Slice

East Harlem Patsy's Up to $1.75 for Slices

Fri, 18 Jul 2008 11:30:00 -0500

Craig Nelson of Not for Tourists emails with some intel that's new to Slice: "Patsy’s [East Harlem] slices went up to a $1.75—finally." And I say, well, they still haven't broken the $2 price point—at a time when $2.25 seems to be the average in the city. Still a great deal—if the slice is good that day! Thanks, Craig.

Promising Pizza Alert: Pizza Grill

Thu, 17 Jul 2008 16:45:00 -0500

When I did my Park Slope pizza walk three weeks ago, I noticed a place on Fourth Avenue just past 11th Street that had a new sign and some of those car dealership–type flags. The number listed on the sign was disconnected. Hmm. Was this a just-failed or just-about-to-open pizzeria?

Well, I went by the other day, and I'm happy to report that it's an opening. Pizza Grill replaces whatever pizzeria was there before. I can't remember its name. The space is large and clean. Slices cost $2.25. And judging by the slice I had on Thursday, the place has potential. Granted, it was one slice. So caveat emptor. And I had it only warm from a slice pie with no reheat. But it was thin and chewy, had a good not-too-mucked-with sauce, and best of all, had just enough Parmigiano on it to give a tangy and salty bite.

The proprietor is the former owner of Verrazano Pizza in Bay Ridge.

I'm keeping my fingers crossed. More word when I get more intel.

Pizza Grill

471 Fourth Avenue, Brooklyn NY 11215 (at 11th Street; map)
718-499-0600

Dear Slice: Domino's Gotham City Pizza

Thu, 17 Jul 2008 06:00:00 -0500

Clicking in to the Slice inbox this morning, we've got a message and some photos from our homeslice P.G. (aka Prairie).

Dear Adam and fellow Slice obsessives,
Long time no talk. How have you been? I've been well, though I wish I could be speaking to you on better terms. You see, at this very moment, I am digesting one of Domino's Gotham City Pizzas.

The things I do for this site.

Some of you may remember that I tipped Slice on this last month, and the tie-ins have really ramped up since then. Domino's has created a signature pizza, the Gotham Style Pizza. This pizza, as it turns out, is really just their standard large pie with 50 percent more pepperoni, delivered in a nifty black box, for $9.99—and, oh yeah, you might get a check for $10,000 just for ordering it.

"Every day for 21 days (July 7 to July 27), Domino's customers will have the chance to win $10,000 delivered to their door when they order the Gotham City(TM) Pizza. Now through July 27, customers can order Domino's new Gotham City(TM) Pizza-a large, hand-tossed pizza, cloaked with 1.5 times the amount of pepperoni than a standard order for $9.99 delivered in a specially-designed Gotham City(TM) Pizza Box. No purchase necessary to enter or win."

Needless to say, I didn't win $10,000. The pizza was good enough, and the box was black and shiny.

Later on, Slice,
PG

'Pizza Corpse' Book Launch

Wed, 16 Jul 2008 08:00:00 -0500

I took some art history courses in college. Did they prepare me for this?

Pizza Corpse is an exquisite framing of the artist's nostalgia, social and cultural associations; interest in the grotesque, hygiene and self-image, corporal perturbations, and any other greasy subject related to these concerns in and out of the box. All of the featured artists are Yale School of Art graduate students or recent graduates, who grinningly pulled the book's topic out of a hat. This strategy not only introduced a re-examination of Fluxus terms for the compilation, but it also served as a method to display contemporary alterations of Internet-accessible imagery. You will find this book to be a humorous browse or an earnest sit down; the responses in the book are as varied as the toppings on a pizza.

I'm not sure they did.

Pizza Corpse Book Launch

Where: Printed Matter, 195 Tenth Avenue, New York NY 10011 (b/n 21st and 22nd streets; map)
When: 5 to 7 p.m.; Thursday, July 17, 2008
More Info: http://printedmatter.org/news/news.cfm?article_id=329

Joe's Pizza in Los Angeles

Tue, 15 Jul 2008 10:15:00 -0500

Editor's note: Today, Chuck K., a New York expatriate living on the West Coast, drops by with intel on the outpost of Joe's Pizza that opened in Los Angeles. Buon appetito, friends! —The Mgmt.

Step right up! Get your honest-to-goodness, 100 percent original New York-style pizza. Whether it's Tony's, Johnnie's, Frankie's, or Vito's, Los Angeles pizza purveyors love to claim New York authenticity in their pies. Not long ago, an establishment in Marina Del Rey killed whatever optimism I had left for "New York-style" pizza around L.A.

At this nameless place, the crust tasted like a ream of loose-leaf paper, and the sticky, sweet ketchuplike sauce was smeared all over the dough. The cheese, well, we won't go there. L.A.'s generally dismal New York pizza scene changed for the better a few months ago when Joe Vitale of New York City's original Joe's Pizza opened a red brick storefront on Broadway in Santa Monica. The sign screamed to me, “Yo, how about a slice?” Was I dreaming? Was I experiencing a pizza hallucination? Would an alleged New York–style pizza finally taste like New York?

I've heard that New Yorkers deprived of good pizza for too long develop hyponapoletana nervosa, a condition characterized by sweaty palms, irregular heartbeats, and an insatiable craving for fresh mozzarella. Joined by a couple ex-New Yorkers, we cured this bug with Vitale's fresh mozzarella pie, which was as delicious as any on Carmine Street. So authentic that, for a moment, I thought I could hear basketballs pounding on the asphalt of the West 4th Street courts.

Anyone who has enjoyed a Joe's pie knows Vitale makes a firm, crisp, and chewy crust with no tip sag. Silky and creamy, the fresh mozzarella sticks to the slice and melds with the fresh sauce. Folded, the pizza makes that magical crunch—one that only a true pizza lover understands.

In addition to the fresh mozzarella, we also devoured a half-sausage, half-cheese pie, which was good but only average. A nice homemade fennel sausage would have improved the taste. The fresh mozzarella is the way to go. Probably because Vitale uses fresh Grande-brand mozzarella despite the price. For sauce, he reaches the same gourmand caliber with San Marzano tomatoes. The pies are baked between 500 and 525 degrees—not nearly as hot as a brick oven but hot enough for a perfectly charred crust.

Is It Really the Water?

Finally, I had to ask Vitale about the water. Does it really make a New York pie? In his words: “It's not the water. Santa Monica can be proud of its water.”

His opinion can be taken to the bank. The pie tasted like it had been sauced, cheesed, and baked right there on Carmine Street. What else is there to say? I'm going back over right now for a couple more slices. Vitale said he'll be opening more L.A.-based pizzerias, and with the price of gas rising like the dough in one of his pies, this won't be a minute too soon.

Joe's Pizza of Bleecker Street

111 Broadway, Santa Monica CA 90401 (map)
310-395-9222
joespizza.com

Come Eat Pizza with Us for a Good Cause

Mon, 14 Jul 2008 19:30:00 -0500

Where: Una Pizza Napoletana, 349 East 12th Street, New York NY 10003 (at First Ave.; map)
When: 3 p.m., October 11, 2008 (Saturday)
Cost: $85 a ticket (available here)

Attention all serious eaters and pizza fanatics: On October 11, Slice founder Adam Kuban and I are going to be hosting a Serious Eats–Slice pizza-tasting and discussion with Anthony Mangieri at Una Pizza Napoletana. This pizza event is a fund-raising benefit and is part of the New York City Wine & Food Festival.

We're going to talk and eat pizza with Mangieri, surely one of the country's great pizzaioli. There will also be coal-fired brick-oven pizza from Totonno's as well as regular gas-oven New York slices to compare and contrast with Mangieri's Neapolitan-style pizza, along with wine, beer, and chocolate.

Everyone attending will also receive an autographed copy of my book, Pizza: A Slice of Heaven.

Tickets are $85, and all proceeds go to Share Our Strength and the Food Bank for New York City.

So come and eat pizza and hang out with Anthony, Adam, and me at Una Pizza at 3 p.m. Buy your tickets here.

60¢ Pizza at East Harlem Patsy's

Mon, 14 Jul 2008 10:30:00 -0500

I've got word from the folks at Patsy's in East Harlem that the joint is rolling back prices for its 75th anniversary. You can grab a pizza there for 60¢ on Tuesday, August 19. The retro pricing event runs from 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. 2287 First Avenue, New York NY 10035 (b/n 117th and 118th streets; map)

Yeah Yeah Yeahs' Brian Chase Digs Di Fara Pizza

Mon, 14 Jul 2008 10:00:00 -0500

Clicking in to the Slice inbox today, we've got ... an email from a guy in some band or other.

Photographs by Brian Chase

Hi, Adam,
I posted a review of Di Fara's on my band's website, http://site.yeahyeahyeahs.com/, that I thought you would be interested in checking out.

Dom for president!

Best regards,
Brian

------------------------------------------------------------

Dear Brian,

Dom for president? I second the nomination.

Wow. Nice meditation on what makes Dom and Di Fara so special. Thanks for passing that link along.

I think you've nailed it with the bit about imperfections. To quote:

But, for me, what makes the pizza truly outstanding and worthy of genius status is its inconsistencies and 'imperfections.' A Di Fara's pie is not uniform all around. It's just the opposite. The crust is slightly burnt and darker on one side but cooked at a more moderate temperature on another; the cheese is more concentrated in some places and more spread out in others; on one side, the cheese would be cooked slightly longer than the other; the dough is thinner here and more dense there; large chunks of tomatoes poking through in some spots are absent everywhere else; the basil is scattered about. This results in contrasts in texture: some parts are gentle, soft, and moist and others are chewy, tough, and dry; flavors range from sweet and mild to bitter and fiery.

When you look at Dom's pies, you know there's evidence of the handmade about them—and, perhaps, evidence of a mind focused on flavor rather than some obsessive-compulsive need to make a perfectly round pizza with X-many ounces of cheese per quadrant.

And I have to say, you must have timed it just right. There's NOBODY in the background of your photos.

Thanks again for the link. And thanks for makin' great music. I am a fan of YYY.

Hasta la pizza,
Adam

Coalfire: Chicago's Entry into the Coal-Oven Pizza Craze

Fri, 11 Jul 2008 13:45:00 -0500

Daniel Zemans, our man in Chicago, checks in with another piece of intel on the Windy City pizza scene. Daniel also blogs about Chicagoland pizza, along with his friends, on the Chicago Pizza Club blog. —The Mgmt.

The Chicago Reader, the Windy City's preeminent free weekly, recently named Coalfire the best pizza in Chicago. I disagree, but Coalfire does make a very good pie.

Neapolitan-style pizza has been making headway in Chicago for a few years, but Coalfire, which opened 14 months ago, is the only coal-oven pizzeria in Chicago. The creative force behind Coalfire is J. Spillane, who brought his pizza love to the Midwest from Worcester, Massachusetts. After ten years as a bartender, he perfected his pizza-making craft at home and opened Coalfire.

From the beginning, the place has been an unmitigated success. The response was so overwhelming that they had trouble meeting demand in the beginning and actually ran out of dough a few times. They have worked out the kinks, but they’re still so busy that phone orders are not accepted on Friday and Saturday nights from 6:30 to 8:30.

Coalfire is a small place with simple but nice décor. The restaurant fills one room, with the cooks and the oven in plain view. When the pizzas are served, the pans sit on old tomato cans, which I found to be a fun touch. I ate there early, just after they opened at 5 p.m., and the sunlight that came through the front window was sufficient to light the whole restaurant.

Coalfire serves 14-inch pizzas that are baked by a coal fire inside what was designed as a wood-burning oven. There are nine signature pies, but diners are welcome to pick their own combinations. I had the Fiorentino, which has mozzarella topped with tomato sauce, hot calabrese salami, and red peppers.

The dough is prepared each night for use the following day, and the ingredients for the rest of the parts are all top of the line. The salami is made by Columbus Salame. The sausage (which I did not try) comes from Bari Foods, an outstanding Italian deli and grocery store across the street. The mozzarella, which is fresh and quite creamy, comes from the same supplier that Bari uses. Most important, Coalfire uses Stanislaus’s Alta Cucina tomatoes, which are arguably the best canned tomatoes around.

The crust is, as one has a right to expect from a coal-burning oven, crisp on the outside and chewy on the inside, with a nice amount of blistering. The slices are foldable, but as a matter of principle I abstain from such silly behavior. Those who are horrified by sagging tips on their slices will be disappointed by the Fiorentino, but the laws of physics demand a crust that thin sag under the weight of salami.

My typical complaint about Neapolitan-style pizza is that there are not enough toppings. No matter how good a crust is, I think it needs more to make it a pizza. I find that too often those who make Neapolitan pies are so in love with their bread that they do not adequately balance it out. That is decidedly not the case at Coalfire, where almost every inch of crust was covered with mozzarella, and the hot calabrese salami and red peppers were well represented.

The tomato sauce sits on top of the cheese, which I think is the right way to cook Neapolitan pies. It helps ensure the crust remains crisp and allows diners to focus on the sauce when eating their pizza. And when the sauce is as good as it is at Coalfire, that is definitely a good thing.

Coalfire is a short cab ride from downtown, making it accessible to those visiting Chicago from out of town (though the place has yet to be discovered by tourists). It is also not out of the way if you are going from downtown to the United Center (home of the Bulls and Blackhawks). Regulars will be disappointed to learn that Coalfire has just received its liquor license, which means the BYO policy is a thing of the past. But my concern is the quality of the pizza and not the liquor policy, and the pizza at Coalfire is excellent.

Coalfire

1321 West Grand Avenue, Chicago IL 60622 (map)
312-226-2625
coalfirechicago.com

Slice's Nationwide Coal-Oven Pizza Map
Home Run Inn: You Can't Ball Like Derrick Rose, But You Can Eat His Favorite Pizza
Lou Malnati's: Home of Flawless Deep Dish
Thin-Crust Pizza in Chicago? Yes, and It's Outstanding at Vito & Nick's
Giordano's, a Stuffed Pizza Classic in Chicago
Uno's, Chicago's Original Deep-Dish Pizza

Pizza Pix on Photograzing

Tue, 08 Jul 2008 14:20:13 -0500

From left, recent pizza-related Photograzing submissions from Bitchin' Camero and Nick Solares.

For years, Slice readers have been sending me snapshots of their slices or have emailed asking about ways to upload and share pix of their pizza. There was no easy way to do it.

Until now.

Serious Eats, which Slice has been a part of since 2007, just launched a new food-photo-sharing site last week called Photograzing. You may have missed it in the run up to the holiday weekend. No worries. Head on over and check it out.

Users can upload their food photos from their blogs, Flickr, or other photo-hosting site and share them with other Photograzing readers. So far, there haven't been enough pizza photos for my taste (could there ever be?), but I think you homeslices can fix that right?

Eventually our web mastermind is going to give me a way to promote great pizza photos from Photograzing onto Slice itself. But until then, why don't you prime the pump with some crusty, saucy, cheesy, beautiful pizza porn?

If you want to upload photos, note that your Slice/Serious Eats account will work on Photograzing. If you don't have an account, it's free and easy to grab one.

Hasta la pizza, folks!

Openings: Fornaccio, Williamsburg

Mon, 07 Jul 2008 10:00:00 -0500

When we visited Toby's Public House last week, not only did we pick up on some great pizza, we also picked up a tip to pass on to you.

Nicola Bertolotti, who was brought in to school the other pie-makers at Toby's, will be opening his own place in Williamsburg in mid August.

The new pizzeria will be called Fornaccio, which Bertolotti told us means "old oven." The name derives from the fact that Bertolotti happened up an old house with a hundred-year-old oven that he's been restoring, along with the rest of the place.

Fornaccio will make Neapolitan-style pizzas there, and the oven will be wood-fired. Bertolotti plans an extensive wine list for the pizzeria as well, importing glassware and tableware from Italy for some authentic detail.

The space is on Havemeyer between North 6th and North 7th streets, not more than a pizza-brick's throw away from Fornino, where Bertolotti once worked under chef-owner Michael Ayoub. Past performance is not a guarantee of future returns, but given the pies Bertolotti turned out at Fornino and those he's overseeing at Toby's, I'd put stock in Fornaccio to emerge a strong buy in the area.

You can catch Bertolotti's work at Toby's in Park Slope–Windsor Terrace for the next three weeks or so before he moves north to concentrate on finishing his spot. Look for the ribbon-cutting later this summer.

Fornaccio

Havemeyer Street, between North 6th and North 7th streets

Home Run Inn: You Can't Ball Like Derrick Rose, But You Can Eat His Favorite Pizza

Sat, 05 Jul 2008 17:00:00 -0500

Daniel Zemans, our man in Chicago, checks in with another piece of intel on the Windy City pizza scene. Daniel also blogs about Chicagoland pizza with his friends on the Chicago Pizza Club blog. —The Mgmt.

Do you remember when the Chicago Bulls had a 1.7 percent chance of getting the first pick in the NBA Lottery and won? Sure you do—it was only a little over a month ago. And surely you remember when the Bulls drafted Derrick Rose last week while the Knicks took some dude from Italy. I don't know what Danilo Gallinari knows about pizza or whether he is the next Frederic Weis, but I do know that Derrick Rose is going to be a star and that he is a pizza connoisseur. The point guard of the future's favorite pizza is Home Run Inn, an institution on the southwest side of Chicago.

Home Run Inn opened as a bar in 1923. According to restaurant lore, the place got its name after a ball from a neighborhood baseball game flew through the front window (which was not open). For the next 24 years, the family-owned bar established itself as a neighborhood fixture, with Vincent Grittani serving the drinks and his wife Mary cooking up midday meals. In 1942, Nick Perrino married Loretta, the Grittani's daughter. In 1945, he returned from World War II and Vincent Grittani died. Two years later, Perrino and his mother-in-law decided to start giving away Mary's pizza for free in an effort to boost business. Needless to say, the idea worked. Today, the business, which is still family owned and run by Nick's son Joe, has eight locations and a booming frozen pizza business, all of which serve up pizzas made according to the family recipe introduced to the world in 1947.

Thanks to two expansions of the original location, Home Run Inn can accommodate as many as 600 diners, which includes a banquet area. The main part of the restaurant features a full bar, Cubs and White Sox pennants, a variety of beer signs, Tiffany-style lights, and red brick walls. Even though the place holds a lot of pizza and usually has a decent crowd, the tables are far enough apart and the ceilings are high enough that I did not feel cramped at all.

Like traditional Chicago bar pizza, the pies at Home Run Inn are cut into squares. Unlike the typical bar pizza, the crust at Home Run Inn is neither crisp not particularly thin. In fact, the thickness will seem normal to those who are more familiar with New York pizza. But in typical Chicago pizza tradition, these pies are loaded with cheese and delicious toppings, leaving diners with a pizza that's about ¾ of an inch thick. The crust, while not crisp, is sufficiently sturdy to hold those toppings with ease.

Unlike most places, which serve pizzas in the pans in/on which they were cooked, Home Run Inn serves its pies on plastic trays that have a bed of small spokes on the bottom, which allows for any grease to drain off the pizzas. It's a nice touch, but rather unnecessary as these are not greasy pizzas.

I tried two different pizzas on this visit, both of which are among the Specialty Pizzas offered on the menu. First up was Laura's Favorite. I don't know who Laura is, but she has outstanding taste in pizza. Her signature pie comes with fresh spinach and crushed plum tomatoes. In a bit of a twist from traditional Chicago thin crust, the crushed tomatoes are actually on top of the cheese. At first this seemed odd, but then I thought that it was an ingenious way to make sure diners would taste the sweet tomatoes separately from the delicious, slightly acidic sauce. Laura's Favorite comes on an outstanding garlic butter crust. That crust is available on all pizzas for an extra $1.50 and I highly recommend getting it no matter what pie you may order.

The second pizza I tried was Chicago's Best. If you're going to name a pizza after Chicago, it ought to have meat. And this one has three kinds – sausage, pepperoni, and smoked bacon. While the smoked bacon slightly overpowered the other two meats, there was enough sausage and pepperoni to ensure all parts of the pig could not be ignored. Like the tomatoes on Laura's Favorite, the meats were served on top of the cheese. Apparently I gave them too much credit for separating the tomatoes from the sauce on Laura's Favorite. While toppings on top of cheese might make sense to New Yorkers, it is not the Chicago way. Still, despite the flaw in construction, the Chicago's Best was a very good pizza. If I get it again, however, I will upgrade to the garlic butter crust.

For those of you not planning a trip to Home Run Inn in the immediate future, you can give their frozen pies a shot. I have never had one so I can't vouch for them, but Home Run Inn has sold frozen pizzas since the 1950s when a bartender too a dozen pies to a corner grocery store. Today, they are the most popular frozen pizza in Chicago and this city is thebiggest frozen pizza market in the country. Home Run Inn claims that their frozen pies differ from their fresh pizzas only in that they are flash frozen instead of cooked.

One notable difference between Home Run Inn's frozen pizza line and the restaurants is that they sell deep dish frozen pizzas, but limit their restaurant sales to the original thin style they've been selling since 1947.

Home Run Inn Pizza

Location visited: 4254 W 31st Street, Chicago IL 60623 (map; but there are multiple locations); 773-247-9696; homeruninn.com/pizzerias

Introducing Photograzing

Wed, 02 Jul 2008 14:00:00 -0500

As much as we’d like to, there are times during the day when can’t actually eat something delicious. At those moments, then, we have to resort to the next best thing—looking at delicious food.

Photograzing is a place to share your best food photography, discover new food blogs, and find tasty inspiration. Whether it’s ideas for tonight’s dinner, some eye candy to help you procrastinate, or just a lively connection to the community of food-lovers on the web, we hope you’ll find this new food photography site a staple of your online diet.

Learn more about Photograzing or go and start sharing your perfect pie photos!

Jeff Varasano in the 'Atlanta Journal-Constitution'

Wed, 02 Jul 2008 12:41:09 -0500

One of Jeff Varasano's homemade pizzas. "One of my best-tasting pies ever," he writes on Jeff Varasano's Famous New York Pizza Recipe.

When it rains, it pours. Jeff Varasano's hometown paper, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, runs a profile on him today. This, in addition to the one the New York Times ran as well.

The AJC's piece has further insight into Jeff's character, painting him as a bit of a wonky engineer and pizza visionary:

To understand the Varasano mind and its approach to problem solving, it helps to know a couple of things:
> One: At the age of 14, he set the U.S. Rubik's Cube record with a time of 24.67 seconds and then published "Jeff Conquers the Cube in 45 Seconds: And You Can Too!" This achievement was noted during an assembly of his freshman class at Yale.
> Two: He is prone to saying things like, "I can watch two ducks fight over a piece of bread and go home and apply that. I see connections that other people can't."

I've met Jeff, and he's not as geeky (in the traditional sense) as this profile would make him out to be. He is, however, pizza-obsessed—a true pizza geek.

I like that this profile has more info on Jeff's upcoming Atlanta pizzeria:

Investors have approached Varasano about setting him up in the pizza business, but he and Stokley are planning on going it alone when they open this fall in the new Mezzo Atlanta building on Peachtree. Disagreements with partners, he claims, doomed his software business.
Isn't he nervous about the pressure of running and cooking in a restaurant?
"No," Varasano says. "Once I learn the brick oven, it won't be too different from what I do here."

Our own Ed Levine is quoted in the story, too, calling Jeff's voluminous pizza page the War and Peace of pizza blog posts."

Jeff Varasano, of Patsy's Reverse-Engineer Fame, Profiled in the 'New York Times'

Wed, 02 Jul 2008 01:48:38 -0500

How cool is this? In September 2006, Jeff Varasano's Pizza Page blew up like mad when Boing Boing and all the other biggies linked to it. You see, Varasano announced on his page that he was finally satisfied with his at-home Patsy's clone. Well, the New York Times finally noticed—took 'em two years—and runs a great profile on Jeff. It's full of charming anecdotes about his travails while cooking with an oven modified to bake pizza during the self-clean cycle:

In the steel floor of the lower oven, there is a jagged, dime-size hole, made when an errant piece of superheated topping melted through. One window pane in that oven’s door is shattered, destroyed after a drop of sauce fell onto it at high heat. There is a long list of wrecked equipment — two more oven windows, three mixers and food processors, one internal fan. The oven has been shorting fuses lately. It’s getting harder, Mr. Varasano said, to make up stories for the oven repair guys.

The story also mentions that Varasano is thinking of opening his own pizzeria in Atlanta, where he now lives, this fall.

The iPhone Gives Bad Pizza Advice

Tue, 01 Jul 2008 15:37:56 -0500

View Larger Map

So I just made a case for getting my greasy hands on a free developer iPhone 3G from Apple. One of my points was that Slice could help improve the device's pizza logic. I thought the thing only needed minor tweaking.

Turns out, it needs a lot of help. As Aaron Landry points out, the separate video that really gets down to the nitty gritty on the Maps with GPS feature shows Bob the iPhone Guy starting out in Brooklyn Heights. On Pineapple and Henry streets. He searches for pizza, and the iPhone defaults to John's Pizzeria in Times Square. Peep the map above. That's like 7.4 miles away.

And as Landry says, Bob passes a number of great pizzerias along the way. Check out Landry's insightful post about it. It's great stuff.

See, Apple, this is why you should GIVE ME AN IPHONE. So Slice can help you work out these bugs. Bob's demo video, after the jump.

iPhone 3G Gives Bad Pizza Advice

Apple, Give Me an iPhone; I'll Give YOU the piPhone

Tue, 01 Jul 2008 14:00:00 -0500

Yeah, you already know that you can use an iPhone to look up all manner of stuff via the Google Maps feature, but with the new 3G iPhone coming out July 11, GPS is added into the mix. I was poking around on the Apple site last week and noticed that the GPS feature page featured an iPhone trained on the location of John's Pizzeria in Times Square. And in the latest video tour, the gesticulating iPhone Guy looks up P-I-Z-Z-A in Manhattan and clicks on John's. (Video, after the jump.)

The iPhone: The Ultimate Pizza-Locator Device

My Case for a Free iPhone

Apple, I've been a loyal customer for years. From my Apple ][c "portable" computer, through the bad times, and now in the good times
I've been an advocate for your products among my friends and family. I'm letting one of my friends borrow my old iBook after a PC crash, thus introducing him to the ease-of-use of OS X. And now, even my recalcitrant PC-loving girlfriend is considering the switch to a MacBook
I developed a little iPod-based app—a pizza guide called the piPod (now retired) that was linked to by Jason Kottke, thus highlighting to thousands of tech-savvy users a little-known feature of the device at the time

But enough about me. With a free iPhone, here's what I could do for you:

Clearly, Gesticulating iPhone Guy loves pizza. Why else would he search for a pie while "visiting" Manhattan? But I think your pizza-finding algorithm needs work. John's is decent, but there are better pizzas out there. Give me an iPhone, and I will help you refine your device's pizza-sensing capabilities. The masterminds at Slice HQ are already brainstorming
Geeks love pizza. With improved pizza-finding capability, the iPhone would make your core base of users very happy and even attract new users who would abandon their BlackBerry or other smart phones for a device that could run a "piPhone" app. (By the way, I just trademarked that, so hands off)
Field-test the new 3G iPhone against grease stains. Yes, you have that new plastic case that replaces the old stainless steel back side, but have you tested it against grease absorbency? I didn't think so. I'm just the man for the job

And Now a Message to the Homeslices Out There

If we did a mobile version of Slice, would you use it? What types of features would you like to see in a mobile Slice? We've been kicking around the idea for a while, and if there's enough groundswell for it, we might begin development on it. Show your support, and Apple might even see that our dev team needs a 3G iPhone to test against!

Dessert Calzone at Toby's Public House

Mon, 30 Jun 2008 20:30:28 -0500

Photograph by Raphael

In my Toby's dispatch earlier today, I didn't really go too in-depth with this thing, A.) because it's not pizza pizza, and B.) because it's dessert, but Toby's Public House has an interesting dessert calzone whose innards include ricotta and nutella. You'd think it'd be a bit weird, but it really does work. More on this at Serious Eats New York »

Toby's Public House, a Familiar Pizza in New, Laid-Back Surroundings

Mon, 30 Jun 2008 15:30:00 -0500

Toby's Public House

686 Sixth Avenue, Brooklyn, NY 11215 (at 21st Street; map); 718-788-1186; kitchenbarny.com
Oven Type: Wood-burning
Pie Style: Neapolitan
The Skinny: A relaxing, laid-back pub whose name belies the fact that there are some great little Neapolitan-style pizzas coming out of the rustic wood-burning oven here. Small, 12-inch, well-balanced pies are crisp at the edges but do exhibit some tip sag

You could be excused for overlooking the great little pies being served at Toby's Public House. The exterior looks more like something I'd imagine you'd see in small-town England, and the name doesn't exactly scream pizza. But step inside, glance to the back, and you'll find a rustic-looking wood-burning oven with a couple no-nonsense-looking pizzaioli going at it with the dough.

What's more, on our initial visit there last week, we spotted a familiar face—Nicola Bertolotti, who once worked as the lead pizzaiolo at Fornino in Williamsburg. I've always liked the pizza at Fornino, so I Bertolotti's presence seemed to go a long way in backing up the praise-laden emails and IMs I'd been getting about the place since it opened in March.

Pizzas here are Neapolitan-style, about 12 inches in diameter, and come out of the oven crisp, chewy and foldable. Crispness consistency seems to vary from pie to pie. Our sausage and onion pie (top) was near perfect on the crisp-chewy scale, but our Buffalina (above; a Margherita topped with buffalo mozzarella) had some major tip sag on half the slices while the other half of the pie was crisp enough to present a proud upskirt (right).

When we sent a second round of Slice correspondents out for another go (I had been spotted and wanted an unvarnished sampling), the pies were reportedly crisper. We might conclude that, like many pizzerias with temperamental wood- or coal-burning ovens, the consistency may vary here.

What seems pretty certain though is the nice balance of crust, sauce, and cheese. I thought the sauce was pretty standout. While many Neapolitan places feature a barely-cooked (or not-cooked-at-all sauce), this one was thick and rich and had a pleasant enough herby flavor.

For me, the jury's still out on Toby's until I can visit it enough to see if it holds up. But it's a great addition to this part of whatever neighborhood it's in—Park Slope? Windsor Terrace? "Greenwood Heights"? And it's good enough to draw me the 20-minute walk from my North Slope home.

Bonus Coverage: Dessert Calzone

Photograph by Raphael

I won't go too much into this thing, but Toby's also offers a unique (at least to me) dessert in its nutella-ricotta calzone. It seems like a weird combo, but it works. Paired with a glass of Fra Angelico, as suggested by the staff, and you're golden. More on this item at Serious Eats New York »

Di Fara Closes to Cater Wedding

Mon, 30 Jun 2008 10:15:00 -0500

Photograph by Eating in Translation

Looks like Di Fara was closed for a "big order" Saturday. The occasion? Somebody's wedding. The blog Eating in Translation has the rest of the story, as Paul Harvey would say.

Drew Carey Orders 45 Pizzas Shipped Cross-Country

Sun, 29 Jun 2008 15:00:00 -0500

Guess California pizza just doesn't cut it for Drew Carey: the comedian loves the pizzas from Antonio's in Parma, Ohio, so much that he's having 45 pies delivered by UPS all the way to Los Angeles to celebrate the season finale of his CBS game show, The Price is Right. The order is a pricey $450, not including shipping. Talk about pizza loyalty...

In Videos: Jamie Oliver Makes Pizza

Sat, 28 Jun 2008 12:00:00 -0500

This series of videos shows Jamie Oliver making pizza. They're fairly interesting because Oliver has cooked around the various regions of Italy, each with its own specific way of doing things. Instead of slavishly sticking to one culinary canon, however, he finds a way of making pies that fuses all the good stuff that works for him. And check out his killer wood-burning pizza oven. All that, after the jump.

Sorry the following bit is broken up into four parts. It's how the RedLasso dilly works. Can't do more than so much in one clip. Anyway, here is Jamie Oliver's pizza dough recipe, if you want to follow along.

First Look: Artichoke Basille's Crab Slice

Fri, 27 Jun 2008 12:00:00 -0500

Upper left claw quadrant: The crabby crab slice. Photograph by Alaina Browne

Remember we mentioned the new crab slice at Artichoke Basille's yesterday? Well, my coworker Alaina Browne went and grabbed one last night on her way home. (Thanks, Alaina!) Here's what she said: "I am not a fan of Artichoke pizza. The crust—it's really thick, and it's hard. The wait was 30 minutes. I just don't like it. And the crab pizza? It was gross." 328 East 14th Street, New York NY 10003 (East Village; map); 212-228-2004

The Pizza Polisher: File Under WTF!?

Fri, 27 Jun 2008 11:02:42 -0500

Gawker just published a list of New York City's Top 50 Eccentrics. Check this one out, and then scratch yer head, kids:

46. Pizza Polisher: On weekdays and only in the summer, a homeless man rubs discarded pizza slices on the arms of Segal's lesbian statues in Sheridan Square. Via commenter Hamud Ibn Hamud.

Maybe he's getting the slices from nearby Bleecker Street Pizza? But it gets better ... after the jump.

The comment that earned the Pizza Polisher a place on Gawker's list actually was left on that site on May 1. Here's the full version, which is stranger:

On weekdays in the summer, and for some reason only in the summer, there's a homeless guy who rubs discarded pizza slices on the arms of Segal's lesbian statues in Sheridan Sq.
I've seen him do this a number of times and so have several friends.
We've all noted that the homeless guy doesn't seem to have a preference for the toppings on the pizza slices he uses, but the pepperoni is particularly eye-catching on the statues' white surface.