Una Pizza Perfetta

My pizza adventures have been on something of an upswing lately.

First I (mostly) swore off crappy pizza and discovered the excellent pizzeria No. 28 in one fell swoop. And then there's Margy's amazing homemade pizza, which I can pretty much demand at any time of year save the sultry summer months.

But I must say that 2007 really started out with a bang when Enzo, who seems to be my pizza-hunting guardian angel -- or at least my official taster -- finally brought me to Una Pizza Napoletana in the East Village.

I had read about the place for months, years, eons, whatever -- long enough to know that I needed to try it. (It opened in 2004.) The band had an evening gig in Brooklyn, and, earlier in the week, when I mentioned getting together with some or all of the fellas for dinner, Enzo looked at me and said, "UPN, dude." Done.

I did a little more reading in the days leading up to tonight. The user reviews on Citysearch cracked me up. They basically alternate "Best pizza ever" and "What's the big deal?" But, knowing all about Una Pizza's borderline psychotic insistence on using only the best, most classic ingredients and techniques, I had a strong feeling about which side of the fence I'd land on. Still, I couldn't help but notice that every reviewer, regardless of whether his or her comments were positive or negative, moaned and groaned about the price of the pizza. Among other complaints were descriptions of the proprietor, Anthony Mangieri, as the "pizza Nazi," and stuff like, "They make you cut your own pie!" and, "They don't give you free water!"

I'm reading this and thinking, Just show me the pizza.

So Enzo and his wife and I -- my biggest regret would soon be letting Margy skip out on this one -- showed up around 7:30 on this Friday night, and there were a few people on line ahead of us. One thing I was not going to do was get bummed out about waiting, not even while standing outside in winter drizzle. This was a quest, after all -- my ongoing quest to eat decent pizza -- and quests take time. Within a few minutes we were waiting inside, and I could finally see some pies.

Wow, were they small. Yet another feature of the UPN product that Citysearchers couldn't seem to pipe down about. But gosh, were they gorgeous. I caught myself ogling and averted my eyes to that inward place that's always dreaming about pizza. Now and then I'd look over at Mangieri tending the wood-fired brick oven and see him pour olive oil from a copper kettle onto a pie in an artful, well-practiced swirl. The guy had me at hello.

Now, the menu at Una Pizza Napoletana lists four items, all pizzas, all featuring a combination of very basic ingredients (drawn from this list: San Marzano tomatoes, buffalo mozzarella, fresh basil, oregano, fresh garlic, fresh cherry tomatoes, extra virgin olive oil, Sicilian sea salt). Want an anchovy? Go someplace else. Feel like some pepperoni? Seek it elsewhere. Heaven forbid you're in the mood for a salad. Waiting on line, I whispered to Enzo, "I wonder if you can get a little hot pepper if you feel like it."

"Probably not," we said in unison.

After a wait of maybe fifteen minutes in the very small, sparsely adorned dining room, a table was ready, and the Italian waitress led us over. Enzo and I immediately began speaking to her in Italian, just to test the waters. She seemed to appreciate that. We ordered three Peroni and three Margheritas (San Marzanos, mozzarella, olive oil, basil, salt). And then, I have to say, I felt a little depressed.

The money thing was getting to me.

Of all the things in this world that we can spend our hard-earned cash on, food is right at the top of the list for me. It just makes sense to seek out certain edible items that might occupy a higher price bracket. This isn't always necessary -- it can even be foolish sometimes -- but very often the best foods, or the best available varieties of certain foods, cost the most. I had already had this conversation with myself before entering the cash-only, four-items-on-the-menu Una Pizza Napoletana, and I had concluded that if the pie is indeed that memorable then it would be worth it to pay whatever it cost.

What a 12-inch pizza costs at UPN is $21. And I really felt the impact once I'd requested one.

But then the pie arrived, and thoughts of dollars and cents receded far enough away that I'd have given Mangieri whatever he wanted from me. After just a quick bite or two, 21 bucks seemed utterly reasonable -- a steal, even. I began to stammer an endless stream of "Wow" and "Unbelievable." Other topics could not enter the conversation, if conversation is the right word for oohs and aahs and incomplete sentences. When we talked, we talked about the pizza.

Two features jumped out at me: harmoniousness and deliciousness.

First, the harmony. Every carefully chosen component of the pie came together in the ultimate "the whole is more than the sum of its parts" way. It helped, of course, that each part had an impressive pedigree, but it was the balance that was so stunning. At another place, I might've wanted a spoonful more sauce. Here, I did not. In a different pizzeria, I might have wanted just a bit more crunch from the crust. Here, that notion would have been a travesty. This crust perfectly toed the line between crisp and chewy, and it was branded beautifully with little char marks from the oven. My friends, UPN veterans, said they'd never had such a well-done pie there, that usually it was cooked a bit less. I found that hard to imagine -- again, what I was eating seemed perfect, and I didn't want to acknowledge that anything less so was possible -- but in my state of rapture I figured that even a less well-done pizza would still be great.

On to the deliciousness. This pie simply tasted better than all but maybe one or two that I've had in my life. I usually judge a pizza by breaking it down -- how's the crust? is the sauce too sweet? does the cheese have any flavor? -- but this one defied my conventions by forcing me to view it as a whole. Harmony again.

Of course, I can try to analyze it. The tomatoes were lovely, a little bit of tang that worked in conjunction with the yeastiness of the dough. The buffalo mozzarella was more assertive than most mozz. Placed on the pie almost in little balls, it melted slightly outward but retained a milky whiteness, and its lush creaminess balanced the acidic tomato. Adding the olive oil, which pooled up just a bit in the center of the pizza (like it does on good pies in Italy), was an important touch -- you could really taste it. And the basil offered color contrast and refreshing herbal flavor.

But the thing that really blew all of us away was the sea salt. If this were a movie review, here's where I might say "beware of spoiler," because I'd want everyone to discover for themselves the little surprises that pop up here and there as you gobble the pie. I didn't know where, I didn't know when -- the large, angular salt crystals were cloaked by the other ingredients -- but now and again I'd get this little crunch followed by saltiness, and it grabbed me every time. The whole experience was thrilling, and it was over too soon.

Before it ended, though, Enzo motioned toward our waitress as she zipped by. "C'è un po' di peperoncino?" he asked. "Is there a bit of hot pepper?" Oh no, I thought, he's gonna ruin everything. But nothing could be ruined -- we had our pizzas, and no one could take them away from us. And it's not as if we were going to order dessert, although in retrospect a white pizza would've been a fine substitute for gelato or biscotti.

Anyway, I could swear that a bit of a smile took a downward turn as our server accelerated past us, answering, "Non c'è la. NON C'È LA!"

"It's not here. IT'S NOT HERE!" You know what? They don't need it.

Margy's Pizza

I've waxed rhapsodic over Margy's pizza many times now, but it would be irresponsible of me not to commemorate each and every appearance of this magical food.

It's always the same, yet it's always different. Temperature and humidity surely play a part in the behavior of the dough, and who knows how many other subtle factors are at work. Water salinity? Margy's body temperature? The shifting moods of fickle flour?

Tonight the crust was a little thicker and a little more pale than usual, but it cooked up perfectly and, as always, tasted fantastic. I've been experimenting with sprinkling Maldon sea salt over the white pies -- we alternate red and white -- once they come out of the oven, to great results. The large, flaky salt crystals really wake up fresh tomatoes (especially ones bought in December). The difference in flavor with and without the salt is illuminating.

Margy, you've done it again.

Finalmente!

Maybe you've heard me complain endlessly about the meager pizza choices in our Jersey town. I'm frustrated, I'm bitter, I'm angry, I'm depressed, I'm incredulous that no one has bothered to make a decent pie within twelve miles of our home. But then I go and eat the local schlock anyway... because it's pizza, dammit, and who wants to go weeks without pizza?

Well, sign me up.

I'm done with the places around here, and I'm not joking this time. I am now willing to go weeks without pizza if it means sparing myself junky pies. I'm not happy about this -- pizza is convenient, it's cheap, and it's always readily available... plus, you know, I'm a tiny bit obsessed with it -- but my hand has been forced by too many crushing disappointments.

Tonight, however, at least restored my faith that someone in this country besides Margy and my mom is committed to pizza excellence. Of course this was across the river in NYC, at No. 28 on Carmine Street, but at this point that's what I'm dealing with: either traveling a little or begging Margy for the homemade goods.

I had heard about No. 28 from Enzo, who is well aware of my obsession and who knew I'd dig the place. I just assumed Margy and I would have to wait for a table, but the joint was hardly full when we arrived. (Seems most New Yorkers are just like most New Jerseyans and choose their pizzerias based on proximity rather than deliciousness.) Walking in, we saw a brick oven, we smelled burning embers, we got excited. We ordered a Margherita with buffalo mozzarella and a white pie with garlic and sopressata.

As we were waiting for our pizzas, a trio of young Neapolitans walked in and made themselves at home at one of the outdoor tables. We were treated to the wonderful sound of their local dialect, which was so thick and obscure to my ears that, though I speak decent conversational Italian, I could only understand the odd word here and there. We were not in the New Jersey suburbs.

Again, that fact was borne out when the pizzas arrived. The first, most obvious good sign was burn marks on the crust. Aah, burn marks. All the ingredients were top notch, and there were very few of them -- another good sign. Pizza, to me, is not a depository for all my favorite meats and vegetables and cheeses; toppings are only there to support the most important component: the dough. And support it they did. The tomato sauce was fresh and bright, and the buffalo mozzarella was creamy and imparted just the right amount of dairy flavor. The garlic on the white pie made itself well known without being overpowering, and a bit of ricotta mellowed out the sopressata beautifully. The crust walked that delicate balance between crisp and chewy, offering a little bit of both.

It's no wonder that No. 28 has gained a "D.O.C." designation from the organization that recognizes proper Neapolitan, that is to say properly elemental, pizza. In that great miracle of culinary miracles, I got hungrier the more I ate, until my brain had to finally interfere and heed the stop signals that my stomach was refusing to send in such a blissed-out state.

Major Letdown

It's sad to go back to regular assembly-line pizza so soon after being treated to Margy's incredible homemade version, but grabbing a pie when you're pressed for time is the ultimate in convenience -- and one of the only relatively safe bets in a town of few decent take-out choices. Tonight it was gobble, gobble, then I was off to witness the dazzling guitar heroics of Jeff Beck live in concert. Margy opted out of the guitar-heroics part.

Leftover Pizza

Margy is a magician. Hers is not normal pizza.

Margy Labors on Labor Day Weekend

If there's one kind of grueling work that really pays off, it's pizza making. And Margy, it must be said, is becoming the master.

While we usually schedule pizza in advance and give ourselves something to look forward to -- or in my case, to obsess about -- today it was a late-breaking inspiration. Suddenly energized by our plan, we ran to the market to grab some fresh mozzarella and some San Marzano tomatoes, and we summoned our pal Yoz to come share the wealth.

While Margy made the dough and the San Marzano sauce, I worked on prepping the toppings. I sliced pancetta, sautéed mushrooms, and cooked spinach and garlic, and of course I halved a bunch of our homegrown cherry tomatoes. I couldn't contain my excitement over the idea of matching Margy's pizza with our flavorful little tomatoes.

It's wild how the crust always turns out a little different, probably owing to the weather and perhaps some more subtle factors, like water salinity and Margy's relaxation versus agitation levels as she kneads the dough. She claims I say this every time, but tonight might have been her best pizza ever. Yoz said it was the best pizza he'd ever had, and he later commented -- before the ice cream cone -- that he usually doesn't eat that much in three days. Attaboy. He will be invited back, perhaps even with an open invitation, regardless of whether his presence means fewer leftovers for Margy and me.

And the cherry tomatoes made one hell of an addition to pizza night. I scattered them on a white pie, along with olive oil, anchovies, chilies, mozzarella, and Parmesan. I sprinkled a few flakes of sea salt on the finished pizza to bring out the flavor a little more. Yup, best ever.

Backup Plan

We had nothing in the fridge, and I just didn't feel like going to the store.

The Real Deal

Lombardi's never lets you down.

Okay, that's not entirely true. It lets you down sometimes. I've been quite disappointed with the pie on occasion. After all, it's a delicate balance between a zaftig slice and one that's just plain enormous, and Lombardi's has been known to tip the scales on the excessively doughy side. A bit of end crust should be a modestly sized handle with which to grab the pizza; it doesn't need to be the size of the restraining bar on a roller coaster.

But on the other hand, Lombardi's gets lots of things right. The sauce is fresh and tangy and bright, and the hot-as-hell oven knows how to scorch the crust in all the best ways. Bubbles abound, rich pockets of mozzarella pop out here and there, and sometimes you find the perfect crunch.

This pie rocked, despite having a few roll-bar crusts. It had better have rocked, because I was enjoying it with my friend the extreme-metal drummer, and he doesn't like things that don't rock. In fact, this Lombardi's pizza might have inspired some of his finest work, because at his show after dinner he pulled off feats of power and speed and sheer madness that are almost certainly impossible on an empty stomach.

I'll Eat Any Pizza Once

My family and I are pizza snobs -- we've been through that. Despite my being a pizza snob, I can pretty much enjoy a less-than-wonderful slice, even as I list to myself (or to those around me) the reasons why it's no good. We've been through that too.

It's all just by way of saying that if someone tells me to try a certain pizza, I'll definitely do it. And tonight that someone was the person I trust the most: my mother. She said that she and my dad had actually found a decent pizza near their new pad and that I should check the place out.

My mom gave me a bum steer.

Well, not really. She didn't say the pizza was amazing; she said it was acceptable. But see, that's about the highest praise she and my father can muster for anything not made in:

* Mom's kitchen
* New Haven
* Italy
* France

France? What can I say -- a pie they had someplace in Provence is still being talked about.

So I guess my expectations were built up too high by the sheer nature of my stickler parents endorsing the joint. It's happened before. It's not like we didn't eat the pizza. Margy and I scarfed it down before we headed up to Vermont for a much-anticipated family reunion. The pie was, yes, acceptable. I should have asked them to make it well done, but I usually let a pizzeria do things its way the first time before I tell the guy I actually like some color on the crust.

The Elusive Sicilian in Midtown

I think this pizza surprised us. When Margy and I made a plan to meet up in midtown Manhattan for dinner, I know she was surprised when I suggested a pizzeria, because the place was a mere block away from where I worked for six years and I had never mentioned it before.

See, I usually mention nearby pizzerias, especially if they're even remotely decent.

The thing with this place, Lazzara's, was that I had never eaten there. I'd heard about really good thin-crust Sicilian pies from my friend K and others, but during my time in the hood Lazzara's closed at 4pm, and I never considered pizza to be a good choice for an office lunch, as my company didn't offer time off for an afternoon siesta. The one time I chewed on a floppy slice (from some other place) at a birthday party in the boardroom, all I could do when I got back to my desk was blink my eyes heavily and try in vain to work.

But I'm glad to say Lazzara's is now open for dinner, because its pie was damn good. The crust had some crunch and lots of flavor, plus it had those precious burnt bits that I dream about. The sauce was tasty and not applied too thickly. The cheese... well, we're just going to have to go back soon and pay more attention to the cheese, because we were too caught up in the fact that we had missed this place for years to form a truly thorough analysis. Plus before we knew it our pizza was gone.

Zappapizz

The lousy Greek pizza isn't the important thing here. (It looks pretty good, but it wasn't.) This was the rare night that nothing was required of our food beyond it being mere fuel, for my dear friend Mr. Thowmbpsin and I were on our way to see Zappa Plays Zappa, and we were running late.

We did, though, have a nice beer and some sparkling conversation in addition to a thin but unforgivably floppy pie and a Caesar salad whose dressing had no detectable trace of anchovy. But what can you do -- we heard some of the most amazing music of our lives. Anyway, I'm still thinking about the rib-eyes.

A Few Warm Pies

Despite the fact that it was 45 degrees outside and 51 degrees inside, we decided to get some take-out.

Now, I am not ordinarily one to order pizza in Vermont, snob that I am, but Margy and I had visited this new cafe on our last trip and been impressed with its brick-oven pie. My sister agreed. So she made a salad and we ordered three pies, one for each of us. Two wouldn't have been nearly enough.

I have to say it was the best pizza I've had in months, besides Margy's of course. The crust was tasty, and it was browned and charred in spots. The sauce on the pepperoni pie was tangy and not too sweet. The cheese was creamy. And the fresh tomatoes on the two Margherita pies actually had some flavor. My sis doctored the Margheritas with some chopped anchovy, Margy and I poured some Magic Hat beers, and, standing in the kitchen by the oven that kept the pizzas hot, we all stopped shivering for a few blessed moments.

Old Reliable

No one wanted to cook, so we grabbed a pizza.

One Last Slice...

We hate to see that pizza go, but it served us well.

Margy Brings the Magic

After I begged for months and months, Margy finally agreed to make pizza.

I'm not telling the truth. Fact is, she has fun reveling in her special pizza-making gift. After all, what better way to spend a few hours in the kitchen? And with all the oohing and aahing over the results, there's no way she could think her efforts go unappreciated.

It's wild to note the changing moods of a batch of pizza dough. Margy always uses the same method, yet there are always subtle differences in the final product. One day the dough won't stop rising. One day the crust comes out chewier than most. Is it the weather? The tides? Margy's disposition?

This time I noticed the crust didn't brown as easily at its thickest points as it usually does. So in some spots it was almost pale. But it was crispy, often crunchy, and it was as savory and delicious as ever.

Tonight we had two kinds of pies, a few of each, with enough leftovers for two or three more meals: a red pie with pancetta, mushrooms, fresh mozzarella, and fresh basil; and a white pie with olive oil, spinach and garlic, anchovies, fresh mozzarella, and Parmesan. Both of us ate far more than we needed to, but we couldn't help ourselves. This pizza is magic.

Backslide...

Forgive me, for I am weak.

I really can't resist pizza. Especially when I get home hungry at 9:30. Yet I'm destroying my own suspense. I've said I'm on a crusade to get a real piece of pizza, but I'm just blowing smoke. Clearly I am willing to settle for convenience over artistry.

I could get in the car and drive to New Haven for some of the best pizza in the country, some say the world. I could hop a train to Manhattan and finally visit Una Pizza Napoletana. I could try one of several well-reputed places in Brooklyn, relatively easily. But these special trips seem to go against the casual inspiration of "let's have pizza."

See, I'm still justifying. I need to make a special trip, just to cure my jones. It must happen. "Let's have pizza" clearly isn't working out.

These, by the way, are Margherita slices from the only pizzeria in town that Margy and I hadn't tried until now, the one local place with a brick oven. The pizza looks pretty good, doesn't it? All I can say is this: having a brick oven means nothing unless you make a decent pie to cook in it. The fresh mozzarella was good. That's about as much praise as I can muster. The sauce was sweet enough to put over ice cream, and the crust had no flavor at all. It did, however, have plenty of texture: It was so dense at the end that a saw would have had trouble getting through it.

I swear, some places expect, I might even say encourage, people to throw away their end crusts. Disgraziato.

The Lazy World of Times Square Pizza

Pizza is one of my very favorite topics. I am not unique in this regard. I've said it before, and I'll undoubtedly say it again: I know how to recognize good pizza, but I understand that it is not always possible to find good pizza. And I live twenty miles outside of Manhattan, in an area where fine specimens are available, not in, say, Steamboat Springs, Colorado, where I've heard it's impossible to get quality baked goods of any kind, let alone a decent pie.

I'm not like my dad. As he chews on any slice that was not either A) made by my mother, or B) from his hometown of New Haven (where you can find some of the finest pizza ever), he's famous for saying "This isn't pizza." No, I'm more realistic than that. But I can still get my hopes up and then fall prey to true pizza disappointment, which is one of the most stinging letdowns there is. And I never learn.

Tonight my disappointment came at John's Pizzeria in Times Square. I knew I'd be in the area, and early in the day, as I thought about where to eat, I remembered John's. My decision was made, and I started to obsess in the mid-afternoon until it reached a fever pitch. I dreamed of tangy and vibrant tomatoes, oozing oases of fresh mozzarella, blackened bits of crust shattering under my teeth...

Nah.

What I got was much closer to my local pizzeria's undistinguished output than I could have imagined. I had been to John's before, years ago, and I knew I wasn't going to have the best pie I'd ever eaten, but I wasn't expecting this isn't pizza. You can see the photo -- it wasn't awful. I'll admit that it was pizza. But there was absolutely nothing special about it. Neither cheese nor sauce had much flavor, plus the pie committed the cardinal sin of having a pale bottom. A pizza cooked in a brick oven should get banged up a little bit, show some signs of almost touching the flame. This sucker was all dainty on the flip side. I appreciated the browned top crust, and especially the few little bubbles, but if I'm going to have an achy jaw in the morning from all that chewing -- and this stuff required more work than usual -- I want to remember my pizza fondly.

I'm going to chalk this one up to the Times Square location; surely a pizzeria can get away with anything in such a tourist trap of an area. And I am going to vow to soon try Una Pizza Napoletana downtown, which I understand is the real deal, even going as far as turning out unsliced pies like they do in Italy. But my excitement begins now, and it's a long way down.

Margy Cooks! And Bakes! Pizza!

This was the moment I'd been waiting for.

I'd eat other pizzas and wish I were eating this one right here. Margy's pizza. She really is ridiculously good at making the stuff. From scratch -- no store-bought dough for her.

You know, now that I think of it, pizza making is a male-dominated pursuit. Maybe Margy will change all that. My mom, Margy's pizza muse and mentor, would have changed all that herself had she responded to just one of my dad's thousands of entreaties over the years: "If we opened a pizzeria we'd make a fortune."

But alas, my family likes to save its best food for itself. And the occasional guest. (We are not barbarians.)

I guess if you don't like thin, crispy pizza you wouldn't like Margy's. But you'd have to be really vehement about this, because one crust-shattering bite can go a long way toward converting those of the floppy-slice ilk.

Tonight's toppings were, as usual, simple, to let the magic of the dough shine through. Sushi is about rice; pizza is about dough -- period. What is added should never distract us from these essentials, but should rather enhance. So on the red pies, which Margy assembled with a simple uncooked tomato sauce seasoned with herbs and spices, we had fresh mozzarella, pancetta, mushrooms, and fresh basil. I did the honors in putting together white pies with mozzarella, spinach and garlic, anchovies, and grated Parmesan. Just writing about this now I'm having a hard time not walking over to the fridge for a leftover slice. And I'm really full.

This may be easy for me to say since I've never actually made pizza myself, but the one indispensable item here is a baking stone for the oven. Using a stone is the only way for the home cook to achieve a temperature high enough to turn out a gorgeous pie. (Commercial pizza ovens can reach temperatures of 800 degrees or more.) You slide the stone onto the oven rack -- or just leave it there all the time, like we do -- crank up the heat to 500 or 550 or whatever your highest setting is, and in 40 minutes or so it's ready to get to work and will cook a pizza to crisp perfection in around 8 minutes.

Just be sure to disable your smoke alarm.

A Few Words on Pizza (More to Come)

A confession: I am a pizza snob.

Yet not really. Let me explain. I know good pizza, I want good pizza, but that doesn't mean I must always have good pizza to be satisfied. Sometimes any old pie will do just fine. Like now, for instance. Our local pizzeria turns out a perfectly respectable product, which Margy and I enjoy from time to time. She's not a pizza snob at all, though she too can appreciate the good stuff; in fact, she makes the best homemade pizza I've had after my mother's. And that's no joke. But there was no dough to be kneaded tonight -- we had to order out.

Basically this is the best pizza we can get without going to too much trouble. And sometimes you just need pizza.

Paris Journal: Il Cardinale Pizzeria

CFM has always focused on dinners, but I thought I'd make an exception for this lunchtime treat. Plus the photo came out too well not to share.

This is the "Regina" at Il Cardinale, the pizzeria counterpart to an Italian gourmet shop/restaurant near our hotel. The toppings are mushrooms and slices of fantastic ham. As I sawed away at the pie I watched the local color come and go, always chatting with the Parisian pizzaiolo, who treated one of his regulars to a great-looking multitopping sandwich made from pizza dough and baked in the small oven next to his work station.

Afterward I brought my leftover pizza to Margy at work, and she devoured it in seconds.