The Good Pie, December 2010.

Having the day off to take care of some personal business and having completed that business early, I asked my wife and part-time pizza eater if she would like to go out for lunch.  To my surprise she not only said yes, but she suggested that we go to The Good Pie and check out their lunch specials (see previous visit here).  So we did.  I believe the lunch specials run Monday thru Friday 11A.M. to 1:30P.M. but recommend calling ahead to make sure.

We squeaked in just under the wire, I think it was 1:29 when we sat down.  My fellow pizza eater ordered the pizza del giorno (daily special) with a chopped salad.  The chopped salad had a creamy garlicky dressing (made with raw egg, so maybe the same as the Caesar) romaine lettuce, olives and pepper rings.  Spinach pizza was the daily special, it had spinach, garlic and pecorino (cheese).  I believe it also had olive oil.  The bite of chopped salad I had was excellent, On my next visit I will have to get it.  The spinach pizza wasn't bad either, but due to a traumatic childhood event, not something I would ever order for my self.  I ordered the salami pizza and Caesar salad. As with my previous visit the Caesar salad was excellent.  The salami pizza had tomato, Genoa salami and fresh mozzarella.  On my previous visit my pizza seemed a little wet, at the time I suspected it was the buffalo mozzarella (there water buffalo you know!), so I made sure I got fresh mozzarella.  My salami pizza was great.  The tip of the slice still needed some support when they first brought, but after it cooled slightly it could hold it's own.  I know I just said my pie was great, but that really doesn't do it justice,  it was probably one of the best pizza's I've ever eaten. 

On that note I don't feel I can add anything else worthwhile.  So do your self a favor, open your mind and eat some pizza from The Good Pie.

Highly Recommended.
Chief Pizza Eater.
GAW

Shakespeare's Pizza, November 2010.

I have been traveling to and from my hometown a lot over the last few weeks and every trip takes me through Columbia, MO home of a couple of great pizza joints.  One of which just won Good Morning America's Favorite Collage Hangout.  Shakespeare's Pizza has a strong following,  I recently posted on CityProfile.com, the question "What's your favorite pizza joint?" and Shakespeare's Pizza keeps popping up as the answer. I last checked out Shake's about 1 year ago, you can see it here.

Today I could no longer just drive through Columbia and stopped at the new(er) Shakes way out west located at 3304 Broadway Business Park Court.  I brought 2 dinner salads ( lettuce, cheddar cheese, sprouts, tomato and red onions) and 2 Medium pizza's (one with pepperoni, Canadian bacon, hamburger and onions, the second the same just no onions).

As on my previous visit the pizza was great, maybe even a little better.  The staff at the way out west location were very friendly and it was defiantly easier for me to collect the pizza and go than the downtown location.  But the downtown location probably has more character, especially dining-in.

Highly Recommended.
Chief Pizza Eater.
GAW

P.S.  I was having some trouble with the white balance so the photos aren't the greatest.

The Good Pie: Pizzeria Napoletana

The Good Pie:  Pizzeria Napoletana.

3137 Olive Street Saint Louis, MO 63103 (map link);  (614)289-9391;  http://www.thegoodpie.com/

Pizza Style: Neapolitan.
Oven type: Wood.
The Skinny:  Neapolitan Pizza in St Louis.
Price: $9.50 (marinara) to $16.50 (prosciutto arugula)
Chief Pizza eater says:  Highly Recommended.

The Good Pie has been on my to do list for the past couple of years, but only just recently did I manage to try it.  In celebration of our 12th wedding anniversary my wife suggested I choose a pizza place for dinner, and The Good Pie was it.

The Good Pie is not your typical family pizza joint,  If you want a pepperoni and bacon pizza or a sausage and mushroom pizza with a pitcher of beer you might be disappointed.  As the names says, The Good Pie is a "Pizzeria Napoletana",  and myself being a Neapolitan Pizza neophyte I won't try to explain what goes into using that title, but will suggest you follow the link for a better idea.  I will say that the pizza's are somewhat simple in that they have few toppings and cooked at very high temperatures in a wood fired oven.  The menu has only 12 pizza's, including the daily special and the only additions or substitutions allowed are the addition of  Buffalo Mozzarella or a large farm fresh egg.

On our visit my wife (and part-time pizza eater) stared with the White Anchovy Panzanella from the appetizers.  It has a bed of greens (arugula?), croutons, olive oil, pesto and the white anchovy's.  The white anchovy's are nothing like the brown, briny bits you find at the supermarket and on most anchovy pizza's with the exception that they are both fish.  Don't get me wrong I like those brown briny bits, just in moderation.  The white anchovy's had a mellow taste and the dish as a whole was very good.  I ordered a Caesar Salad, it had romaine lettuce, Pecorino cheese and egg.  The menu states also that the dressing is made with raw eggs (just so you know).  I can't describe exactly what it was but, I believe my Caesar salad was the best I have ever had.  On my next visit I will add the white anchovy.  If they didn't serve pizza I would still return for the Caesar salad.

We ordered 2 pizza's the first was the Funghi, with roasted mushroom, taleggio (cheese), fresh mozzarella and herbs.  The second was The Good Pie with tomato, buffalo mozzarella and basil (same as the Margherita with exception of the buffalo mozzarella).  I believe both pies had a drizzle of olive oil.  The pizza's were about 12 inches and were served un-cut, each came with a pizza wheel.  Before I get any further, I should remind you that I know little or nothing about Neapolitan pizza other than what I may have read,  so...  As you can see from the photo above the crust on both pizza's had a nice char.  After cut, both pizza's where very limp at the tip, kind of needed to be folded back on it's self to keep the topping from falling off.  The Good Pie seemed to be a bit wet, I'm not sure if it was from the buffalo mozzarella or the tomato's, but even so I was quite good.  In the future I would probably order the Margherita over The Good Pie, as I suspect it was the cheese adding the extra wetness.  Although the Funghi needed to be folded up it didn't appear to have the same wetness going on as The Good Pie.  The Funghi with it's extra cheese and roasted mushrooms was very different experience and also very good.  The end crust (cornicione) was excellent all on it's own, so much so that  I wish I had ordered the pizza bianca (fresh bread) to start the meal off, next time.

Although not pictured we did get dessert, an order of salted caramel gelato.  When I ordered it our waitress response was "you know it's salted right?".  That may have been meant to warn us, as it had a lot of salt, really, a lot of salt.  I found it a interesting combination, but one I don't think I would try again.

Over all I had a very positive visit to The Good Pie, the food and service were both very good.  As I wrote this review I kept coming back to the fact that I really don't know much about Neapolitan Pizza and that I really need second point of reference, so I give my recommendation with a little bit of trepidation.  So until I can find a better Neapolitan pizza in St Louis, I Highly Recommend The Good Pie.  If you know of another location for Neapolitan pizza let me know I'm interested.

Highly Recommended.

Chief Pizza Eater.
GAW

East Coast Pizza.

Late lunch at East Coast Pizza. A slice of Meaty, a slice of pepperoni and a ice tea.

Chief Pizza Eater.

GAW

Location : 17304 Chesterfield Airport Rd, Chesterfield, MO 63005,

12th Anniversary.

Dinner at The Good Pie. More later.

Highly Recommended.

Chief Pizza Eater

GAW

Location : 3139 Olive St, St Louis, MO 63103,

Domino's Pizza

I have what I will call an open work schedule.  Most days I get off work at 5 P.M. others I might not leave work until 8 or 9 P.M.  Sometimes I know the day before others I find out the same afternoon.  I found myself in the later situation not to long ago.  So if I want to eat dinner (supper) before 9 or 10 P.M., and I do, I must source food from the local eateries.  It must also be delivered, so that narrows down my options.

On this most recent occasion I choose Domino's Pizza, one of the Big Guys.  I ordered pizza and payed for it on-line (it brings my human interaction level to a new low).  I seemed to have had the New Domino's pizza earlier this year (just didn't blog about it for some reason) so I ordered a thin crust (St Louis style?) with pepperoni, Canadian Bacon, hamburger, onions and mozzarella cheese.  It turned out to be a pretty good pizza, certainly better than I might have expected.  The thin crust was crispy and a little flaky,  much better that the New Crust as it doesn't have any of the fake buttery stuff.

Recommended But,  only if you are stuck at work, low on cash, can't go out to get a better pizza, and you are really hungry.  Plus you have to get the thin crust.  Do they offer the thin crust outside of the St Louis area??

The Chief Pizza Eater.
GAW

The Haus Pizzeria and Bar

The Haus Pizzeria and Bar

14815 Clayton Rd Chesterfield, MO 63017 (map link);  (636)385-5919;  www.thehausstl.com

Pizza Style: Thin
Oven type: Gas.
The Skinny:  Great Pizza with a Style all their own.
Price: $8.99 (12" cheese) to $18.69 (16" Specialty pizza)
Chief Pizza eater says:  Highly Recommended.

A few weeks back I decided it was time for Pizza.  Believe it or not, that's a very tough decision for me to make.  Probably the hardest part is deciding where to go,  we (St. Louis area) have so many great pizza places that it can cause great mental anguish for me just to pick a place.  I've seen several great pizza joints close in the past few years so I try to spread the love around and keep it close to home also.

So after much thought I decided to get pizza from The Haus Pizzeria and Bar,  I had had both a good pizza and a good conversation with the owner from there during my Binge 2010  and wanted to try it again.

We started with a Garden Salad, which comes with lettuce, carrots, black olives, tomatoes, sliced bell peppers, chedder & mozzarella cheeses.  Not only was The regular size salad very good it was also more than ample for two adults and one child.

We ordered 2 pizza's the first was a thin crust half cheese and half Zesto Pesto.  The Zesto Pesto has chicken, mushrooms, artichoke hearts, pesto sauce and mozzarella cheese.  Both of my fellow pizza eaters thought the Zesto Pesto was excellent.   Although not the kind of pizza I would order for my self, I also enjoyed a slice of Zesto Pesto.  The Cheese pizza was well accepted also.  What little was left over of the two was gone before I could get to them the next day,  they had to be good for the girls not to leave me any.

The second pizza was a "Thicker Crust" with pepperoni, Canadian bacon, hamburger and red onions.  Yeah, I know I'm pretty predictable.  I have to be honest here,  I'm not a big note taker, never have been, so I'm writing this from memory and it has been at least a month maybe longer since I ate the pizza. That being said what I remember most was that I was in a happy place while eating this pizza.  The crust brought a flood of memory's from my childhood.  Although the pizza from The Haus is assembled and cut slightly different from the pizza of my childhood the crust is very similar, and was really bringing back great memory's.  I keep going on about the crust, but the pizza as a whole was very good, and I know I say this all the time, but it was truly a struggle to close the box and not just eat the whole thing in one sitting.  I normally take several photos throughout the eating process of the crust and such, but I was put a little off balance by the flash back and never photos beyond the unveiling.

I'm sure that there will be those that can't put the pizza into one of their well defined category's (New York, St Louis, Chicago, etc.) and won't like it, but if you don't try it you will never know, maybe it will bring a flood of memory's to you also.  What more can I say?

Highly Recommended.

Chief Pizza Eater.
GAW