North Beach Pizza, Little Star, and Deja Vu, within walking distance.
I used to work for one of the major[ly shitty] pizza chains, and we had the occasional customer who’d adamantly order theirs with XXXXXXXX-sauce.
We got the point—they liked sauce a lot. Of course their pizza wasn’t, and could not be, made using 8x the normal amount of sauce; it would have to be delivered in a large punchbowl, driven at speeds not exceeding 15mph. We did try to be as accomodating as possible, but that much extra liquid has an unintended consequence: the pizza doesn’t cook properly.
“Hey, my pizza with four extra ladles of sauce is brown on the edges and still cold and raw in the center!”
(Gee— you think? I tried to explain that, but I guess you couldn’t hear me over your petulant screams of “you guys never use enough sauce.”)
Given that the founder of Domino’s is a nutter, who’s used his wealth from Domino’s to start a “porn-free” community in Florida, I’ve decided to never buy anything from Domino’s again.
And over in the East Bay Zachary’s (stuffed deep dish) and Arinell’s (thin NY style). Zach’s is a sit-down place, Arinell’s used to be a tiny hole in the wall (literally), now it’s a slightly larger hole in the wall. Zach’s tomato sauce is yummy, plenty of actual chunks of tomato.
A lot of Berkeleyites are fanatics for the Cheese Board pizza…um, their toppings don’t do much for me but they do make good crust (it’s a bakery).
When I order out I tend to get from a little place over near me in El Cerrito called Pizza Roma. There’s nothing incredible about it, it’s just a good local pizza joint and unlike all of the chains they make a good crust which is IMHO what makes or breaks the pizza.
Dang. Now I’m really, really hungry for pizza.
I’ve had authentic NY pizza in Manhattan and Brooklyn and found it wildly overrated. I was told that was because I ordered it by the slice, rather than by the pie, so last time in manhattan I made sure to get a pie made fresh at a place recommended by locals. It was good, but it wasn’t something where I’d eat it and only it and flip out over it and tell everyone the pizza they were eating was a shell of the pizza back home, etc. Felt the same way about Chicago style, although I only ate there once. Now Gray’s Papaya hot dogs, theres something I get every time Im in NY. Just can’t get a dog like that out in California.
As for west coast pizza, you generally can’t get good stuff from a large chain. Extreme Pizza & Roundtable are pretty good. Roundtable is actually a fairly hotly contested place, some people absolutely hate it, most people (like myself) think its pretty good. Domino’s, Papa John’s, and Pizza Hut are pretty inedible. CPK is ok if you want thai basil and walnuts on your pizza.
Local places (SF/east bay area) are just as hit or miss as chains - As mentioned Zachary’s is solid, so are North Beach, Amici’s, and Romas. Spuds is acceptable. Cheeseboard and Arizmendi are both good but more in the CPK vein. City Pizza is cheap and bad. Lavalls (now defunct) and Blondies are awful.
I think I eat too much pizza.
LaVal’s closed? When did this happen? I have fond memories of their pepperoni pizza, crust bubbly and a little crispy, with that little sprinkle of cheddar cheese on top. Boy that stuff was good. Blondie’s and Fat Slice were basically the same, OK if you got them hot out of the oven on Telegraph to eat while browsing the street vendors. Delivered their stuff was awful.
Wow. Once a staple of my diet, I haven’t even thought about those places in years… Yup, pizza is best when it’s topped with nostalgia.
:drool:
I don’t know exactly when it closed, but I went by there about 2 months ago and it was all boarded up. I used to go there frequently, not for the pizza so much as I liked the ambience. Something about going down the stairs, the big screen tv, the decent beer selection, etc. made it a fine spot to catch a game.
I meant I make it at home! Native New Yorker here. My recipe involves a sourdough yeast, several days of cold rising, autolysing the dough during kneading and jury-rigging my oven to get it up to about 800 degrees (the cleaning cycle is not JUST for cleaning, if you clip the oven lock), but it’s worth it.
I SWEAR that I’m not a New York pizza snob. I find the pizza in Chicago, both deep and flat, to be quite good.
But, the fact that people in the Bay area (and I’ve had more than a few tell me this) find Round Table edible is amazing to me. So, chalk me up for hate!
(to make up for it the Bay area has better fish and produce that the east coast! I feel the need to say this so that it doesn’t become an east coast/west coast rap war!)
Well you have to realize we’re comparing it to places like Papa John’s, who’s pizza is something like taking a piece of cardboard, drawing some sauce, cheese and toppings in crayon on it, putting it in the oven and then eating it. Compared to that, yes Round Table is edible.
LaVal’s on Northside is still open, I believe.
Now that’s what I’m talking about! The crust is exactly why East Coast pizza kicks so much ass.
For those interested in the method Fiveyearlurker is describing, click here. That’s the full recipe and technique, but does take jury-rigging an oven with a self-cleaning cycle to do at home.
Guys, I strongly suggest checking with your wives before jury rigging your oven. Mine is a bit upset with me just because I’ve caused a handful of small fires.
Yes. I’m in Seattle. There is no pizza in Seattle. There’s this nasty stuff that the locals *call *pizza, but they’re way, way off.
Here in Santa Barbara, the pizza is pretty terrible. I can’t say that I’ve tried every place yet, but of all the pizza places I’ve eaten, only one beats the one I can make with Trader Joes dough, and that only slightly.
I’ll try some of the North Beach places mentioned at some point, but the best that I’ve found is actually at Whole Foods. Not great, mind you, but decent.
But do you FOLD IT LIKE A MAN?!?
I don’t know your pizza persuasion, but for Chicago-style check out Delfino’s in the University Village, and for New York style check out Topolino’s in downtown Bellevue. Both places are actually owned and run by guys that grew up in those respective cities. By the way, I grew up in Chicago and my wife grew up in Manhattan… so we know of what we speak and it took us years to find these places. I agree that most Seattle pizza is absolute drek… but there are a couple of places around that do deliver the goods when you need a taste of home.
I’m pretty sure that the little one in El Cerrito on San Pablo ave is too, that’s why I was surprised to read that.