jet's pizza

ok i'm so hungry right now and i need to go grocery shopping so i am really wondering why am i writing a post for a food blog right now, and especially a post for THE BEST FUCKING PIZZA EVER???  something is wrong with me.

jet's pizza is amazing.  somehow in growing up in michigan i totally missed what everyone tells me is a michigan food staple but no, i never had it.  it is classic detroit style square pizza.  i have been a lifelong buddy's pizza fan and i have to tell you, jet's is better than buddy's.  yes.  you read that right.

eat me

the amazingness of jet's is limitless.  so first of all it is like the best, crunchiest, butteriest crust ever.  then there is the fact that they pile on the exact right amount of gooey delicious cheese and zesty sauce.  and the toppings are ridic.  it does not hurt that the first time i had jet's pizza it was covered in bacon.  but i have since had it with other toppings and still feel the same way.

and in the interest of science (ha) i ate buddy's pizza covered in bacon right after i ate jet's pizza covered in bacon and it was not as good.  the crust is less flavorful and the sauce is disproportionate, and also buddy's has always had this problem where like the toppings and sauce pretty much only hit the middle third to half of the pizza, and you have way too much plain crust.

moving on to other menu items, they have super delicious cheesy bread sticks and super delicious boneless wings and the most fucking amazing ranch sauce you have ever had in your life which is reportedly made in house and which annette tells me you will never eat again if you know what is in it, and i do not know what is in it and do not plan to find out so i can happily gorge myself on it until the end of time and/or until i die of a corotted artery (or however you spell that) (and what the hell is a corotted artery anyway?  is this one of those things that i just made up in my head?).

clearly the ranch sauce has already gone to my brain.  eat jet's pizza immediately.  that is all.

the best pizza in cincinnati is back!

any extremely dedicated stragglers who still happen to read this blog will remember how obsessed i was with pizza night (so obsessed, in fact, that i refused to even write about it until it was over. you can read about it on my forkheartknife post... scroll down a ways). i mentioned in that post that they were going to be opening a restaurant.

well the heavens have parted and the glory of heaven is shining down upon us because a tavola is (hopefully) going to actually open soon! apparently things took longer than expected (including the delivery of a specially made wood burning italian pizza oven). they are going to be in the space on vine street next to where abigail street is supposed to open.

baby jesus must really love me because i happened to run into bill on one of my obsessive forkheartknife runs recently and he invited me to come to a tasting night they were doing. the space is still under construction but they wanted to do a test run of some of their pizzas and cocktails.

i think my tastebuds must have some type of memory loss issue because DAMN that pizza was good, so fucking good, i forgot how good. that night i had the margherita, a prosciutto/smoked gouda/caraway seed miracle, bill's awesome homemade sausage, mushroom, and maybe one or two others which i am blanking on. it's like the opposite of childbirth... your body makes you forget how fucking amazing the pizza is otherwise you would be too depressed whenever you weren't eating it. all pizza is completely homemade in every possible way, with jared making the dough and sauce which are both so unbelievably good that i think there has to be some type of illegal activity involved.

as an extra treat they were also testing out their cocktail menu. sam and keller are the bartenders. sam has been traveling to the best cocktail bars in the country to get inspiration and wisdom and it shows in the drinks he was making. he makes his own elixirs... i can't think of a better word (there probably is one) but it's these mesmerizing mixes of flavors and scents in bottles that then go in your drink. he also follows a strict no added sugar policy, which i love since i can't stand sweet drinks.

this is serious, creative craft cocktail mixing that is on a level i have not seen in cincinnati. i know, you guys are going to throw your roms and your mollys at me, and i definitely respect their cocktail mixing talents. however, there is personality and art behind the drinks that will be appearing at a tavola and it is different from what anybody else in this city is doing.

as for the space, it is long and open. you can see everything that happens in the kitchen. up front will be a bar area where people can hang out, and further back the tables. there are hardwood floors, high ceilings, exposed ductwork and brick, and lots of big mirrors.

i'm very excited for a tavola to open and i just hope that you bastards don't mob the place so that i can't get a table for 2 hours. i still haven't been to senate for that very reason. hopefully this addition to the vine street restaurant strip will make everybody's life a little easier, and i will get to eat a chuck norris dog and wash it down with the wood fired pizza of my dreams.

newport pizza company

it seems that everyone likes newport pizza company. i don't. to be fair, i have only been there once (today), but i was totally unimpressed. my list of complaints is as follows.

1. it is overpriced. a thin, 12 inch pizza ranges from about $10-13. are you serious?

2. the crust is bland and cracker-ish.

it's not delivery, it's not digiorno... it's disappointing

3. the toppings are meager. pictured above (sorry for the crappy cell phone pic) is the pizza i ordered, the "lotsa mozza and roma." please note that there is lotsa nothing. i actually took this picture to illustrate how little cheese and toppings i got. most of the slices were lucky if they had cheese on 2/3 of the slice. that might be ok if the crust was delicious but see #2. alternately, that might be ok if the pizza was cheap but see #1.

4. service is mediocre at best. the waitress did not check on us after bringing our food so i went up to the counter to ask for pizza sauce (because my pizza was so bland) and waited there staring at her for several minutes before i caught her attention. dude, one of your customers has hunted you down at the bar... you might want to see what i want. i asked her for sauce because the pizza was bland. she acted unsurprised (so umm... you already knew the pizza was bland?) but did not offer to bring me something else. she did promptly bring me a tiny cup of sauce... and it was ice cold. gee, thanks for the dollop of prego (i mean, if it was fresh, wouldn't it be warm?). sorry, i know i am being super bitchy, but there were like 4 tables and i was paying a lot (i thought) for a small, tasteless, disappointing pizza and it felt like a kick in the pants to not even get warm sauce. then, when we paid, she came back and took the tips off the table while we were still sitting there. isn't that waitressing 101? ok, i will stop being an asshole.

5. there was no flavor. my pizza was mozzarella, tomatoes, and a few tiny shreds of dried out basil. that's it. no garlic. no sauce. no nothing. for that i paid $11.25 plus tax and tip. i was with barry and bri and they got pizzas with more toppings that looked better, the meatball lasagna ($13.25) and the garden of eden ($12.25), and i tasted the lasagna one and it was better than mine anyway, but they were definitely not worth the price.

6. i ate at 5 pm and it's 10 pm and i'm hungry.

i know everyone loves this place but i don't get it. i suppose i should give it another chance but with all the other really good pizza options around (ahem dewey's ahem) i don't really see the point.

cincinnati pizza quest 2009 (march): pomodori

cincinnati pizza quest took liberal foodie, the husband (hers, not mine), and me to pomodori's in march. we liked it. the toppings were interesting and fresh, the service was good, and the pizza itself was damn tasty. our only real complaint is that we did not think there were enough toppings for the price. it's pretty much a one pizza per person kind of place, and at $12-14 each for the pizzas we ordered, we just thought we would get more.

fig and prosciutto pizza

actually, my pizza (fig and prosciutto) and the husband's (prosciutto and mushroom) were fine. but LF's (shrimp, red pepper, and asparagus) was kind of sparsely covered, and all the toppings were clumped up in the middle of the pie. since it had no sauce on it, a lot of the bites she got were just dough and cheese. blah.

shrimp, red pepper, and asparagus pizza

other than the lack of toppings everything was pretty good. it's not the cheapest pizza, and there are no drink specials, but i think it's worth it. the crust is flavorful and soft and chewy and delicious. the service was friendly and attentive. next time i would like to try their pizza margherita.

wood fired oven = damn tasty crust

here are our ratings:
crust - 4
toppings - 3 (the quality was excellent so this would be higher if LF's pizza had more toppings)
sauce - n/a (none of our pizzas came with sauce)
cheese - 3.5
service - 4

overall - 3.5 slices

there are other items besides pizza on the menu, but i can't tell you what they are because i forget. anyway everyone else in the restaurant was ordering pizza so i'm thinking that's pretty much the thing. however, they do make their own pasta so that would probably be worth trying.

(all photos courtesy of LF)

cincinnati pizza quest 2009 (february): adriatico's

after hearing great reviews of adriatico's from like half the people we knew, liberal foodie and i decided that the second stop on our pizza quest had to be there. adriatico's is carry out or delivery only, so i stopped by to pick up the pizza on the way to LF's house one sunday evening.

when i got to the restaurant, i explained that i was new to their pizza and i needed some help deciding what to get. they were really friendly but almost everyone who worked there claimed that they were so sick of the pizza from working there that they couldn't advise me on what to order. one guy said he liked the thick crust but that it was all good. so i didn't really know what to do. i called LF and we decided to do 2 mediums: one thin crust with just cheese, and one thick crust with pepperoni.

adriatico's, you have been hit by the cincinnati pizza quest

LF's husband really wanted us to get "the bearcat," but when i asked what that was, everyone was like "it's this big!" and held their arms out as wide as they could go. i did not think that we needed the bearcat for just the three of us so we didn't get it.

i got our pizza's and drove to LF's house. now here is the thing. she lives kind of out in suburbia. and i got lost trying to find 75 from the restaurant. so it was probably a good half hour between the time the pizza came out of the oven until the time it got to LF's house. so i am thinking that may have affected the pizza quality. on the other hand, a delivery could take just as much time, especially if there was more than one pizza stop on the delivery guy's list.

anyway, by the time i got there and we snapped a few photos and bit in, we were like "well this pizza is... ok." we did not think it was great. we did not think it was the best pizza in cincinnati. the flavor of the crust was good, but especially with the thick crust there was too much of it. i like a thick crust, but only if it is really dense and more crusty than doughy. this crust was puffy and there was not enough sauce or cheese to balance out the mouthful of just... bread.

thin crust with cheese

the sauce was good. it was spicy and rich and slightly sweet. i liked the cheese but LF thought it was kind of bland. also, it was not really melty anymore since it had been out of the oven for so long. the pepperoni was good but nothing special. i didn't really like the bigger than average size of the slices, but then again i just am really not a toppings person.

the husband really thought we should have gotten the bearcat (which is described on the menu as being huge and having a bunch of toppings) because he says it is their specialty and it is why people eat at adriatico's. however, based on the orders they were making in the restaurant, it seemed that most people were ordering large pies with just cheese or one topping. and anyway, i really do not like a ton of toppings on my pizza. plain cheese is my favorite.

the husband's position is that if we are going to be doing a pizza quest and writing about it on our blogs, then we should be trying whatever is the specialty at a given pizza place. and he claims that the bearcat is adriatico's specialty. therefore, since we didn't try the specialty, we can't really comment in a knowledgeable way about the place.

thick crust with pepperoni

i disagree with him. frankly, it's fun to share my pizza experiences with you guys and this blog is about informing people about cincinnati restaurants, but at the end of the day i'm doing this for me. i'm going to order the kind of pizza i want and if it's not the specialty, too damn bad. i'm not spending my money eating pizza i don't really want regardless of what people want to read about.

so readers, what do you say? have any of you had the bearcat? is that what is really good at adriatico's? did we miss out by not ordering it? you are also free to comment on what kind of pizza you want to read about, but i'm probably not going to be basing my ordering decisions on that (unless you want to fund my eating... hint hint... haha).

the official cincinnati pizza quest ratings (on a scale of 1 to 5 slices, 5 slices being the best):

crust: overall - 3.5 slices (thin crust - 4, thick crust - 3)
sauce - 4 slices

cheese - 3 slices

pepperoni - 3.5 slices

overall - 3 slices

i liked adriatico's pizza and i would eat it again if i was in the neighborhood. however, i'm not going to travel for it. it's a good local choice if you live in clifton, but otherwise i don't really think it's worth going there for, especially since they don't have anywhere to sit. but who knows, maybe the bearcat is worth the trip...

cincinnati pizza quest 2009 (january): ramundo's pizzeria

cincinnati pizza quest 2009 has arrived! liberal foodie and i are joining forces to bring you a joint review of one pizza place every month this year. why, you ask? well we were talking about it and we realized that we really do not know much about the cincinnati pizza scene, and we decided that, as responsible food bloggers, we need to remedy that asap. and who better to bring along for the ride than you, most excellent readers?

cincinnati nomerati has a great series of posts called cincinnati pizza showdown so if you don't feel like waiting a whole year to get the lowdown on where to eat pizza in this city, i recommend you head over there.

how many times have i driven by this sign without going in?

for january, LF and i decided to head out to ramundo's in mount lookout after we heard a rave review from our pal graham over at what i ate this week. the funny thing is that graham actually went there on my recommendation for good new york style pizza... and i had never been to ramundo's. but the ecstatic ravings of a few native new jerseyans (new jerseyites?) convinced me that there was most likely good pizza to be had there.

since graham had gone there on my recommendation, i felt it was my civic duty to actually try the pie myself. LF and i went for lunch one day and met her husband there. LF and i got the thin, new york style, and the husband got the thicker regular crust. we tried pepperoni, supreme, and cheese.

it's pretty tiny in there

i liked the pizza, but i did not think it was amazing. i think the best pizza of the bunch was the pepperoni. normally i am a huge plain cheese fan, but the pizza was just a little too bland for it to be really great at ramundo's. i really liked the cheese (gooey, lots of it) and the sauce (slightly spicy and flavorful but not sweet) but i was not a big fan of the crust. it just lacked flavor.

i also felt that the new york style slices were too thin. you could not hold them flat, you had to fold them. my ideal new york style pizza can be folded, but it is not a requirement. i actually preferred the non new york style slice... it was the same crust but just thicker and smaller (and easier to eat).

our spread

the ambience: there is none. there are a couple little tables and a counter, that's it. i think ramundo's business is mainly carry out. but the staff was super nice and let us stand at the counter and eat even though we were in the way since both of the tables were taken.

prices were great. i got two slices and a large fountain soda for $5.99 (including tax). my wallet was happy.

extreme close up

the official cincinnati pizza quest ratings (on a scale of 1 to 5 slices, 5 slices being the best):
crust - 2 slices
sauce - 3.5 slices
cheese - 4.5 slices
topping - 3.5 slices

overall - 3 slices

i recommend ramundo's as a cheap place to grab a slice or two for lunch or a late night snack. the pizza is good without being great, but it doesn't try to be anything it's not, which i think counts for something.

(i forgot my camera that day so all photos are courtesy of LF)