Fat Tony’s Italian Pub

This restaurant has CLOSED.

It’s closed.

I have eaten here twice. Sat at the bar both times. The bar is really nice and great place to watch a Carolina game. Service has been very good both times. The food, though, is hit or miss. Ordered a burger the first time and it was very good. Second time ordered build-​your-​own-​pasta with marinara and the sauce tasted like they just opened a can of tomato paste and poured it on. Totally inedible. Come on, how hard is it to make sauce? And in an «Italian» restaurant? The mushrooms tasted like they had been marinated (most likely in a jar). The meatballs were bland and sub-​par.
Bottom line, great location and a great place for drinks and a burger while you watch a game. Forget the rest of the menu.

Where to start. First, tons of potential… but the location really needs someone to go around and clean things up and get some items repaired/​replaced. For example, our booth seats were torn and had blue duck tape as a remedy but it was obvious this has been practiced for awhile now and it’s just tacky. Several of the lights inside are burned out or the housing for the lights are coming out of the ceiling tiles. Just some attention to detail can fix things up pretty quickly.
The service was good, nothing terribly exciting… it’s obvious our waitress is more comfortable serving college students than a mature couple. She was friendly but wasn’t terribly knowledgable on the menu and didn’t suggest anything.
We ordered 2 pizzas. One was the whole wheat testarossa and the other was the white pizza.
The whole wheat testarossa was disappointing. Way too much garlic and applied pretty sloppily… with tons on one side of the pizza and barely any on the other side. Also, the pizza wasn’t cooked all the way thru. Hate it when that happens. The roasted red peppers are obviously canned and reminded me more of pimento strips. The grilled chicken was like cardboard… tasteless, flaky like material that probably doubles as shipping filler.
The white pizza is missing some ingredients… it’s simply mozzarella, olive oil and sundried tomatoes. First, way too much olive oil was used on our pizza. The mozzarella had great consistency and was okay flavor wise. The sundried tomatoes were alright… not overdone (which is easy to do) but I think this pizza could use a hint of garlic and maybe some ricotta cheese to really make it POP.

Good food. The Calzones are HUGE! I had the testerrosa, Very good. Great place to watch the game.

Let me start by saying we did not have the pizza. I have hear ok things about their pizza. But as far as the rest of their food goes, it is disgusting. We are new to the area and like to try new places, we found this place and thought it looked nice. The cheese sticks were cold in the middle… the alfredo sauce was think and sweet. My husband, who is a very «open» eater even had a hard time eating his food. I DO NOT suggest this place.

I’m a very picky eater. When I first moved to Wilmington I was disappointed in the pizza choices. Until I tried Fat Tony’s. It is without a doubt my favorite pizza. The crust is always the perfect consistency. The sauce is perfect. I could eat here every night.

Awful service. Had to ask for every little thing. Stopped in for some drinks and apps. Beer selection was great food… okay. Porch view was nice, just simply horrible service. I use to be a waitress… so it takes alot for me to give a bad tip– and that’s what they got. Only reason they got 2 stars was their beer selection saved em a little bit.

Poor food. My wife and I eat out dinner quite a bit and both of us agreed the food was exceptionally bad tonight. I had the Corned Beef with cabbage, carrots and potatoes. It was the special of the day. My wife had spaghetti with meat sauce. The corned beef and potatoes were edible but tasteless. The carrots and cabbage were bland and had a bad flavor. My wifes spaghetti also had weird flavor that we did not like. These are both core dishes that a competent restaurant should be able to make at least at the par level. You would think an Italian restaurant could get spaghetti right!
I have been to Fat Tony’s a few times before and was never impressed. The only reason I decided to give it another try was a coupon I had for buy one get one free entrée. Even with the coupon I felt I got ripped off.
Overall the place has good atmosphere, great beer selection and good location. I would recommend if your going to have a few beers and maybe an appetizer. I do not recommend Fat Tony’s if you desire a good meal. Wilmington has too many good restaurants to waste an evening forcing down tasteless fare.

I love Unilocal because it leads me to places like this.
I came here the night before an Ironman (12 hour endurance event), with the intention of loading up on carbs.
I split 2 pasta entrees with a friend — the pesto penne with sweet Italian sausage and the spaghetti with meat sauce, topped with chicken. It’s $ 10 for pasta with sauce, and $ 2 for an additional topping.
The only disappointment was the chicken. DON’T get it. It’s basically just sliced chicken meat that dirties an otherwise perfect pasta. I should have listened to the waitress, who told me that the meat sauce would be enough protein. It is. The italian sausage, on the other hand, was excellent — soft, sweet, delicious.
This was some seriously excellent pasta, in crazy big portions, at a very low key place. I’d recommend this to anyone.
I didn’t partake in the bar scene, but did see a huge selection on tap.

Driving around close to the hotel I decided to give Fat Tony’s a chance once inside they grabbed my attention right away with 24 beers on tap! It being early on a Monday night it was fairly quite, the bar service was great. I ordered the cioppino for an entrée and it was very good. From a food geek stand point I think they should have called it frutti di mare, but the flavor was good none the less.

I like this place infinitely better when A) Carolina’s not playing and B) the smokers leave the bar.
When we arrived tonight I thought I was going to cough up a lung under the weight of the smoke in the bar area. As the night wore on, though, the smokers generally cleared out, and the air improved vastly. And while we managed conversation throughout the Tarheels game (sound aired loud and clear over the PA), things improved greatly when the game ended and a surprisingly great mix of 90’s rock came on.
The atmosphere is actually pretty cool here (warm strands of lights overhead, intimate rustic Italian vibe), and the bartender was exceedingly attentive (despite the fact that we were seated at one of the outer-​lying barrel tables). He also looked like a basketball player himself and the unnaturally long arms span served him well.
Long story short: I dig the place when it’s not trying to be a sports bar. Sadly, I think that’s what it’s trying to be a lot of the time. As for the food (this is a full service restaurant during the day and evening), that remains to be seen. Jeff had a seriously greasy slice of pizza and a friend tried a decent meatball/​parmesan melt (strangely the potato salad fared the best here). I’ll have to report back after I’ve tried more than just the excellent beer selection.