route 1 so if you feel like pizza, you have lots to choose from. I am a pizza purist so I have never even attempted to eat their pizza.
On the other hand, I like the occasional box of wings. Fresh from the fryer, these wings are pretty decent. I have been to too many places that put batter on the wings, have some nasty sauce, or some other atrocious anomaly. Stick wings in fryer, toss with hot sauce, The end.
As mentioned beforehand (in true college town manner) they charge a dollar for everything. A dollar for ranch to go with your wings, a dollar for celery sticks. I ordered celery sticks to get over the 10 dollar limit for online ordering and get to the store– they ran out of celery sticks, so he stuck in a ranch (next to the ranch I already had with my salad). A place like this would barely exist outside the college bubble!

Food was okay… beers were good, too. They have some good deals on the menu.

Solid slice of pizza…
Pretty big slice, thin crust kinda NYC style… not quite as crispy but pretty good.
After walking around campus all afternoon it hit the spot with an ice cold coca cola.
Five bucks for slice of cheese and a drink, in & out in 15 mins, quick & easy
…(like my women)

Your pizza SUCKS! But after a few beers they are ok but there pizza is flimsy and sad! And the service is not great! The guy heating up my 2 slices of pizza is to busy talking on the dam phone to put my pizza in the oven! If you are looking for good pizza in college park your best bet is papa johns across the street! They are open late and have deals for students. Avoid this place unless you are drunk!

After a loong day, I decide to pick up a Calzone from this place before my 30 minute drive back. I take a chance and order their ‘Burger Calzone.’
I’ve had a shitty day and a terrible commute, including my off ramp being nearly blocked by cops dealing with a dead deer. I bite into my Calzone and it is amazing!!! First off the crust is whole wheat, not greasy, not doughy, the perfect consistency all the way around. The first thing I taste is garlic and herbs. The mozzarella is nice and melty (I did throw it in the microwave for 30 seconds when I got home). The burger meat is there, it tastes nice, it’s a little different than a normal calzone flavor, but it’s basically like sausage made with beef instead of pork. There are a decent amount of onions, but they’re #1 cooked just enough they’re not raw but still slightly crunchy, and #2 perfectly evenly distributed… two things I should add that MANY Italian places can’t get right. The tomato sauce on the side is very nice as well, not greasy by any means and goes well with the wheaty-​meaty flavors.
For about $ 8.00 I got what I felt was a very large calzone, with a good amount of filling, cooked perfectly, and with everything in balance (no huge mess of onions on one side like some places).
Truly a better Calzone than even some of the sit-​down restaurants in Gaithersburg. I have to go back to college park tomorrow, and I will probably get another calzone.

Worst pizza, and food in general, in College Park. Delivery food arrives cold time after time.

Oh the fond memories of this place! I love everything about Ratsie’s it’s just one of those places you will never forget during your college life. I also love that I never had to wait in line the owner always gave me special treatment and the diva in me loved it! I would also rather eat the pizza here than at the any franchises it’s New York Style and consistently good, also the mozzarella sticks are good as well just not good on the waist of course. I recently stopped by here during the lunch hour and nothing has changed!

If you can read this you’re not drunk enough to eat at Ratsie’s. Please try again later.

Everything shuts down in CP if it’s not the weekend (Thursday counts as the weekend in college towns), so for me, lowly test prep teacher, leaving class at 10 on weekdays means limited options. Hence I stopped here on a whim. The appearance suggested I was in for disappointment, even though my only two requirements were a) edible and b) not Jimmy Johns (it’s delicious but tiresome).
All in all, not bad for pizza by the slice. It was quick service (about 10 minutes), the guys were nice enough, and it met my two criteria. The only unfortunate things were that «veggie» apparently means as much onion as you can possibly fit on a slice, the pizza was a little burnt (but I like crispy rather than soggy which is often a problem when loaded down with juicy vegetables), and the sauce tasted like it was out of some industrial size «pizza sauce» 10-​gallon tub. For less than $ 5 it was a satisfying after-​10 dinner choice.
Dine-​in may be a different experience, but carry out for a laste night slice exceeded expectations a little.

Alright, soooo Ratsie’s… a guaranteed late-​night stop for dozens, if not hundreds, of College Park students every night.
Is the pizza good? No. Is it pizza? Yeah. And to be quite honest, that’s all Ratsie’s needs to attract UMD students after the bars close for the night. Their mozzarella sticks and fried zucchini aren’t a bad choice either.
The most annoying part about Ratsie’s? They’ll squeeze money out of you at any opportunity. Want some extra marinara sauce? $ 1 Please. Want a side of ranch? $ 1. Really dude? Your pizza is so grossly overpriced and not even that great… Ratsie’s is so lucky to have the location they’ve got, otherwise their restaurant would be just as empty at night as it is during the day.

Seriously f*** the haters.
Ratsies is a College Park establishment. Why would it be around so long if it served terrible food?
This is my go-​to sober pizza restaurant (not Dominos, not Vitos, not Pizza Bolis…) Ledos and maybe Papa Johns are the only restaurants serving pizza that may stack up to what ratsies offers.
Though, proceed with caution because you feel sick after eating Ratsies.
But in terms of the quality of the food and service, I give it 5 starts

Having returned to CP for the first time in over a decade, Ratsie’s was the only place open after 10pm that I recognized. It was also the first time I’d ever eaten there.
2.5 stars is about right. However this place must be doing something right. Because, along with Marathon Deli, it’s the only place that is still around from the early 1990’s. Okay there’s Bentley’s, but no one goes to Bentley’s for food.
Anyway, Ratsie’s makes their own dough, which is good. Their prices are cheap. They also have many specials that will satisfy any starving student.
My Burger Calzone was passable, but consisted of bread more than anything else, and as such was dry. Their pizza is decent.
Basically, everything here is a good deal for the price. You get a lot for your money and, while it’s nothing special, it’s good. They sell Pizza by The Slice, They Deliver, and it’s better than fast food or any other unhealthy late night meal.
Oh how I miss Cluck-​U!
I guess longevity of this sort, in this transient campus town, is a testament to something.

People seem to love this place, but I won’t even eat here drunk. The food is that drenched in oil and not worth the calories. I’d rather eat at Dominoes. That’s sad.
If you do come here after the bars, expect to see at least two people passed out with their heads on tables or even get thrown up on. (true story) Some girl also tried to fight my friend here after she cut the line and was pissed she got called out. If you want to use the bathroom, expect to wait a while. Don’t expect toilet paper.