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Sal & Carmine's is amazing!!! I think it's the best slice in the city. It used to be run by 2 crank old italian guys but Salvatore has since passed away. RIP Sal. Not it's just Carmine and a guy who I suspect is a son of one of the namesake. The crust is doughy and chewy in the best of ways. The sauce is good but the cheese is great. The slice is a bit salty but I like it that way. It makes me know that i'm eating pizza with real whole fat cheese and makes me ache for a beer. The back of the joint is dark, quiet and a respite from the streets. I like to get the paper and eat a few slices in silence to get out of the house and take a break from the family. I love this place. Long live S&C's
The Cheap
www.cheapeatery.com -
netmover
Aug 23, 2009 10:51 AM
Can anyone confirm that the legendary Totonno's in Coney Island burned down?
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re: netmover
Jeffsayyes
Sep 28, 2009 03:05 PM
I wonder if people will still line up like they used to....
It's been a long hiatus and the pizza climate has changed quite a bit. At the time, it was my favorite pizza but I will have to go back to compare it again.
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Last night I went to Joe's for a slice and was underwhelmed, given all its rave reviews. It was a good slice, far better than the average, but not GREAT. Then I happened to walk past Bleecker Street Pizza and even though full, couldn't resist the mozzarella slice (I think also called Nona Maria). I was shocked at how delicious it was. Though not DiFara's, it might indeed be the best slice in Manhattan. (They sell pies & they deliver too.)
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I agree that Oxford on 52nd & Lex isn't bad in a pinch. My favourite is Rigoletto on 69th and Columbus. Any comments?
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kcijones001
Oct 17, 2007 01:12 PM
Honestly, if you're willing to go to first and 22nd, try a pizza from franks..But, get a pie, not a slice and order it well done with meatballs....ughhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
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I've got a clear cut winner when it comes to pizza. Friendly Gourmet on the corner of Nassau and Cortlandt. They're only open for lunch during the week. My favorites there are the sausage and pepper pizza and the white pizza.
I'd introduce Friendly Gourmet's pizza to people I used to work with who's favorites were Lombardi's, Grimaldi's, etc. While I converted less than half, even those non-converts admitted that this little storefront shop made great pie.
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I tried Delizia on 73rd and 1st (I know-not midtown) last night and was very impressed. The plain slice was not exceptional but the margarita slice and grandma slice were very very good.
Although not in Manhattan, my favorite is Carmines in Williamsburg off the Graham Ave.
subway stop. It's a perfect slice of pizzeria pizza.
I recently tried pizza33 and thought it was very average. -
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Top 3...
Well, I haven't eaten at all the greats, but I think right now I'd go with DiFara, Patsy's, and then Joe & Pat's down in Staten Island. The first two are relatively easy for me - DiFara is DiFara, and Patsy's is my favorite of the coal-oven pizzerias (the char from coal is a clean, bitter carbon smoke flavor that I think is delicious with the relatively clean tastes of good mozzarella and un-sweet, refreshingly tangy tomato sauce - in an ideal world, it would be coal smoke for pizza, wood smoke for unctuous, salty meat).
Third place is contentious. Totonno's has a mind-shatteringly perfect crust, but their cheese is kind of stringy and flavorless, and their sauce, while adequate, doesn't have enough flavor to make up for the cheese. If you want toppings on your pie, Totonno's gets a huge boost and might be 3rd, because the flavorless cheese is less of a liability when you've got sausage, peppers, and onions on there. But I ultimately live and die by the plain cheese pie, so Totonno's probably doesn't even make my top 5. If you love a good crust, though - hey...
I think Grimaldi's makes a great pie - good basic sauce, good cheese, nice coal char on the crust. But their pies are frequently a little soggy, and they can be inconsistent. Still, a strong contender for 3rd. Picturesque location under the Brooklyn Bridge, sort of a friendly bustle to the place (which is unfortunately almost as overcrowded as DiFara), and really good cannoli all add to the picture.
L&B Spumoni Gardens is a fantastic place. Their round pie is nothing special, but I think their square slices are very good. But it's a very different aesthetic than most pizza around the city - they are fluffy and kind of sweet and tangy, with a delightfully crunchy bottom; the presence of cheese is almost subliminal. When you consider the whole experience of heading down there on a summer's Saturday afternoon for a couple of squares and a cup of spumoni, eating it under the red awning on the sidewalk surrounded by kids' sports teams and families, the place ranks right up there. But removed from context and soberly considered by itself, their pizza is not up to par at this sanctified level of competition. So L&B might be my 3rd favorite pizzeria in the city, but it's definitely not my 3rd favorite slice.
I have high hopes for Lucali - I like the place a lot - but I ate there again last night and the crust just isn't up to snuff. Their tomato sauce is delicious, and their cheese is impeccable (the guy who owns the place took his cheese cues from Dom). But the crust isn't quite what it should be. A little doughy and not very flavorful, almost no char. It picks up some flavor from the wood smoke in the oven, but not enough. I think maybe the pies I've had there have just been undercooked - a few more minutes in a wood-smoke filled brick oven might edge them closer to perfection - but they seem to be that way kind of consistently. Anyhow, it's a shame, since they nail the sauce and cheese; if they can work the kinks out of the crust, this will be a really legendary pizza place, possibly vaulting to #2. But for right now, the puffy, flavor-deprived crust keeps this place out of my top 3. I hope they read this and take it into consideration. Maybe next time I go I'll ask for my pizza "well-done". In fact, that seems like a really great idea - I'll have to try it ASAP.
Anyhow, all of these places are extremely good, but at least this week I'm going with Joe & Pat's cracker-thin plain cheese pies. This place is the opposite of Totonno's; if you like a lot of toppings on your pizza, you're out of luck. But if you like a plain cheese slice, maybe with a sprinkling of oregano or some pepper flakes, this pizza is excellent. They have a gas oven - no smoke - but their pies are so thin that they can cook them at a really high temperature without producing uneven cooking. As such, they can get just the right amount of charring every single time. The chewy-crackery crust is delicate enough that their thin layer of high-quality mozzarella provides just the right balance (on a thicker crust, you'd have to add more cheese, and would need to move to something slightly less rich). And the sauce is very good. A word of warning - this is a pizza that won't survive cooling and reheating. But it's in Staten Island, so I doubt many people will find themselves in the position of trying to get one to go. And the slices are so thin and delicate that you could be about to burst and still put away a quarter of a pie (it's wafer thin!), so leftovers should never be necessary. Adding to the pizzeria's rank (but not to the slice's), there's an Italian bakery about a block down the road that has some of the best cannoli in the city.
I'll mention one or two other things, as long as I'm unburdening myself of pizza opinions. I went to Nick's out in Forest Hills the other night, and convinced myself to get a pizza instead of one of their outstanding sausage calzones. I'm glad I did - they just about nailed it. I went with half cheese, half sausage and peppers (because I like the sausage they use there quite a bit). The sausage and peppers were very good. The cheese surprised me - I remember this place having really good cheese, but this was almost Totonno's-ish, kind of stringy and not quite as flavorful as it should have been. But still pretty good, and when you combine that with a very good tomato sauce and a PERFECT crust, the result was the best pie I've ever had there. In the past, their pies have been a little on the soggy side, but this crust was crispy-chewy like a crust from Joe & Pat's, and had a great char to it. Maybe they overcooked it? Maybe this is more evidence that I need to start ordering my pies well-done? Whatever it means, it was a phenomenal pizza. And then for dessert I had a good espresso (served, charmingly, with a vinegar-shaker full of sambucca) and their tasty-if-incorrect cannoloid. I cannot in good conscience call it a good cannoli (it does too many things very wrong), but I insist on calling it good (it's very tasty!), so I am forced to call it a cannoloid, which I think rolls off the tongue a little easier than quasi-cannoli or pseudo-cannoli. Not a contender for top 3, but worthy of mention.
I've also found myself in the neighborhood of Columbia quite a bit recently, which has meant visits to Sal & Carmine's. When I first ate there, years ago, I was unimpressed. But the place is really growing on me. Their crust is doughy, which for some of these places I've mentioned is a bad thing, but here it's definitely a good thing. Most street slices use the crust as an edible means of conveying a bunch of hot greasy cheese to your mouth. And that's cool - that's cool. But, while the pizza at Sal & Carmines IS street pizza, with a bunch of hot greasy cheese ready to be conveyed mouthward, the crust here is recognizably bread-related. It's doughy, chewy, and actually quite delicious, good dense freshly made flatbread that happens to be part of a pizza but which would be good on its own. And about that mass of hot greasy cheese - it strikes you at first like all the others, but about 3 chews in it melts in your mouth into a delicious, creamy cloud of cheesiness, like a bite of freshly-made mozzarella cheese. Which is NOT something that most street pizza does. Anyway, this place still doesn't stand up to the heavy hitters of the outer boroughs, but I think it's moved up to join Patsy's in my top 3 list in Manhattan. I don't know what the third would be. Right now, probably some fancy "Authentic Neapolitan Style" pie, but I'm hoping that maybe Adrienne's downtown can bump it off - I've heard good things about their grandmother slice.
Note: I've made no mention of Lombardi's or John's. I just wanted to make explicit the fact that this was not an oversight on my part.
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re: kathryn
I'm glad someone approves! It's such a touchy subject.
Joe's is sort of half and half. I've never been blown away by their pizza. Various sources suggest that this has to do with the time of day, or the time of week, or who knows what, but if I can't go there any time it's open and get a great slice, the place loses a lot of its appeal. That said, you can go there any time and get a pretty good slice, and that's worth a lot to me. If I lived anywhere near the place, I'm sure I'd be a regular. I definitely prefer their pizza to John's, and possibly to Lombardi's. But I don't really consider it a "destination pie", as I do the others I mentioned; I wouldn't travel more than about 5 minutes out of my way for a slice there, whereas I'd spend a whole day going up to New Haven, or two hours waiting in line for a slice at DiFara.
In other words, I left Joe's off my list without meaning any disrespect. It's great for what it is, I just don't think it's one of "The Great Pizzas of New York City". Whereas, with Lombardi's and John's, disrespect was definitely part of the package deal.
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re: netmover
The Chowhound Team
Nov 23, 2007 06:20 AM
NYC is divided into two boards - Manhattan and Outer Boroughs, so threads that cover both, such as this one, belong here on The Best board, which covers the greater NYC area, including the Tristate area.
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DIFARA in BROOKLYN !!! top of the pops- got to go to new haven or napoli to do any better- made by the master!!! ave j and east 15th in midwood brooklyn- it's just downhill after that- in manhattan, try Patsy's upper east side (lower harlem)- great, and totonno's in coney island is pretty good. dom dimarco (difara) is the man...
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ballulah
Dec 6, 2006 10:03 PM
Two Boots is kind of good-bad pizza, if anyone knows what I mean by that. It lures you in with that wonderful garlic smell that stretches around the block...and then doesn't quite deliver when you bite into it, and yet it's enjoyable. Dunno.
Not sure if there's an outpost of Bravo Pizza in that area, but their fresh mozarella slice is always delicious...and I see more and more Bravos around and about. I believe there's one on 42nd near 5th Ave.
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Lombardis on Spring, Awesome
Joes on 6th Ave, Awesome
There is some place in Alphabet City that is pumping out some individual pies that are as delicious as they are expensive.
You cant go wrong with pizza 33 at 33rd and 3rd
Johns in the thater district is not to shabby either, same with the Tottonos that are all over town. -
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Cheese Boy
Nov 11, 2006 04:02 AM
I had Patsy's tonight. (1AV/117th). First slice was delish, second slice not as delish. Second slice was from a different pie and was a tad undercooked (almost no char). Still good though IMO. I was there around 5:30-ish, and it was busy. We have to make allowances when they're rushed I suppose.
Midtown decent Pizza places:
Two Boots (GCT) is pretty good.
And for Sicilian [squares] I like Royal Pizza (3AV/ 38th-39th sts).›5 Replies-
re: Cheese Boy
I dont undertand what people in NYC like about Two Boots pizza. I've heard it recommended time and time again over the 5 yrs I've been here and will never get it.....I think its some of the worst pizza I've had in NYC. I mean this is a city with places like Lombardi's......Two Boots tastes like the stuff I'd get for delivery in San francisco. And that corn meal on the bottom is a terrible texture in my opinion.
Can someone explain to me what I'm missing? I work very close to the one on Bleeker so I've tried it more than a few times now. And every tme I've regretted it.
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re: Nehna
I hear you, but that's the only place where I don't mind the cornmeal (usually I hate it) on the bottom. maybe it's cause it detracts from how spicy their sauce is. But I do love the perrpeoni pizza, sorry.
If you're in Queens, go to the New Park Pizzeria in Howard Beach on Cross Bay Blvd. right of the Belt. It's the stuff movies are made about, real NY pizza. -
re: Nehna
That cornmeal baffled me, too. But then I tried the pizza at Full Moon, in the Bronx. Not a world-beating pizza; very good, but not Great. BUT, they used a fine-ground cornmeal (actually, come to think of it, it might have been semolina) in the same way as Two Boots, and the crust was fantastic - the best part of that particular pie. So, that cornmeal addition can be great; but I agree, for me it doesn't click at Two Boots.
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re: ratatosk
Striver
Jan 2, 2008 05:53 AM
Full Moon is consistently good - and occasionally, like the sicilian slice with eggplant fresh out of the oven which I had last week, outstanding. If you're in the Arthur Ave nabe and looking for pizza, this place and Roberto's new trattoria "Zero Otto Nove", which has a brick wood-burning oven and does Salerno-style pizzas, would be good places to try.
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re: Nehna
Two Boots is very different from the others. Not that it's wonderful, but it's almost in a different food group, so comparisons are difficult. The taste and texture is something you either like or don't, but it's not really the same category- any more than a slice of Sicilian would be. Certainly, it's worth a try for those who haven't.
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frenetica
Nov 10, 2006 07:53 PM
I'm actually eating a slice or margherita right now from Brick Oven Pizza 33 and it's incredibly awesome!!
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By no means am I saying that my following suggestion is the Best in NYC, but mid-town east isn't the greatest neighborhood for pizza, so I'd say the Two Boots in Grand Central may be a good bet.
And the best in the city is... Joes!
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Well, I went to dinner at John's on Bleeker last night for the first time.
My friend and I ordered one pie:
half plain
half meatballs, pepperoni, peppers, onions, and mushrooms.The plain was fine. It was nicely charred/crispy and the sauce was not overly sweet or tangy. I found it was just right. The cheese tasted good and wasn't too stringy when bitten into.
We both started on the plain, and by the time we got into the topped slices, they had cooled off considerably. The slices became slightly bogged down and were somewhat soggy. I think I'll save the topping overload to deep dish pies from Uno's or the like.
I enjoyed the plain slices very much and the topped ones slightly less. My friend and I both hadn't had pizza in quite a while, so we didn't have any memories to recall for a basis of comparison.
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Not sure if you're must looking in midtown or in general. Here's a thread (there are many others) on best pizza in the city: http://www.chowhound.com/topics/show/...
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re: Lucia
netmover
Nov 10, 2006 07:02 PM
best in the city...I just happened to be marooned in east mid-town with a craving for a good slice. Not much looked worthy of wolfing on Lex or 3rd Ave in the upper 40's to mid 50's...so I went for the tried and true burrito. I do need to kn ow the best destinations for pizza wherever they may be in the Big Apple...please give me your Top parlours.
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