Tuesday, February 8, 2011

My Life with Pizza

I love Pizza. In all its varieties.

As a young boy, I remember the cold, square-sliced pizza of the Three Little Bakers. The pie was rectangular, cut into squares and had no cheese -- just thick bread topped with a sweet, light marinara sauce. A nickel a slice.

Picture of an authentic Neapolitan Pizza Margh...                                                Image via WikipediaI graduated to more sophisticated pizza as I grew older. My father would bring pizza home every once in a while for a Friday night treat.

We would eat pizza while dad taught us how to play a card game like poker, or black jack, or pinochle. The pizza was New York style, thin-crust, cheese, no toppings. He usually bought it from "Lou's" (name changed). Lou's sold pizza and assisted select customers with investments in horses, football teams, and such.

The pizza at our high-school, Friday night football games was the cheap over manufactured, synthetic kind, but I liked it.

I lived in Hammonton, New Jersey for a while where Bruni's had as good a pizza pie as I have ever had. Speaking of Hammonton, Marian and I met and were married there -- and we stopped for pizza not long after we left the church and the reception. It sounds funny now, but seemed perfectly normal back then.

Pizza at the beach was Grotto's, for me. I loved Grotto's back in those days, and still love sitting at their boardwalk bar with a couple of slices, a diet-Coke, a book, and an ocean view. My sister, at the age of sixteen, was the first waitress hired at Rehoboth Beach's Nicola's Pizza speaking of the beach and pizza. Nicola's and Grotto's are still thriving.

It didn't take long to find good pizza in Fort Worth. The Meadowbrook area was fortunate enough to have Charlie's Pizza, a Saturday night family favorite for over twenty years. Charlie retired a few years ago. I miss him, his family, the many friends we made there over the years -- and the pizza. It was the best.

Brick oven, Neopolitan pizza is popular now, and I like it. Cavalli's and Il Cane Rosso, are two good examples in the area, but they are popping up everythere these days.

If an evil food god insisted that, for the rest of your life, you could only eat one of the following three: pizza, hamburgers, or tacos, which would you choose?

I'd take pizza. No question about it.
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9 comments:

Lynn said...

Oh man, that's like asking "which child is your favorite?"

Becca said...

I also LOVE pizza. It is my favorite food. It took us a long time to find good pizza in FW. Il Cane Rosso is probably my fav, we just haven't made it to Cavalli's yet, it's far for people who don't normally leave the downtown/uptown area much.

Jennifer said...

Pizza, no question. That's the one food I could eat during both pregnancies and it can be vegetarian or not. The most perfect comfort food.

Francis Shivone said...

Thanks all, I guess it's unanananimous.

John said...

There were two good pizza joints in my hometown growing up. Both were local and owned by parents of kids I went to school with. You went to one place with your parents and the other on Friday nights with your friends.

Here in Fort Worth our two favorites are Tony's in Bedford and Bellisimo in Colleyville. Tony's is on Harwood in a strip mall close to 121-N. Bellismo is on 26.

I am a fan of traditional pizza with pepperoni, sausage, and mushroom.

Fran, would you eat pineapple on a pizza?

Francis Shivone said...

John -- I seldom have anything but cheese pizza although I do like toppings sometimes.

Pineapple? Hell, no.

Italians traditionally through whatever leftovers they had on the pie, but I think the line was drawn somewhere before pineapple.

BTW, the only bad meal I ever had in Italy was at the Vatican's cafeteria, which was like a bad hospital food.

I have been to Bellisimo.

Ciao.

Anonymous said...

The real question is not whether one would rather only have pizza, tacos, or hamburgers. The really question is whether one would rather only have pizza or ice cream. There's the true dilemma.

Andrew

Francis Shivone said...

Pizza and ice cream? Good hypothetical. I think I would stay with pizza, although there was a time that I would have taken ice cream.

Francis Shivone said...

Correction:

In the following comment statement:

"Italians traditionally through whatever leftovers they had on the pie..."

I used the word "through" instead of "threw."

Weird mistake.