Does New York Make The World's Best Pizza ?
Quite Possibly ? Yes !
Dominic DeMarco
Quite Possibly, the World's Best
Does New York make the World's Best Pizza? Believe it or not, the answer is Yes. Yes beelieve it or not, New York may be the Pizza Capital of the World, when it comes to making the Worlds Best Pizza. "Are you insane?" some may say. Not not really, but I get people thinking this, if anyone makes the claim that New York makes the Best Pizza in the World, and that includes Napoli, and all of Italy, in this said statement.
Well everyone knows that New York makes the BEst Pizza in all of America. That's a fact. You can forget about Chicago, New Haven, and Pizza Bianco in Phoenix, everyone knows New York Pizza is the best, from a couple thousand regular Pizza Joints turning out great Pizza from gas fired ovens, to the awesome historic Pizzerias like; Lombardi's, Johns' of Bleecker Street, Patsy's Pizzeria in East Harlem. and Tottono's on Neptune Avenue, Coney Island, all of these with coal firened pizza ovens, to wonderful spots that make traditional Neapolitan Pizza in Wood Burning ovens, at places like Bella Blu on Lexington Avenue, Motorino, and Trattoria Gigino in Tribeca, New York collectively may very well be the spot that makes the World's Best Pizza. "I kid you not."
I love Italy and Naples and have numerous wonderful Pizzas, but I have often had dissapointing ones as well, as in the case of Pizzeria di Matteo in Napoli, which many consider one of the World's best pizzerias, making some of the World's Best Pizza. "Not" !!! No way. This and some other places in Naples, Italy, do not really turn out great Pizza. Sometimes yes as in the case of Da Marino Trattoria / Pizzeria which makes amazing Pizza that lives up to the moniker of Best in The World. The Pizza that I've had at Da Marino is among the nest Pizza I have ever eaten anywhere, and for me, along with Tutino Pizzeria. Their Pizza is amazing, and one of the best in Naples, and the World.
THE BEST PIZZA I HAVE EVER EATEN
THESE ARE MY FAVORITES of ALL TIME
DiFARA PIZZA ... Avenue J, Brooklyn, New York
RISTORANTE PIZZERIA MARINO, Naples, Italy
JOHN'S PIZZERIA , Bleecker Street, New York NY
L'ARCHETTO PIZZERIA, Salerno, Italy
TUTINO PIZZERIA, Via Cesare
PRINCE STREET PIZZA, Spring Street, NY .. "The Soho Square with Pepperoni is Amazing !"
TOTTONO'S, Neptune Avenue, Coney Island, Brooklyn NY
L&B SPUMONI GARDENS, Brooklyn, NY
BELLA BLU, Lexington Avenue, New York NY.. A Secret Gem making "Some of NYC Best Pizza"
La LANTERNA, Greenwich Village NY .... "The Potato Onion Pizza is Amazing"
The Above LIST is not in any particular order. I've eaten Pizza in the Best Places in the World, including Naples, Sicily, Rome, Salerno, The Amalfi Coast, and New York. These are the best Pizzas I've ever eaten.
NEW YORK'S BEST PIZZA
"PIZZERIAS"
"The WORLD'S BEST" !!!
JOHN'S PIZZERIA
aka JOHN'S of BLEECKER STREET
My FAVORITE PIZZERIA OVERALL
TOTONNO'S PIZZERIA NAPOLITANO
NEPTUNE AVENUE
CONEY ISLAND, BROOKLYN
NEW YORK
"LOVE IT"
Pizzaiolo Michael
TOTONNO'S
Coney Island
.
.
The MASTER
Dom DeMarco
DiFARA PIZZA
Avenue "J"
BROOKLYN, NY
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.
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The Great Mark Iacono
At LUCALI'S
Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn
The OVEN at LOMBARDI'S
"This is where it all Started"
AMERICA'S 1st PIZZERIA
Opened in 1905 by Genaro Lombardi
.
Genaro Lombardi with pizzaiolo Totonno Pero
1905
SPRING STREET
NEW YORK NY
.
Inside LOMBARDI'S
JOE'S PIZZA
Carmine Street
New York NY
NEW YORK'S BEST LOVED SLICE
.
The Soho Square
From PRINCE STREET PIZZA
Now my FAVORITE PIECE of PIZZA in New York
But when it comes to a so-called Plain Slice ?
Nobody Beats Dom DeMarco and his awesomely tasty PIZZA
at DiFARA PIZZA Brooklyn, New York, and the World's Single Best PIZZA
"SERIOUSLY" !!!
.
.
.
The GREAT DOM DeMARCO
And The WORLD'S BEST PIZZA ?
"DOM'S"
DiFARA PIZZERIA
BROOKLYN, NEW YORK
PATSY'S PIZZERIA
East Harlem , New York
"FRANK SINATRA'S FAVORITE"
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.
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SUNDAY SAUCE
alla BELLINO alla PACINO
.
.
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SAL & CARMINE'S PIZZA
Since 1957
Upper West Side of Manhattan
2671 BROADWAY, NY NY
As The Signs says, "CRISPY PIZZA" !!!
One of NEW YORK'S BEST
.
FAMOUS BEN'S PIZZA
SPRING STREET
Soho
.
SFINCIONE
"REAL SICILIAN PIZZA" !!!
BEN'S is one of The Few Places in NEW YORK
to Get REAL AUTHENTIC SICILIAN PIZZA, "SFINCIONE"
aka PIZZA PALERMITANA
Of PALERMO
.
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RECIPES From MY SICILIAN NONNA
"The BEST PIZZA in NAPLES"
RISTORANTE PIZZERIA MARINO
Via SANTA LUCIA 118, NAPLES, Italy
tel. 39 081 764 0280
GERARDO Making PIZZA
L'ARCHETTO PIZZERIA
SALERNO
"One of The WORLD'S BEST"
PIZZERIA TUTINO
One of the best pizzas in Naples, made the old way. I love the one with yellow piennolo tomatoes, provolone and pepper, but also the complete fried one with cicoli, here prepared in the unusual round shape. And what about the fries … Omelettes are literally a drug. You can decide to eat something on the fly outside, leaning on the tables made available, or go upstairs to sit comfortably at a table in the room, whose walls are decorated with frescoes that recall the old traditions of Naples and its ancient trades. The value for money is excellent. I highly recommend it.
"One of Napoli's Best"
HISTORY of The NEW YORK SLICE
NEW YORK PIZZA
SLICE JOINTS
Pizza can be a great divider in New York. In fact, one of the easiest ways to get into argument (without end) is to name a “Best Pizza in the City.” But at the same time, pizza — specifically the reheated, foldable, portable slice — is one of the city’s great uniters. There is no culinary experience that New Yorkers share more widely and more unanimously than the slice joint. Like catching a sunset over the skyline or stepping in an icy curbside puddle, the slice joint has, since its beginnings more than 50 years ago, become common currency.
New York pizza starts with large waves of Italian immigrants settling in the city in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. By 1920, roughly a quarter of the 1.6 million Italian immigrants in the United States were living in New York, establishing enclaves in Manhattan, Brooklyn and the Bronx. Such neighborhoods were home to the first pizzerias, like Lombardi’s in Little Italy, which opened on Spring Street in 1905. The namesake of the Neapolitan immigrant Gennaro Lombardi, the restaurant used a coal-fired oven to create pizzas with puffy, charred crusts and a bubbling layer of tomato sauce and cheese that made it one of the most popular restaurants in Little Italy. As if in biblical succession, as apprentices left to start their own pizza operations, Lombardi’s begat Totonno’s in Coney Island, John’s in Greenwich Village and Patsy’s in what is now Spanish Harlem. These are the four acknowledged prewar pizza pillars in the city. (Though none of them was a slice joint in the current sense.)
The price has changed over the decades, but the scene and staging remain much the same. Look at the crowd of New Yorkers and tourists alike bundled in winter coats on a recent Wednesday night at Joe’s Pizza on Carmine Street. The pies at Joe’s, which opened in 1975, are considered among the city’s best. See how the customers rotate in a perfect line through the door and up to the glass case, their orders ready and their money in hand. “Three dollars,” the pizza man says briskly, after he has placed the requested slice into a decked oven. Out come the hot, bubbling triangles of cheese and sauce on thin, pliable crust. Once their slices are ready, the diners — if so formal a word even applies — grab a place at the counter in the window or push out the door, slice in hand, on to wherever the evening may take them. This is the “New York style.”
The origin story of New York pizza starts with large waves of Italian immigrants settling in the city in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. By 1920, roughly a quarter of the 1.6 million Italian immigrants in the United States were living in New York, establishing enclaves in Manhattan, Brooklyn and the Bronx. Such neighborhoods were home to the first pizzerias, like Lombardi’s in Little Italy, which opened on Spring Street in 1905. The namesake of the Neapolitan immigrant Gennaro Lombardi, the restaurant used a coal-fired oven to create pizzas with puffy, charred crusts and a bubbling layer of tomato sauce and cheese that made it one of the most popular restaurants in Little Italy. As if in biblical succession, as apprentices left to start their own pizza operations, Lombardi’s begat Totonno’s in Coney Island, John’s in Greenwich Village and Patsy’s in what is now Spanish Harlem. These are the four acknowledged prewar pizza pillars in the city.
Hot, filling and eaten with the hands, pizza elicited breathless coverage from The Times fairly early on, as food writers marveled at the appealing combination of ingredients and convenience. By 1947, the paper was fully sold. “A round of dough is baked with tomatoes and anchovies and cheese atop, cut into wedges, then eaten with the fingers between gulps of wine,” the food editor Jane Nickerson enthused. “The pizza could be as popular a snack as the hamburger if Americans only knew more about it.”
Nine years later, The Times’s Herbert Mitgang contemplated the reasons for pizza’s popularity, writing, “The guess is that a number of Americans of Italian origin, aided by advertising and refrigeration, have made pizza as delectable as such other postwar imports as Lollobrigida” — referring to Gina, the saucy Roman film star. The Neapolitan-style pie became a chic dinner-party staple that could also be supplemented with a salad for a filling, family meal. But one innovation would change how New Yorkers enjoyed pizza forever.
RAY'S PIZZA
6th Avenue, GREENWICH VILLAGE, NEW YORK
1984
Frank Mastro, an Italian immigrant and businessman, saw the potential for pizza to be as popular in America as the hot dog. He just had to figure out a way to make it quicker and cheaper for both restaurant owners and diners. So in the mid-1930s, he devised a gas pizza oven that maintained optimal temperatures even as the door was opened over and over.
Although it is hard to pinpoint when pizza was first sold by the slice, the introduction of the gas oven with multiple decks gave New Yorkers the option of enjoying a crisp-bottomed slice either as a full meal or a substantial snack between meals as they moved around the city. Pizza shop owners no longer needed to learn how to operate a coal-fired oven, meaning pizza could be made quicker and with less training. By the 1960s, the slice joint boom was on. And it is the slice joint that really turned pizza from an Italian Food in New York City into a New York City food — a meal shared across neighborhoods, ethnicities and age groups, equally at home in the Bay Ridge of “Saturday Night Fever” as in the Bedford-Stuyvesant of “Do the Right Thing.”
This proliferation was also helped along by the same thing that brought pizza to this country in the first place: immigration. In the ’60s and ’70s, waves of immigrants from Eastern Europe, the Caribbean and Latin America began joining the work force and landing in food service roles, where the barrier to entry was much lower than in other fields.
As one of the standard-bearers of the current slice-joint renaissance, Scarr Pimentel remembers his spot on 138th Street and Broadway. “Kids like me pretty much grew up in pizza shops,” said Mr. Pimentel, whose family moved to New York from the Dominican Republic. “If you had five bucks you could have a slice, a soda and some ice cream. It was a full meal and sometimes the owner would slip us an extra slice or something.” Mr. Pimentel opened his own pizza shop in 2016, the sleek and retro Scarr’s Pizza on the Lower East Side. His slices and pies are made with organic flour, high-quality tomatoes and cheese and carefully sourced (often organic) toppings, but the slice-joint spirit holds true. “Who would’ve thought a kid like me from the Dominican Republic would own a pizza shop in New York City one day?” he added.
JOE'S PIZZA
BLEECKER & CARMINE STREETS
GREENWICH VILLAGE, NY
John Kambouris immigrated to Washington Heights in 1965 from a small Greek island about 200 miles east of Athens. “I had $10 in my pocket,” he said from behind the counter of Pizza Palace on Dyckman Street, which he has owned since 1979, when he bought the business from an Italian couple he knew from the neighborhood. “They say the Italians bring the pizza here, but we put our culture on it.” In the 1960s this area was Irish and Jewish, he explained. Today, the neighborhood is home to a large Caribbean population, including a large concentration of immigrants from the Dominican Republic. “I love what I’m doing … we’re making pizza that people want and I don’t have to be Italian to make good pizza,” Mr. Kambouris said, before noting, “I’ve put three kids through college off of this shop.”
It’s in hundreds of shops like his around the city, many no bigger than subway cars, where you’ll find New Yorkers shoulder to shoulder, eating slices in near silence. “Teens, Wall Street guys, guys camped out with a shopping cart, a pizza place is the most diverse space in the city,” said Colin Atrophy Hagendorf, author of “Slice Harvester: A Memoir in Pizza” and host of the Radio Harvester podcast. “Inside a pizzeria that dream of diverse New York City is a reality. I think that’s such a beautiful thing.
Basta !
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SOUP
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