This Pizzeria is the 'Master' of Ribs

With the many restaurants I’ve reviewed in Strongsville, one category that I’ve been remissed in covering are the pizzerias. I must admit I don’t know the great pizza stops in town. If you do know of a fantastic place for pizza, nominate it on the main patch.com page and I’ll add it to my list of places to go.

With that, I blindly picked the place I went to for this column. Being a brave and adventerous soul, I typed in “pizza” and “Strongsville” in Google and did a search. Up popped up at 19616 W. 130th St. and off I went.

The outside of Master italian Pizzeria was rather nondescript. The inside, however, had a nice homey feel and looked like a nice, local pizzeria to bring family and friends to.

The one thing I really dug about this place was the original artwork gracing its walls. Being an artist myself, I love looking at other folks' work. There were some nice pieces up for show. The owner, Jay, found many of the local artists on Craigslist.

It should also be noted that Jay himself is an excellent artist in his own right. Yes, some of his work is also on display, though not for sale. His No. 1 fan won’t allow him to sell them.

I found Jay to be a personable and friendly fellow and enjoyed discussing art with him. Of course when my appetizer arrived at my table, it was time to quit the arty chit-chat and do my job and eat.

Our server had mentioned that the ribs and wings are great here. I ordered the Ribs, Wings and Onion Rings plate to sample both as well as get me some rings. Let me say that the ribs were easily the best thing I had here. They were meaty and falling off the bone. The barbecue sauce was especially yummy. I want more!

The sauce I got for my wings was exceptional. I can’t recommend the “hot ranch” enough and this sauce is made on the premises. It was so good that I was also dipping my rings in it. The wings themselves were okay though not as crispy as I’d like.

Up next was two small specialty pizzas: Chicken Bacon Ranch Pizza and Philly Cheese Steak Pizza.

The thin crust is only available for medium and larger sizes so I had to get my pizzas in the traditional dough. I’m not sure why that is and would have loved to have sampled the thin crust.

The regular dough wasn’t bad and had a nice chew to it but is still pretty much your average pizza dough. The Chicken Bacon Ranch Pizza was quite hardy. It was packed with white meat chicken and was very cheesy. I would definitely recommend it.

I liked the Philly Cheese Steak Pizza but wasn’t blown away by it. It lived up to the “Cheese” part of its title and was cheesy. I also really enjoyed the sweet onions and green peppers that shared the space. It came up short on the steak end. I sort of envisioned more meat. Again, it was a good pizza but it might have been a serous contender if they’d double the meat.

Other specialty pizzas that sounded pretty tasty included: Super Pepperoni (You can never have too much pepperoni!), Fire Pizza (It includes various hot peppers and Italian sausage) and the Mark Special Pizza (Loaded with mushrooms, baby!).

Next time I come here I’ll pass on the pizza and go straight to their slow-roasted St. Louis style ribs. I loved the ones I had here and feel good ribs are harder to find than good pizza.

That would make this one pizzeria that is the “Master” of ribs.

I still want to find the very best pizza that Strongsville can offer so be sure to give me some great suggestions to aid me in my quest for a killer slice of pizza pie.