This place is extremely over priced. For instance, $15 for a salad...really??? I can go to Bob's Market down the street and pick up one of their pre-made to-go salads and I won't see one piece of wilted lettuce. I can't say the same for a (supposed) freshly made salad from Izzy's, that's for sure. Plus, their chicken noodle/matzah ball soup DOES taste like dishwater! Sure, you get good sized portions, but a hearty portion of crap is certainly not a good thing. By no means is this place a NY style deli...and Izzy should be ashamed for claiming it as such. More like a ""Santa Monica Alley Deli"".
Furthermore, their servers are extremely rude or shall I say completely off their rocker. One example: My family and I were dinning there and when the server asked if we were ready to order, my husband asked for a couple more minutes as we were discussing something (non-food related) and hadn't had a chance to look at the menu. The server stood there for what seemed like 10 seconds, and (according to my daughter) looked at me and said, ""What's your problem?"" Confused, I looked around then looked up at her and said, ""What? Are you talking to me?"" She was looking directly at me and said, ""Yeah, joo got a problem wit me?"" I said, ""No. What are you talking about? I wasn't even looking or talking to you."" The funny thing is, my husband and I weren't even discussing anything problematic or that had any kind of negative tone or connotation to it. My husband then jumped in and said, ""Whoa! Who the hell do you think you are, talking to my wife like that when no one at this table has said or done anything to you!"" He then asked for the manager who came over immediately, but was too old and bewildered to do or say anything at that moment (he was out of breath from walking from the cash register to the SE corner where we were boothed...say about 18ft.). Realizing the waitress just got away with her behavior, we picked up our things and immediately walked out. That incident caused us to boycott the place for 2 years until finally we caved and went back thinking maybe that crazy server was gone. Of course, we should've known better. This time our waiter (yes, a male) took our order and brought to us an entirely different order within a shorter than usual amount of time it takes to get your food. We kindly explained the food was not what we ordered and it probably was for a different table. Wouldn't you know it, the waiter had the audacity to argue with us and tell us we indeed ordered the food he brought to our table. We were like WOW...REALLY???...another psycho server?!?!?! This took about 10 minutes of going back and forth with him, requesting he look at the other orders he submitted to the cooks and Izzy himself coming over, before the waiter finally realized he was mistaken. And after all that, no discount and cold breakfast. We're good citizens so we paid the bill, but we left a penny (on purpose) for a tip.
Suffice it to say, this place has for sure burned it's bridge with us. No way in hell are we going to pay those outrageous prices for THAT kind of service and eh food. I used to work in the bar/restaurant industry and I believe in tipping well over 20% for good service...their loss, someone else's gain.
So...if you're OK with spending your hard earned money for way over-priced over-rated mediocre food and you want to take a chance in having Sybil or Norman Bates as your server...Izzy's is your place. (Gag! Puke!)
Btw - there is one genuinely nice server. His name is Juan (he's bald). He is the only reason we ever tried to go back in the past. Unfortunately, the slight possibility of his presence isn't reason enough for us to endure the other BS.
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