On my way to a coffee shop to get some writing done, a friend and passer-by rode up beside me to get a quick pizza suggestion.  He was hungry, and short on time and required a slice or two.  No time for ordering a whole pie.  (We were on bikes btw)

This conversation spurred a prompt brain fart.  I have readily given suggestions on where to go for the best pizza pie in the city, but this dude needed a quick slice, and it was 5:30pm, so Jo Jo’s is out of the question.

What is the best, any-time quick stop for a slice of pizza in the city?  Feeling like I failed a friend, I threw out the usual names;  Piccola’s, Vito’s, Mary Angela’s.  How typical.  Oh Richmond I have failed thee.

After I get some suggestions from yous guys, my next task is to find the best pizza by the slice so I can lead my friends in the right direction.

*Jo Jo’s does not qualify since they operate on special hours.

-gRant

There two different ways to get pizza…GOOD pizza. You can order a nice pizza pie or you can stop off at a local joint and grab a couple slices and a soda.

The latter, is always a painless, quick process, but you often don’t get to experience the restaurant’s best pizza the way it was meant to be consumed. Single slices are often left out up to 20-30 minutes at a time and then thrown back into the oven for a couple minutes to reheat.

Generally, pizza is resilient enough to still retain its best qualities even when served in this manner…especially at Jo Jo’s Pizza on 12th and Main St. The absolute best pizza by the slice in the city.

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This is pretty cool, and the app actually looks pretty well designed.  I don’t have an iPhone but if I did I would definitely mess around and stretch some pizzas out.

I actually remember a few years back, Everquest 2 added a “/pizza” command that players could use in-game to order pizza without picking up a phone or logging out of the game.

Friday usually means waking up late for work because you’ve already treated Thursday night like Friday night.  It also means knocking off work early and saving space in your stomach for a pizza fix later that night.

This is exactly what I did today.  A friend and I went up to Tarrantino’s, part of Tarrant’s cafe, only to find that they are expanding the restaurant into their old pizza parlor space.  We had to make do with standing in the way of dining patrons while we waited for our pizza.

After Andy’s pleasant experience at with their pizza, I decided to give it another go around.  Half cheese, half pepperoni.

A good friend of mine has a terrible disease.  Worse than AIDS*.  She’s allergic to wheat.   Technically I think she has a wheat gluten allergy, but either way, she can’t consume anything with wheat in it.  This means no bread, no wheat beers, and no pizza!  My God…

She caught wind of this blog and told me she’d make a delicious wheat-free pizza for us to eat, and for me to humiliate on here.

I have to say, as much as I’d love to dog the rice based pizza crust on Pamparius, my obligations to provide a truthful account of my experiences prevent me from doing so.  I say this reluctantly… It was good.

If you’ve been reading, you may have noticed that I’ve mentioned the New York based pizza blog, Slice.  It’s probably my favorite food blog out there, as it not only covers NY pizza, but its staff of writers is frequently aloof across the states to tell us about the best pizza joints in some cool cities.

I noticed one of their writers is also a contributor to the New York Times; a very popular food writer by the name of Ed Levine.  He wrote this book which I hastily ordered.  [hint: click more for more!]

The pizza blogosphere is apparently a small, small world. Introducing Pizzalicious Blog. Another local bunch of pizza fans.  They gave us a nod over their way so we figured to do the same.  More importantly they posted some killer live footage of Turbonegro playing Age of Pamparius.

Now what the fuck is this? Pepicellis.  Are you kidding me?  This place is getting a Mulligan but it really doesn’t deserve it.  Ashland, VA has this block party a few times every summer and my good man Joel peaked my interest when he heard me rattling about pizza.  He informed me that there would be a few food vendors at the block party and Pepicellis would probably be selling slices.  Well, they had a food table set up, but I paid for a load of trash.  The pizza was hotboxed and obviously I didn’t expect them to have an oven hooked up in the middle of the street, but they were serving up $2 slices that were pretty similar in style to a Papa John’s thin crust, only not good.

I was pretty let down off the bat, but my buddy was even more disappointed.  He couldn’t even believe that’s what they were serving.  He said it was nothing like their normal pizza.  I did some looking on their website, and the few pictures I can find featuring their pie, looked night and day different from what I ate.  For a local place, they were definitely serving up a product that screamed chain pizzeria.  I wouldn’t be surprised if they ordered 150 thincrust pies from Dominoes to save themselves the trouble of cooking for the entire population of Ashland, which probably around 6000.

Not a great first impression.  Will I make the trip back and dine in?  There is a microbrew store up the street so chances are, if the pizza sucks on round 2, I can at least score some sweet booze.

2/10.

If you read my post a couple days ago you learned that I was attempting a no-pizza diet for the week; trying to make it to the weekend without eating my heart stopping favorites.  Well, my roommate came home with a pizza from 8 1/2 and the aroma filling the house was too much for my salivating glands.

I ordered two pies: 1 red Pepperoni and 1 red Green Pepper/Mushroom

As I walked in, noticed one of the employees rushing to the oven and removing a charred disc of pizza with what looked to be my green pepper pizza.  I also noticed a box sitting on top of the oven, a pepperoni pizza, waiting to be consumed.  I would have to wait for another pizza to be made while letting my other pie go uneaten for ten extra unnecessary minutes.

Worried that my precious pepperoni pie would suffer in quality, I raced home, driving faster than one should be through Richmond’s Fan, praying that I’d not hit any red lights.

How was the pie?

STILL. AWESOME. (pics after the break)

Last night we celebrated the birth of a friend with some good company and a few home-made pizzas, courtesy of Sykes, the birthday girl.  She used some dough from Trader Joe’s which ended up being too cripy and tough.  Its difficult to make a good pizza in a conventional oven.  I forget what was on them, but she did everything herself, and we devoured them in no time.

Happy birthday Sykes! -gRant

Here is some hi-tech mozzarella shit. Now you can make your own cheese as soon as you buy silos.

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