Up n’ Coming: Home Slice’s Carnival O’ Pizza
On December 5th, 2009, we will be hosting our 4th annual Carnival O’ Pizza. All of the proceeds of the carnival will benefit Austin Pets Alive, whose mission is to promote and provide the resources, education and programs needed to eliminate the killing of companion animals in Austin. There’s going to be a smorgasbord of fun for homies of all ages; games, contests, performers, and feats of gastronomic and physical endurance.
The festivities and spectacles include:
A raffle with fabulous prizes!
A pizza eating contest open to anyone brave enough to stuff themselves triumphant. The competition this year will be stiff, with the three year reigning champ poised to take the crown a fourth time. If you think you’ve got what it takes, download the application here and bring it into Home Slice anytime. The winner wins free pizza for a year!
Remember Hands on a Hard Body? Well, we have our own test of physical and mental stamina with Hands on an Eggplant Sub. If you think you have the ability to stand in one place for hours, this is your ticket to fame and fortune. Download the application here.
There will be a city-wide pizza tossing competition where pizzaiolis from around Austin and the surrounding area will compete and showcase the art of hand tossed pizza.
Musical and dance performers!
Tons of games for kids and tons of beer for big kids!
Here’s some pictures from last year’s carnival, courtesy of Annie Ray:
The Queen of Pies on KGSR
Jen Strickland, one of Home Slice’s owners, was a guest on KGSR Thursday, October 8th. For those of you who missed it, click here for some excerpts.
Update: Jodi from Tasty Touring has a great post with photos and the interview for download! Rad!
Coming to a Home Slice near you!
After a summer of perpetual 105 degree Groundhog Days and heat-induced apathy, fall instills a crisp feeling of newness, of fresh starts, of things to come. Not known to rest on our laurels, new things are coming to Home Slice.
We just debuted the newest additions to our patio, a bar and a ping pong table.
This Thursday, October 8th, owner Jen Strickland will be interviewed on KGSR 107.1 at 8:15 am. Catch her with your morning OJ or on your ride to work!
In a couple weeks, we will have all of our t-shirts, pint glasses, gift cards, and various wares for online purchase.
December 5th is our annual Carnival O’ Pizza, where we have games, performers, and tests of strength and endurance.
Last but not least, we have begun construction on a take out pizza business next door to our restaurant where you will be able to get piping hot pizzas to order and slices 7 days a week!
Rock!
Phil in Bensonhurst
During our trip to NYC, we had people go in teams of three to get to know some legendary neighborhoods around Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, and the Bronx. Phil, Shauna, and Shane went to Bensonhurst and this is what Phil, so poetically, had to say about it.
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The Verrazano Bridge kisses the forehead of Bensonhurst, teasing it. It spans the narrows and connects Brooklyn to Staten Island. The Verrazano is the Italian cousin of the French broad in the harbor with the torch. Bensonhurst sits in her shadow like the neighborhood boy who never left the neighborhood; nice but not too wise.
We had met in front of the hotel, clandestine as a European Novel: The Cook, The Waitress, and The Bartender. It is mid-morning and the walk down to the Delancy Station is quick in the current of the Lower East Side. She’s from Upstate; but no stranger to the city. He’s from Chicago and can move at a city’s pace. I am not yet in Brooklyn; but I will be soon. I walk fast.
The F train comes out from under the river into the sunlight of a morning. It’s elevated this far out in Brooklyn where the graffiti tags are worn and faded. This is not my neighborhood, not my Brooklyn. It is as odd as going to your friend’s elementary school. Everything is distinctly familiar but oddly out of place. The proud brownstones are pockmarked, whitewashed, two story brick houses standing shoulder to shoulder as we cross Ditmas Avenue, where Marco works at DiFara’s Pizza. The shop is on the corner, down the street from the Ukrainian Social Club, and Marco’s granddaughter darts and around and tends to the old man. Normally, I would get off the train to stand in his shop, lean on his green linoleum counter, next to the humming coke box, and watch him. We are pizza people, the Waitress, the Bartender, and myself, and for me Marco is the Dali Lama. His dough is crisp and perfect; the edge is crimped in because of the shallowness of his Baker’s Pride Oven. He cuts bouquets of basil with safety scissors. None of his moves are sudden; each one is measured. The dough on the back, marble topped table visibly responds to the life in his broad hands, his flour speckled forearms. The old man lays it on the wooden peel and absentmindedly picks around its side as if he were straightening the corners of his bed. Only for a moment. His ladle move was fast; his sauce bright red. He was deliberate with the large pieces of fresh mozzarella. With each piece of cheese the intensity and speed increased. His pizza is perfect harmony. I see the shop from the window of the moving train as we went deeper into Brooklyn, into Bensonhurst.
We pick the stop at Avenue N because it’s closest to a legit Italian Market. It’s been there for sixty years, and the son of the original owner took over the day they started construction of the Verrazano Bridge. His daughter, in her thirties, was behind the counter when we walked in. Her cheeks were rosy from standing behind the store’s line of cold display cases. Her hair was tucked into a Yankees ball cap. She wore a yellow sweater under her white butcher’s coat.
“Can I help you?”
We are foreigners. We have come from Austin, TX to stand in the middle of Bensonhurst, Brooklyn and Jane Goodall it to the best of our abilities.
The Waitress’ tableside manner is legendary. She and the Butcher’s Daughter greet each other with the secret language of immigrants’ children.
The shop has green, gallon, olive oil cans lining the wall. Ten pound cans of Tomatoes. Pastas. The checkered linoleum floor was scuff free. The Bartender moved carefully with a kind of reverence. Behind the wall of cold display, over the Butcher’s Daughter’s shoulder, worked an Abbot and Costello duo – table slicers whirling. They mutter to each other in Italian as they work in the stark white kitchen that dominated the shotgun grocery on Avenue N. The Waitress and the Butcher’s Daughter stand at the register, still clasping both hands together in a greeting minutes old.
There are two bowls with fresh mozzarella balls soaking in them. The mozzarella is the size of the Butcher’s Daughter’s fist.
“Yours?” I am respectful and awed in my question.
She shrugs and smiles at the same time.
“Yeah”.
“It’s beautiful,” I tell her, my eyes lingering on the salt brine bath. It is the Mediterranean, or at least a quart of it, and the mozzarella archipelagoes float buoyant as a school of whale. She reached in like Calypso and plucked out a ball. She turned her back to us only for a moment and gave each of us, and the young mother who had entered the shop, and was buying l/4# prosciutto, a thick wedge of still damp cheese. The wax paper was blotted with brine.
The salt on the cheese tasted like the ocean, like the sea, like a strong, old god and sea monsters. It tasted like the trip home from Troy, when Odysseus couldn’t find his ass with his elbow.
The body and the cream of the cheese was more like Persephone, whimsical in her femininity, sexy with her crush on Orcus. I looked up to see the Butcher’s Daughter smiling at me from under the brim of her cap. The little girl in the stroller gurgled happily around the mozzarella.
She had told us which train to take to get to sweet shop on 18th Avenue near Christoforo Columbo Boulevard. Alba. She told us it was a real neighborhood shop whereas her shop, well, its just place people might come. She smiled and blew a kiss to the little girl in the stroller as the Mother rolled her out into the neighborhood.
There was no one on the street for blocks. It was quiet in a way I had never before experienced in Brooklyn. There was no traffic, no commerce. There was no one. The three us walked past a rusty synagogue book ended by a Key Foods and a Nail Salon. Across the street, three blocks up, were a clutch of aqua-netted beauty school girls smoking, still wearing their protective black smocks. The Waitress began counting the number of people using walkers.
The Verrazano knuckled out into the skyline, a smooth arcing line against the decaying 1950s neighborhood grid. There were plenty of shops windows covered with brown paper from the inside, some covered with plywood from the outside. We walked past a bodega that advertised the world’s best coffee and Santeria on the same placard.
Everything looked far away but close on Avenue N. Manhattan cut across the landscape jagged like Arizona. In this part of Bensonhurst, it seemed like even Staten Island was too far away in the shadow of the bridge.
We stopped and went in to the bar.
LGM: Local Gin Mill. Old Man Bar.
The old man behind the bar has a white tuft of hair slicked back from his high forehead. He has Popeye forearms and a round belly. There are a couple of neighborhood guys sitting at the bar, sipping high-balls in 8oz glasses. It is dark except the light coming in from the street window. The arcade game faces away from the bar, back in the corner, and the guy sitting on a stool, feeding it quarters, is kicking its ass. The barman is in his mid 50’s probably went to elementary school with the four regulars: the two guys at the bar watching TV., the guy playing the arcade game, and crazy Tommy going in between the two, unable to keep still.
We order Bloody Marys.
The Barman and the Bartender exchange greeting much like the Waitress and the Butcher’s Daughter.
“You want it spicy?”
The Waitress flutters her eyelashes from behind her eyeglasses. “I’ve always like it spicy,”
The three of them share the best kind of laugh: the laugh that is had at a bar at noon, when you drink the last Bloody Mary of the morning. Frankie, the barman, handles the ice with delicate respect as he bare hands the cubes individually into the squat glasses. I walk into the back courtyard and call in a cheese delivery.
The yard is as wide as a family room, deep enough for ping pong or air hockey. The building across the astro-turfed rectangle had some kind of vine trellising up its surrounding chair link fence. There are white metal chairs lining the side of the yard. There are potted plants and end tables with little beanbag ashtrays. The bar is under two stories of someone’s home. Or two families, at least. And kids. There was a big wheel. The clothesline was empty.
I call in the cheese order like a hit. I call into the shop and talk haltingly in foxhole Spanish with the Guatemalan King of Prep. I realize quickly that I am in the backyard of the tenants, the people who live above the bar, the family on the block. I ended the call as quickly as I could. I straighten the chair I was sitting on and try to leave their backyard pristine.
A regular, crazy Tommy, is chatting up the Bartender and the Waitress. Frankie, the barman, is talking to one of the guys at the bar, their conversation full of low tones.
The Bloody Mary is strong. The mix is good, though missing horseradish. There is a good bite of black pepper and the Tabasco is not out of control. Frankie rests his knuckles on the bar and asks us where we’ve been so far and smiles when we talk about the Butcher’s Daughter. It’s obvious from his reaction that she is a neighborhood girl, and he’s known her since she was this high. All the guys in the dark bar smile in the same way. They all know her from back when. It is that kind of neighborhood, and that kind of bar.
A younger guy, in his late forties, walks in off the street and takes a seat at the elbow of the bar.
“Mike, where you been?” Frankie is already mixing Mike’s drink before the question is out of his mouth, before Mike’s ass has hit the stool.
Mike says he’s been at the hospital. Frankie’s tone changes immediately. His voice lowers and he asks with real concern, “How’s your Mother doing?” Frankie gets even closer to Mike as he serves the drink, and knocks the bar twice with his ham fist for good luck. Mike is being stoic and Frankie appreciates it; Frankie reaches across the bar and squeezes Mike’s shoulder.
We finish our drinks and walk back out into the neighborhood at half past noon, sunlight only beginning to breakthrough the overcast day. The three of us walk back down the Avenue, past the hamburger stands and barber shops, to the train station.
The vegetation has claimed the brick sides of the elevated station. There are a few clumps of people on the platform waiting to head into the city and no one on the other side, waiting to go deeper into Brooklyn. We ride two stops, the length of the neighborhood, and get out two blocks from where Gotti used to walk the neighborhood in his bathrobe, hoping to play the insanity card in the upcoming trial.
The little courtyards in front of the small multi-family housing have small porcelain statuettes of saints and virgin mothers under Italian and American flags. A rabbi stops to observe as we ask directions from a neighborhood guy, sitting on the stoop, pie-eyed. Slurringly, the neighborhood guy is helpful and kind. He points us in the right direction and we begin walking past more housing to 18th Avenue.
18th Avenue has Italian flags arcing its breadth, the length of the avenue, as far as I can see. There are Italian social clubs and Kentucky Fried Chickens. Societa Figli di Ragusa & Dunkin’Donuts. There are more people on 18th than there were on Avenue N. There are families and children and old people and a few hipster Manhattan exiles. We walk down the Avenue towards the sweet shop.
The sign hanging over the doorway is small, with light blue cursive print. “Alba” is all it says. The mosaic on the vestibule floor has a world map. Only New York and Sicily are colored in. The window facing the street is wall to wall, floor to ceiling, packed with pastries and cakes.
The chocolate is dark and the iced, layered cakes shined in a way that Lou Reed might appreciate. The powdered sugar seems to have fallen like a Bolivian snow. The white crème icing is the color of a negligee.
The shop has a high ceiling and a counter that goes all the way around the large space. Large enough for a six by six obelisk of scones and biscotti in its center.
Four women wove back and forth, from one side to the other, bagging sweet things as they passed, a flutter of wax paper. The oldest and most matronly of the four, a solid chess piece of a woman, stood next to the cappuccino machine, on the North wall, behind the raised marble barista counter. The couple at the counter is sipping espressos in paper cups, waiting for their lemon ricotta cake to be boxed. It is Wednesday afternoon, after all; this is when they come for the lemon ricotta cake. The ricotta comes from Sicily.
“Signorina, Signorina” the youngest of them
calls after the mother hen.
The Mother Hen moves fast, at a clip, around the horn of the counter to the register. The young girl, with dark mascara and Sophia Lauren lips, had maybe made a mistake.
“Volete una sola?” She clearly believes I am on the verge of making a mistake. I order three cannoli instead of one. The couple with the espressos nod approvingly.
The Matron at the cappuccino machine makes my cappuccino while continuing her conversation, in Italian, with the lemon cake couple in their porkpie hat and bouffant hair. She has a satisfied flick of her wrist when the espresso piece takes hold in its place. She flicks the kitchen towel from one shoulder to the other, unfolding her story, steaming my milk. Lemon Cake Couple laughs, as does the Matron, and I find myself smiling goofily, caught in the hilarity of the moment.
The young girl disappears into the back kitchen. Moving the way a daughter might when called out by her Mother in front of the entire neighborhood.
The Waitress and the Bartender find me at the barista counter, leaning the way I might have at DiFara’s, my elbow cool on the marble. The hum of Marco’s coke box has been replaced by the Matron. She sings to herself, the way my father used to, a clutch of loose opera phrasings.
The Mother Hen is sacking a large, round loaf for a par of neighborhood girls clearly running errands. I did not need to know Italian as the Mother Hen handed over the round to the young teens.
“Say hello to your Mother, alright?”
“Si, Signorina.” In unison. They’re twins, I realize.
“Mind your Mother, alright?”
“Si, Signorina.”
We walk out to the corner with our coffees and cappuccinos, cannolis and some kind of dense sponge cake drowned in rum, in a tiny bread pan. The waitress held the small cake out of the pan, letting the shower of rum fall back in. The Bartender and I stood transfixed. The Waitress had seen this very dessert on a travel cooking show, just the last weekend, and now was going to eat it herself, on a Brooklyn street corner.
Maybe it is the street traffic, the gypsy cabs and metro busses. Maybe it is caffeine. Perhaps it is the lingering sound of Italian ebbing into the America of Brooklyn, but my heart raced as I watched the Waitress hold reality to imagination’s promise.
This is Bensonhurst, remember, an Italian Neighborhood in the shadow of an Italian Bridge. Their night sky ended on one side with the blue stars of the Verrazano, with the Southern most tip of Manhattan jagged in the far distance. This is the place where mafia dons ride out their exile. Sardina is never far away from Bensonhurst.
And so, of course, the thick rum cake moved the Waitress to tears, salty with appreciation, salty as Lot’s wife. The bartender and I ate cannoli, the cream of which was comforting, lingering, with enough body to move me, and seductive enough for me to want to me moved. The Bartender and I handled the cannoli like stogies, and stood on the corner like old men, and talked about how nice the weather was, and watched as the Waitress did the most Italian thing of all.
“You have got to try this. Now. You have to get this in you.”
The Bartender went first. The Waitress served him, of course. His knees buckled a little as he telepathically sang a love song to the Waitress.
I looked at Brooklyn all around me before she fed me, too. I looked at the second story rooftops, the forest of 20th century TV antennae. I listened to neighborhood guys sitting at fold out card tables in front of the Social Clubs. I could still taste the salt from the Mozzarella. The cappuccino foam was still in my moustache.
The drunken piece of cake was light and springy. Amazingly vibrant. Punch drunk, perhaps. The dark rum was strong. It was the drink of sailor’s and sailor’s sons, of generations of seafaring merchants, wayfaring homebodies.
The marriage of the two, of course, is the whole story. Either alone are towered damsels or drunken merchant marines. Together they are the thing of legend, of love stories. Together they expose the starfish left behind in the low tide. Together they chart the stars in the night sky. Together they are Penelope and Ulysses, who still have a two family building in Bensonhurst.
Day Four: Shake Shack!
The Shake Shack is located in Madison Square Park and serves burgers, dogs, shakes, and beers. The restaurant was conceived and developed by Danny Meyer’s Union Square Hospitality Group. I know what you may be thinking. No, it’s not pizza nor is it Italian. The relevance of our visit comes on the eve of the launch of our 7 day a week (!) take out business.
The Shake Shack is a simple concept. Burgers, fries, dogs and shakes. No frills. No big whoop, right? Yet people wait in line a minimum of 30 minutes, more commonly and hour, for what on paper sounds like run-of-the-mill fare. Oh, but don’t underestimate this place. Shake Shack is the perfect example of how doing something right, no matter how simple, is all you need to create fervent loyalty.
The line wraps through the park, but no one seems antsy. It’s the opposite of the DMV or a 6pm line at Whole Foods where you’re guaranteed to get yelled at by the multitasking, low blood sugar businessman behind you for taking 13 items in a 10 items or less line (true story). The spirit of the line was quite the oposte was like that of an amusement park, you’re amped and giddy knowing that the result of waiting in line is pure joy. People were chatting and laughing under the shade of the trees, and most of the conversations I overheard were about the food. Wow.
I talked to a friend who lives in Brooklyn about our itinerary, as soon as I uttered the two little words, he flipped out and insisted that I order the Shack Stack. I eat a burger about once every three months, never at the same place, because one of my life’s missions is to find the perfect burger. The best part about this search it that the perfect burger needs the perfect moment. You have to be ready to receive the communion of The Perfect Burger. And oh, there is not just one perfect burger, there are so many out there ready to be discovered. And I know Texas’ unofficial state food is beef, but some of the best burgers I’ve had are in NYC. Freemans made my favorite burger of 2008. The Shack Stack, so far, is the front runner for 2009. I quite literally took a bite and felt compelled to flip off the entire world because the only thing that mattered in existence in that moment was that burger. I sh*t you not. That’s a perfect burger. The Shack Stack is a beef patty that is a Shake Shake proprietary blend of beef that is hand formed daily by their butcher. You get the fixings you want, and on top of the beef patty is a fried portabello mushroom stuffed with cheddar and Muenster cheeses, all tucked into a perfectly griddled potato bun.
We sampled many things from the menu. The crinkle cut fries, shakes of all flavors, beer(including a beer created with Brooklyn Brewery’s Garret Oliver), concretes and frozen custards. Everything was absolutely wonderful and perfectly paired with all the other flavors. It was pure enjoyment injected with warm and fuzzies of childhood summer vacation outings to roadside burger joints.
There is something about the anticipation and delayed satisfaction that truly enhances the experience at the Shake Shack. If i could just walk up and get my fast food fast here, it wouldn’t be quite as exciting and rewarding of an experience. Dare I say? I dare! Better things come to those who wait.
Day Three: Dinner at Pó
Our ‘big dinner,’ as we like to refer to it, was at Pó in the cute and hopping Brooklyn neighborhood of Carroll Gardens. They cook beautiful Italian food from a variety of regions with seasonal ingredients. During the day, we had gone in teams of three, each team to an assigned neighborhood in Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens or the Bronx to get to know the flavors, history, and people that defined it. Towards the second half of dinner, each group got up and shared their experience in their neighborhood. If Shauna waits on you, just ask her about the Babbo. She’s still raving about it.
I cannot begin to tell you how magical this dinner was. Really. There is an image of our special menu below for you to check out because it would take me all day to rave about each and every one of these dishes, and we all made sure to try everything. The dinner was paced perfectly. The service was absolutely impeccable. Through the meal, you couldn’t really distinguish who the owner from the food runner to the waiter in the sense that everyone was equally as warm, attentive, and accommodating.
Some of the appetizers we had that were not on our special menu were THE MOST AMAZING MEATBALLS IN SAUCE EVER; roasted beets with endive, sliced baby artichokes, watercress, and Taleggio crostino; and cured tuna with white beans, sliced artichokes, chili mint vinaigrette. We could barely bring ourselves to talk about anything but the food. The wine parings were also beautifully chosen. What I loved about all the food was that the ingredients sang in harmony. You could clearly pick out each flavor but they all worked in perfect balance.
For our first course, I ordered the orecchiette (a handmade pasta that translates to “little ears” and is native to Apulia) with broccoli rabe in a sweet sausage ragu. The slight sweetness of the sausage and the bitterness of the broccoli rabe did this wonderful dance in your mouth, like the tension between Paso Doble partners, the push and pull of wills that make such a dynamic performance. We were all passing plates around, making sure no one missed a flavor. While my lamb entrée was delectable, I must say that the cornish hen took the cake. Wow. The dessert that I loved was the custard topped with a blueberry sauce.
This dinner, I think I can say for most of us that have made this trip for three years, was our favorite. The food, the atmosphere, the incredible warmth and service of the staff. We kept that place open well passed close and no one made us feel rushed or unwelcome, in fact the kitchen staff ducked out the back door so we wouldn’t be disturbed or alerted to the fact that the place was closed. (such a far cry from Austin restaurants that won’t let you come in and dine 20 minutes before they close.)
It was our last dinner together and it was wonderful to share those three days together experiencing NYC in a way that even my friends(with money) who live there don’t get to and it was absolutely magical.
Day Two: Good evening, Roberta’s
By the time we got to Roberta’s, we had sampled 20 different slices from 10 different pizzerias during Slices Roulette and had at least 5 different types of pizza at Kesté, and to be honest, we were fairly intimidated by the thought of eating again.
The neighborhood, while I’m sure is absolutely bustling in the day time, had an eerie, abandoned feel. From the outside, Roberta’s has a nondescript cinderblock facade with a small, handmade sign. But, we walked into Roberta’s and immediately relaxed. The place felt like home. To the right of the door is a wall of chopped wood supported by metal pipes. To the left of the door is the open kitchen, wood stove open to view with a handful of smiling, adorable boys making pizza. (we were wondering if they enforced a mustache policy because they all had one) They serve wine in small, jelly-sized Ball jars, they have a rooftop tomato garden, a little radio studio where they podcast from, and a patio the size of the restaurant where one side is covered and cozy and the other side has picnic tables and a fence lined with vintage bikes. I don’t know if the bikes were decoration or not, but they fit right in to the eclectic, casual feel of Roberta’s. The place is really cool, and not in a pretentious way.
We started out with Prosecco and pitchers of locally brewed beer. Antipasti included a baby arugula salad, delicious mixed olives, meat and cheese plates that were out of this world. I’m not an aficionado, but I love cheese almost as much as my mom (and my mom is wicked rad) and there was this Brie or very Brie-esque cheese that was the loveliest, creamiest thing. I actually snapped at someone trying to pass the plate on while I had my knife in the cheese. I was kinda mean. But it’s not my fault! 
The cheese made me do it. The second course was pastas. The braised lamb ragu pappardelle was fricking amazing. The meat was tender and full of flavor and the pappardelle seemed to me to be homemade and cooked to perfection. Definitely my favorite dish. Not to undersell the pizza, but I was a little pizzaed out at that point (I know I know, but I’m only one human). The pizza was delicious. They have really incredible topping choices including caper, smoked mozzarella, two types of prosciutto, and Berkshire pork sausage?! Yum. We were pretty tickled when a pizza came out with chorizo, radish, cilantro and sour cream. We were like, “OMG, we can’t escape Mexican food!” Not that we would ever want to, but you have to mix it up. It was pretty damn good, I have to concede, even though I’m more of a pizza purist.
The pizza chefs let our kitchen manager and magician behind our desserts, Phil, get back there and freaking make pizzas with them. How awesome is that? If you are ever there, chat them up, they are all sweet and open to talk about whatever. Pizza. Life.
What I can surely say about Roberta’s is that out of all of the wonderful places we went, and I would and will go back to all of them, this is the place I’m going to take my friends for no special occasion to have a delicious meal, enjoy each others company, wander in twos out to the patio to listen to some music, and chat with the guy who made my pizza and find out his mom is sending him chiles from her garden for the next special pizza(Alfonso, you rock!), like it’s my house but way, way cooler!
Day Two: Good afternoon, Kesté
A scant 2 hours after Slices Roulette, we arrived at Kesté Pizza & Vino, open for only 5 months, on Bleeker in the West Village. We were welcomed by the co-owner and chef, Roberto Caporuscio, who started us off with a brief history of Neapolitan pizza and his philosophy behind his pizza. Of course, it is all about the crust. Well crust, simplicity, and freshness.
Kesté, meaning “this is it” in Italian, serves authentic Neapolitan pizza. In fact, if you want to get the best in Neapolitan pizza, this is IT. Roberto is President of APN (Associazione Pizzaiuoli Napoletani, which maintains strict member guidelines for ingredients, dough, and cooking). He’s like the Wizard of Oz of Neapolitan pizza.
Kesté was by far, leaps and bounds and kangaroo jumps, some of the best pizza we as a collective group have ever put in our mouths. We were served much more food than we ordered, and despite being stuffed to the gills, we kept eating because it was all so amazing. We started with a salad of mixed greens, walnuts, pears, with a simple dressing of lemon and olive oil. Then the pizzas started flying out. Pizza was invented in Naples a very long time ago. Tomatoes had been introduced to Italy, but in pizza’s early days, people still thought they were poisonous. So, one of the first versions of pizza, was flatbread with lard and herbs. When we heard they served a lard pizza we were super excited to try something that, by it’s description, did not exactly sound appetizing to us. I need a new word for amazing, really. The crust was at once charred and soft as a pillow, the lard was salty and crispy around the edges and the basil was a refreshing counterpart to the fatty saltiness. The Margherita was awesome, super simple and divine. The special of the day was a pizza with a truffle cream spread. That piece of pizza, it wasn’t food, there is something too utilitarian implied in using the word food. It was straight pleasure. 
We had many pizzas, all delicious, but the last pizza that really made a huge impression on me was a pizza that out of the oven was topped with arugula, prosciutto, and shaved percorino romano. If you live in New York, or can afford to drop everything and get on a plane, go here. Go here now.
And you know, in researching Kesté, I read a lot of bum reviews, and we all know that people like to complain, it makes them sound smart. 
But most of the bad reviews were from people that I don’t think really know what Neapolitan pizza truly is. For those people, I have a story. Nano, our general manager, and his brothers growing up were not allowed to say things like “eeewww, that’s weird,” or “Yuk! That’s gross.” They had to instead say, “That is not what I am used to.” And it very subtly changed their perspective, and left their minds open to eventually become used to the “weird” European food and such their parents were introducing them to. So, for those people who poo poo this pizza, are you really going to tell the President of Pizza that he doesn’t know what he’s doing? I challenge you, instead of trying to retro-fit this pizza to what you are accustomed to, look at it with fresh eyes and taste buds. The only way you would be disappointed is if you burn your tongue on an iron while getting ready. But you wouldn’t do that, I know you wouldn’t.
Day Two: Good Morning Pizza! Slices Roulette
Wake up, eat pizza. Hey, it’s what we do. It’s 1 and we are all 2 slices + deep. We are playing a game we like to call Slices Roulette. Teams of two went all around the city and brought back 2 slices from the pizzeria they were assigned to. Some good, some bad, some amazing. Even cold.
The Landscape:
Results at the bottom!
A. Washington Square Park, where we converged.
B. Bleecker Street Pizza (voted #1 NY slice by food network)
69 7th Ave S (Bet. Barrow and Jones) (212) 924-4466
C. Joe’s Pizza
7 Carmine St # 7 (Bet. Bleeker & Bedford)
(212) 255-3946
D. Ben’s Pizza
177 Spring St (Bet. Thompson & Sullivan)
(212) 966-4494
E. Stromboli Pizza
83 Saint Marks Pl (at 1st Ave.)
212-673-3691
F. Sal’s
91 Avenue A (Btwn 5th & 6th St)
212-982-3990
G. Famous Ray’s Pizza
465 6th Ave (at 11th St)
212-243-3010
H. Stromboli Pizzeria
112 University Pl (Btwn E 12th St & 13th St)
212-255-0812
I. Nino’s Pizza
131 Saint Marks Pl. (at Ave A)
212-979-8688
J. Vinny Vincenz
231 1st Ave (Bet. 13th & 14th)
(212) 674-0707
K. Artichoke Basille’s
328 E 14th St (Bet. 1st & 2nd)
212-228-2004
We tested and scored the slices. Here are the final results, and even between our staff, scores varied wildly for each place:
1. Vinny Vincenz
2. Nino’s Pizza
3. Bleeker St. Pizza
4. Artichoke Basille’s
5. Sal’s
6. Joe’s Pizza
7. Stromboli Pizzeria
8. Ben’s Pizza
9. Stromboli Pizza, Inc.
10. Famous Ray’s Pizza
Day One: Lombardi’s
Here we are! New Yawk Citay. Our first dinner at Lombardi’s, not only the oldest pizzeria in NYC, but the oldest in the country. And having been here for our first dinner for the previous two years, I had a more focused view of the experience this year. Not only knowing the history of Lombardi’s, and having our own with it, but to finally be able to enjoy my experience on a higher level beyond the blinding gastronomic pleasure.
We were met by one of the most ebullient people I’ve ever had the pleasure of learning from, Scott Weiner, who does pizza tours here in NYC. While we were enjoying our appetzers, Scott told us not only about the history of Lombardi’s but about the nuts and bolts of the 1000 degree coal burning oven, a staggering 12 feet deep, where pizzas cook in a hot 3 minutes. We were sitting on the second floor directly above the oven, and you could feel the heat in the brick wall and the floor at our feet. Ovens like this are certifiably illegal in this day and age, but this oven has been rocking pizzas out since 1905 and will not be stopped.
I think we ordered over 15 pizzas, and not one dissapointed. White pies with subtle and light ricotta browned on it’s peaks with tender meatballs and savory mushrooms. Crispy crust supporting a simple, acidic and tangy tomato sauce supporting islands of fresh mozzarella. Pancetta and chunky, hand-chopped red onion. All flavors swirled in with amazing Chianti, Pinot Grigio, and Montepulciano.
There are so many reasons we start out here every year. Scott took us in groups of five to see the kitchen and explain the oven. It was incredible to see 8 or so men crammed into a kitchen the size of a fancy bathroom moving at a seemingly chaotic speed, yet perfectly deliberate and focused. I will stop here to digress on two points. One, most of the men in that kitchen are of Latin American descent, as are many of ours, and it is absolutely humbling to see how amazingly talented and badass they are. Businesses like this are born out of an immigrant spirit of family and hard work and would never survive without that. Second, although the servers and food runners had to move at lightning speed and, most of the time, had to cut your tourist, drunken ass off to get where they needed to go they always said ‘pardon’ or ‘excuse me’ when they did.
I could go on, but we have 3 pizza eating experiences tomorrow to get down with, so I will bid you and the interweb adieu. Check back tomorrow.
And, Austin, we miss you.
