Philip I.
Yelp
I work in Medley. Anything that smells nicer than the landfill (located east of 107th Ave and South of 106th street) triggers an orgasm of my nasal passages. This brings me to Loven Ovens rather frequently. Now, the main problem with this is that I am not the only one who feels this way about landfills. I am also not the only one who has, so far, discovered Loven Ovens. Unfortunately, the friendly management at this "fast food" Italian eatery has obviously not yet realized that they are severely understaffed to handle the lunchtime rush of patrons. The result is food that is not served fast enough.
Let's face it, Loven Ovens is in a location that is somewhat distanced from residential areas. As such, their core clientele consists of those who are employed by one of the many companies in the Flagler Station industrial park or its environs. Now, I don't know about some of these captains of industry, but I can say that, at our company, they expect our lunch break not to exceed one hour.
Everything I have ordered here is good. The problem is that sometimes, I get something different than what I ordered. This has happened twice so far. I have been here six times since it opened; a 66.6% yield is not tolerated by our company's customers. Lucky for Loven Ovens, the erroneous outcome also tasted pretty damn good. The truth is, I keep coming back because everything I have had here really agrees with my taste buds (my heart and digestive system beg to differ as I type this).
I have not yet understood why they have a Point of Sale system but it does not seem to be driving demand for the orders. I say this because it appears that the cooks prepare the orders based on handwritten slips of paper and there is always a chaotic scene in front of the counter which starts at 12:05pm every day. Seemingly, there is no sequencing of the orders and the people taking the orders often do not know which patron placed which order! Me thinks they need to devise a more efficient ordering flow.
They have specials every day and they are large portions priced extremely competitively. Their penne with meat sauce is one of my favorites but I found that some of the employees do not differentiate this from the baked ziti (I ordered the penne and they produced the baked ziti).
The establishment is clean. The kitchen seems to be organized; the staff, not so much. There is typically one guy preparing the pizzas, one girl taking the orders and two others behind the counter manning the oven and bringing the prepared orders to the counter. There is no table service during the weekday lunch hour.
Of course, I will keep coming back on weekdays (sorry, my beloved myocardial chambers) always making sure to arrive before 12:05pm. At prices this reasonable, I can think of only 2 people who would rather inhale used diaper vapors; I prefer not to associate with either of them.
