‘Sausage’
Once upon a time, a little place called 800 Degrees decided it could redefine fast-food pizza. Needless to say, it was a success. And that success inevitably led to copycats like Blaze Pizza. Surely this is not a bad thing in general because it will ultimately lead to better or more affordable food, but in the short-run I set out to see if Blaze could deliver (figuratively, of course).
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.
Peppi’s Subs, which has a few locations around Pittsburgh, has a little (big) sandwich called The Roethlisburger (or #7 depending on who you ask). I’m not sure how the sub shop attracted clientele between 1983 and 2004 when Big Ben arrived in Pittsburgh, but I was in no mood to find out when I paid Peppi’s in the Strip District a visit.
As the various neighborhoods of Pittsburgh become more and more gentrified, it’s only inevitable that the hipster vibe that inhabits Lawrenceville will make its way to other parts of the city. One of these areas is Bloomfield, where Bread and Salt Bakery has taken up business in what seems to be a back alley. Replete with a man in cutoff shorts and pizza that is charged by the pound (because obviously everyone knows how much a pound of pizza looks like), the place has become popular for its bread. Which is good, because up until recently that was about all they had to offer on their menu.
In a rare move since moving to Western New York for the summer, I consulted the interwebs to grab a meal at the last-minute. By this I mean that nearly every other spot I’ve hit up so far has been on recommendation from an actual human. On this occasion the interwebs sent me to Savory’s in Hamburg for brunch. We were seated immediately, but not before catching a glimpse of the specials.
How do you know if an ethnic restaurant is authentic? You look inside and see if people resembling that ethnicity are inside. Or, better yet, you let one of them take you there. At least that’s how it went down for me when a Taiwanese friend of mine invited me to Rose Tea Cafe in Squirrel Hill (supposedly the Oakland location isn’t as good) to get some Taiwanese food. Rose Tea Cafe isn’t just some tea house, it’s a full-on restaurant with almost too many options to choose. So we turned to my friend to figure out what to get.
Just a couple of weeks ago, a new pizza place opened in Culver City called Wildcraft. Their schtick is the use of sourdough in their pizzas, which is cool with me, but I’m not sure if it entirely qualifies as being wild. Nonetheless, I was eager to try it out and see just how wild and crafty it would be.