Damn Minnesotans need 2 of everything…
Never actually been in their restaurants, but CPK has one of the few frozen pizzas I could stand, if that means anything.
And, yeah, it’s not at all about the sauce for me. That’s like saying barbecue is about the sauce. If shouldn’t be the sauce that makes it great. To be honest, my favorite pizzas usually have nothing but straight crushed tomatoes on them.
Eh. I live here (and came from no less a pizza Mecca than Cincinnati, Ohio*) and find the typical “slice shop” pizza to be extremely disappointing. Sure, the pie is big and so are the slices. But that’s about all it’s got going for it. The crust is wrong, the ingredients are meh, the sauce ain’t great. I eat my share of it–the comment about bad sex applies–but it’s nothing I’m going to be longing for when I leave.
That said, I haven’t tried the really good, sit-down, coal-fired places yet. I figure there’s gotta be something to it.
- I do actually miss Dewey’s Pizza (which I didn’t even realize until just now was founded in Cincy–I assumed it was originally a Dayton or Columbus chain).
Of all the great pizzas in NYC. Tontonno’s is the best.
The trick I’ve found, to a good slice is finding places that have brick ovens.
The best pizza in existence is the Thai pizza from Truby’s in Columbia Falls, MT. Their Cajun, Jamaican jerk (Kaya), and Athenian pizzas are pretty damned good, too.
I’ve never found any other pizza place that was that creative, let alone that good at it.
One of my best days ever was when I hiked the Highline Trail in Glacier NP, and followed that up with pizza at Truby’s.
As long as they know how to use it. Seems like “Brick oven pizza” has become a bit of a marketing gimmick in some places. I was in Hoboken a couple years ago, and popped into a brick oven place somewhere on the main drag. I ordered a pizza to go and started asking the proprietor a bit about his brick oven, which he seemed quite proud of. I asked him how hot he’s got that thing going. He said something like 400-450F.
I was quite perplexed by this. I didn’t show my surprise, just kept asking away, but what the fuck is the point of having a brick oven if you’re only going to get it up to those temps? And I believe he was correct, as it took the pizza about 10 minutes or so to get done. A wood- or coal-fired brick oven is generally heated anywhere from 700-1000+F. That’s kind of the point of them. You cook a pizza in 1-3 minutes or so, and you pick up that wonderful charring from the high cooking temps.
Maybe he heard somewhere that the best temperature is around 400-450 degree. Although the person telling him meant °C and he understood °F?
The best pizza doesn’t exist - but any good pizza has only little toppings. Nothing is worse on a pizza than too much cheese, followed closely by too much sauce. A good napoletana or margherita will beat any other pizza there is. Though, a mediocre pizza can be improved by adding some toppings and makes this acceptable.
I tend to agree with this, although does depend on the style. For thicker styles, I could deal with heavier amounts of ingredients, but I do find that most pizza I have has wayyyyy too much cheese on it for my tastes. You really shouldn’t be able to remove the cheese in a single layer.