Slices of pizza, like shooting stars, are beautiful to behold and usually burn up before they can crush you to death. Dodge a flying chunk of cheese pie with today's Groupon to Mario The Baker in Bay Harbor Islands. Choose between the following options:
- For $15, you get $30 worth of Italian dinner fare and drinks.
- For $10, you get $20 worth of Italian lunch fare and drinks.
For more than 40 years, Mario The Baker has been hand-tossing dough into belly-warming bites that live on an extensive menu of traditional Italian eats. The spread of southern Italian specialties, which include garlic rolls ($0.95), baked ziti ($8.95), and veal parmigiana ($11.95), helps tongues to experience their full tasting capabilities and load mouths with mouthfuls of delicious stomach stuffing. With a dedicated staff of dough spinners, Mario's serves up tasty brick-oven-baked New York–style pizza. Tantalize your tongues by sticking them into la mafiosa, a pizza featuring sliced eggplant, tomato sauce, and mozzarella (starting at $15.45), or try the godfather pizza, which is baked with capocollo, salami, ham, provolone, and mozzarella (starting at $17.95). Top off tummies with a homemade dessert such as the cannoli, cheesecake, or tiramisu ($3.95 each). The restaurant is only a short gallop from the beach, so swimmers can gobble a bite and drink a draft of Bud Light, Bud Select, or Amber Bock, and then scurry back to the shores to finish filling in the ocean with sand.
Reviews
Miami New Times reviewed the original Surfside location of Mario The Baker and praised its famous garlic rolls. Seven Yelpers give the Bay Harbor Islands location a 3.5-star average, and more than 50 iDine users give the restaurant a rating of 4.1 out of 5.
- The moist, fluffy buns are drenched in enough olive oil to supply a small town in Italy; they're seasoned with the perfect oregano-garlic ratio. – Miami New Times
- The staff was very friendly overall and the service was very fast. – Chio R., Yelp, 10/20/10
Mario the Baker
Since 1969, the cooks at Mario the Baker have followed the same tried-and-true recipes, resulting in pizza after fresh-baked pizza emerging from the oven with the same flavors as the restaurant's very first batch. Diners settle into red and black booths to split signature pizzas, including La Maflosa pizza with sliced eggplant and mozzarella. As part of an unrefusable offer, the Godfather pie comes topped with capicollo, ham, and salami and is served with a side of housemade italian dressing.