Sac's Place: A Coal-Oven Pizzeria That's Trendy by Accident

Pickled Italian peppers and home-grown basil, oregano, and rosemary. An award-winning apple pie recipe from Ohio made from (somewhat) locally harvest fruit. Heat in the dining room supplied by a wood-burning stove. Nope, not a trendy "Ball jar joint" helmed by Midwestern transplants in Brooklyn. This is all going on at Sac's Place in Astoria, Queens, run by a couple brothers who grew up around the corner from this coal-fired pizzeria and restaurant on Broadway.

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9 Comments | Posted by Adam Kuban, December 2, 2011 at 10:00 AM
Tagged: Astoria, coal-oven, NYC, Queens, reviews, Sac's Place, Slice reviews

NYC Quintessential: John's Pizzeria of Bleecker Street

Every city needs at least one older-than-old restaurant with a certain kind of cultivated rakishness — hard, straight-back wood booths that don't encourage lingering; graffiti-carved walls that conjure visions of 1950s hooliganism; grumpy signage.

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9 Comments | Posted by Adam Kuban, September 9, 2011 at 9:00 AM
Tagged: coal-oven, Greenwich Village, John's, Manhattan, NYC, NYC Quintessentials, reviews, Slice reviews

Daily Slice: Patsy's Pizza, East Harlem

I'll tell you what gives: $1.75 A SLICE, that's what! That's kind of all you need to know. A buck seventy-five for a slice of the best pizza in the city. When most slices are running $2.50, $2.75. And it's for a coal-oven slice! But if you need more than that, read on after the jump.

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10 Comments | Posted by Adam Kuban, August 19, 2011 at 1:30 PM
Tagged: coal-oven, Daily Slice, East Harlem, Manhattan, NYC, Patsy's, Patsy's (East Harlem)

NYC Quintessential: Patsy's Pizza, East Harlem

There's only one size pizza available on the menu. It's a respectable size — about 16 inches across. Not HUGE but not Neapolitan dainty. Still, even though it's on the bigger side, don't let the size fool you. As the menu says, it's "paper thin." (Yes, the menu says "paper thin.") Got a big appetite? You could easily house three-quarters of a plain pie on your own. Hell, I've eaten an entire Patsy's plain pizza by myself. That was in another lifetime, before Slice even existed. On a long lunch break. I almost fell asleep at my desk when I got back to work. But I digress...

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23 Comments | Posted by Adam Kuban, August 19, 2011 at 10:45 AM
Tagged: coal-oven, East Harlem, Manhattan, NYC, NYC Quintessentials, Patsy's, Patsy's (East Harlem), Recommended, reviews, Slice reviews

Meriden, Connecticut: Little Rendezvous Pizza

The Little Rendezvous is a 73-year-old pizzeria cooking Connecticut-style apizza in a 123-year-old monster of a coal-fired oven.

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10 Comments | Posted by Adam Kuban, August 12, 2011 at 1:00 PM
Tagged: coal-oven, Connecticut, Little Rendezvous, Meriden CT, reviews, Slice reviews

NYC Quintessential: Lombardi's Coal-Oven Pizza

I'll just say it: Lombardi's is kind of a big tourist thing. After having been hyped in countless national newspaper and magazine stories, guidebooks, and travel shows, this "first pizzeria in America" is pretty much packed any night of the week with people more likely to hail from Manhattan, Kansas, than Manhattan Manhattan. (OK, that's probably an exaggeration, but poetic license, you know?)

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25 Comments | Posted by Adam Kuban, February 25, 2011 at 11:00 AM
Tagged: coal-oven, Little Italy, Lombardi's, Manhattan, Nolita, NYC, NYC Quintessentials, pizza history, reviews, Slice reviews, Soho

Coalhouse Pizza: Coal-Fired in Stamford, Connecticut

Gerard Robertson says that he opened Coalhouse in Stamford, Connecticut because he "was sick of driving to New Haven and Brooklyn for good pizza." So will his pies save Stamfordites a trip out of town?

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7 Comments | Posted by Kevin Hayes, December 21, 2010 at 12:30 PM
Tagged: coal-oven, Coalhouse Pizza, Connecticut, Gerard Robertson, hot oil, reviews, Slice reviews, Stamford CT

Openings: Grimaldi's Coal Brick Oven Pizzeria, Sandy Hook, New Jersey

From Slice'r Jeff R. comes this news: FYI, we saw that a new Grimaldi's [Coal Brick Oven Pizzeria] opened up in Highlands, New Jersey at 123 Bay Avenue. They built a huge coal-fired oven and had a soft opening last week. The official opening date is sometime this week. Grimaldi's (Highlands) 123 Bay Street, Highlands NJ 07732 (map)...

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5 Comments | Posted by Adam Kuban, October 20, 2010 at 3:00 PM
Tagged: coal-oven, Dear Slice, Grimaldi's, Grimaldi's Highlands, Highlands NJ, New Jersey, openings

Max's Coal Oven Pizzeria: A Saving Grace for Pizza Lovers in Downtown Atlanta

If a pizza has great sauce but there's so little on the pie you can't taste it, does it matter? That problem, all too common at fancy coal and wood burning oven pizzerias, does not exist at Max's, where they are generous with a delicious sauce. With great sauce, cheese, and toppings, only an overly dense crust stands between Max's and greatness.

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10 Comments | Posted by Daniel Zemans, September 1, 2010 at 10:30 AM
Tagged: Atlanta, coal-oven, Georgia, Max's Coal Oven Pizzeria, reviews, Slice reviews

The 'Moneyball' of Pizza? Using Statistics to Find NYC's Best Pies and Slices

In the New York City pizza landscape, coal is king. That's what statistics consultant Jared Lander found when he rigorously applied the science to user-generated reviews of the city's pizzerias in a quest to find "the best." Lander discovered that pizzerias with coal-fired ovens rated high and that Uptown addresses added to a pizzeria's observed popularity.

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14 Comments | Posted by Adam Kuban, March 23, 2010 at 9:15 AM
Tagged: best-of lists, coal-oven, Jared Lander, science, statistics