LA has never been and will never be known as prime destination in the world of pizza. Sure, there are some great spots for a variety of pies, but there is no such thing as LA-style pizza. Nonetheless, LA does its best to make transplants from other pizza cities happy. Take, for example, Masa of Echo Park, which dishes out some of the deepest dishes this side of Chicago.

Moreover, they have a pizza that may as well have been invented for unvegans like me. Simply put, it’s called Lots of Meat and is chock full of pepperoni and sausage, with everything else that makes a real Chicago-style deep dish pizza.

Upon opening the box (my buddy picked up the pie), I was impressed to find that while the pepperoni adhered to the Chicago law of toppings under sauce, the sausage did not. In fact, instead of bits of sausage, there was an entire thick layer of sausage on top of the rest of the pizza. This was both fascinating and delicious. What was especially delicious about is was that it gave the eater (me) an opportunity to appreciate each distinct flavor without them all blurring together. As for the non, meat, my only complaint is that at times the sauce was more like a pile of stewed tomatoes than an actual sauce. If you like whole tomatoes that’s great, but if your saucy like me you may find yourself plucking out some tomatoes.

Either way, Masa of Echo Park was a delicious taste of the Midwest and did not fail in delivering a real deep dish pizza.

Oh the park at Echo Park. While it is unquestionably a Mecca for local Hispanic family picnics, it is also unquestionably working hard to attract the local hipsters. Hence, Square One at the Boathouse exists literally in the boathouse where people can rent paddle boats and serves up some good-looking if not exciting-looking food.

I chose the Organic Hot Dog on a Wheat Bun, which is clearly not a cluster of words that I enjoy uttering, but I do like hot dogs so whatevs. Plus I ordered the chorizo chili and cheddar cheese on top so there’s that. Oh and the Hand Cut Fries.

The hot dog began in disappointment, as apparently the chili and cheese included onions. They were diced so it was extra hard to take them out, but that I did. Then, the whole wheat bun completely failed to hold together so I was left with a very difficult eating situation, but eat I did. And it turned out the flavors were all there. The hot dog was nicely grilled with a solid snap, while the chili had a good kick and the cheddar was white.

The big winner, though, was the fries. I don’t know if these were fried in crack but they were potentially some of the greatest straight up fries I’ve ever had. I wish I could explain why, but really can’t say besides the fact that they were perfectly fried, perfectly salted and apparently being hand cut had something to do with them as well.

For a meal in the park, Square One at the Boathouse is not bad, but not especially great either. However, for a place to grab some fries as a snack, holy crap this place is amazing.

Down the street from my halfway home in Echo Park is a little spot called Trencher, serving a variety of sandwiches and salads. Normally this would sound boring, but Trencher actually has some pretty interesting options, like the Consigliere and a Fried Chicken Banh Mi. I, however, had my sights set on a different fried chicken sandwich.

It’s called The Coupe and consists of a gluten-free fried chicken breast, spicy pickle slaw, sriracha aioli and a kaiser roll. The kaiser roll is, of course, fully glutenous, leading me to wonder why the chicken would not be, but with all the madness in this world I decided to save my questioning for another day. I ordered without the slaw and was happy to have the house-made chips as my side.

Despite the gluten-free breast, the fried chicken was actually pretty good. Not amazing, but certainly unique in flavor. The sriracha aioli was a nice touch, adding some extra flavor, moisture and a slight kick. And the roll was, well, rolly. I should say that in two feedings at Trencher eating The Coupe both times, one experience was far better than the other. Why? You ask. Well one time they clearly accidentally threw on the slaw and removed it, leaving the awful tangy flavor of pickle behind.

So while a perfectly executed Coupe is something to write home about, the quality control is not quite there.

In LA, the word Rodeo usually means one thing: a shopping street in Beverly Hills. Sometimes it means another random street on the west side and occasionally it means the thing with cowboys and stuff. Almost never does it mean dinner, unless you happen to find yourself strolling along Sunset in Echo Park and stepping into the first divey Mexican place you can find that just so happens to go by the name of Rodeo.

The place had the interior and menu that you could find in dozens of other Mexican places around LA, so I ordered the same thing I would order in any of them – a Burrito Enchilado Plate. This is just fancy Mexi-speak for a wet burrito. I filled mine with carne asada, but it also came stuffed with rice, beans, onions and cilantro, with beans and rice on the side. I wanted no part of the onions, then chose to get mine topped with both green and red salsa because I had never heard of such a thing before and the counter man recommended it.

The result was a pretty solid burrito. In fact, it met pretty much every expectation I had for such a spot. In no way did it amaze me (aside from all the colors!), but it also didn’t let me down at all. This is not the kind of place to rush out and eat, but if you’re in the neighborhood it will get the job done. Especially if the job is to make your burrito both green AND red.

As I walked towards The Echo in Echo Park for a night of dancing to soul music, I passed a little joint called Two Boots Pizza and just knew that by the time the night had ended their pizza would make its way into my extensive digestive system. So when the wee hours of the morning found me stepping out of The Echo, I stepped right into Two Boots and got a looksie at what they had to offer. Although they sold whole pies, a quick look at their slices told me I would be ordering by the slice. These slices were some of the most unique I had seen in a long time, perhaps in forever.

Named for icons like The Dude, The Newman and Cleopatra Jones, each slice had a unique feel to it that may not have embodied the icon it was named for, but still carried a heavy dose of creativity. After perusing, the girlfriend and I settled on a slice of The Dude (described as “Our Cajun Bacon Cheeseburger Pie: tasso [ham], andouille [sausage], ground beef, cheddar, & mozzarella”). And, for a little spice we got The Slayer, which happened to be the special of the night. This one was topped with buffalo chicken, tasso ham, andouille sausage, spicy marinara, jalapeno pesto and a sprinkling of diced jalapenos. Each slice ran me $3.75 and after a few minutes in the reheating over, they were ready to get devoured.

As soon as I bit into both slices, my mouth was very happy I did. Not only were these slices creative, but they also were well-thought out rather than just being s smorgasbord of toppings on a pizza. The Dude had just the right balance of cheddar and mozzarella, and although a more even distribution of meats would have been nice, said meats were tasty and worked well with each other. Let’s get back to that cheddar for a moment. I must say that while mozzarella is the ultimate pizza cheese, cheddar is certainly not a bad choice. It definitely worked well with the ground beef and I wouldn’t mind a little more pizza experimentation that brings in non-Italian cheeses.

Now onto The Slayer. This slice, although pretty spicy at times, never made me feel like my mouth was on fire. Each time I took a heavy jalapeno bite, there was a nice little buffer bite I could tackle to make myself feel better. This was good, because while the spicier bites covered up the taste of the meat a bit, the other bites allowed me to take in the full flavor of this triple meat pizza.

The bottom line is that Two Boots Pizza was a pretty awesome stop. Perhaps it’s not the kind of place for those snobby pizza aficionados who only wish to eat margherita pizzas, but for anyone looking for unique flavors in pizza form, Two Boots is good place to find yourself.