Wednesday, February 2, 2011

South Brooklyn Pizza: "Fuggedaboutit! No, really. Forget about this place."

Yesterday, it was my good friend Ann Fitz's birthday, and she spent part of it eating pizza with me! Ann is a generally no-nonsense, take no shit broad who has been a firm and steadfast friend of mine for a decade. She is a wonderful lady and she knows a lot about food, being an excellent cook herself. Our first pizza-stop was a signless, unmarked storefront on 1st Ave called South Brooklyn Pizza.


This place is VERY charming. The guy working behind the counter had this horrid wig on and looked like a Marx Brother, or perhaps the Fourth Stooge, and he was totally razzing me the whole time. Like, I ordered one slice and he was like, "what about her?" pointing at Ann.
So I told him, "we're gonna share."
And he says, "Yeah, you want I should cut it in three?"
"Excuse me?"
"Well, you said we're gonna share, I assume you're not leaving me out."
As he handed me the slice he asked me if I was "a virgin to this pizza." Not having learned my lesson from going to Rocky Horror as a yout', I nodded yes. He winked at me and quietly said, "well you'll be walking home bow-legged," before loudly assuring both me and Ann that we'd never want to eat any other pizza ever again.


Well, he was wrong! Not that this was bad. It's fine, if not amazing, but it did not at all satisfying the craving I was having for a NY slice, and the Napoli/New York Hybrid Style they are trying to do here is just done better elsewhere, like at Little Luzzo's, for instance. And where a place like Little Luzzo's uses quality ingredients but keeps the price reasonable, South Brooklyn Pizza serves a regular size slice (in a really adorable and pleasant storefront), with slightly better quality ingredients, for $4.00! That is too much for a slice of pizza unless you are in Tokyo. And the results are questionable, to boot.

The on this slice is unarguably incredible. Like, it is perfect pizza dough. Perfect! Salty enough, yeasty enough, excellent texture--it has everything. And the sauce was good, too, though not exceptional. But the cheese. Oh, the cheese. The mozzarella was fine. Not great, not bad, but totally fine. Decent elasticity, decent taste. But then there was what Ann called the "smattering of additional cheese," which we argued about for a while but eventually decided was probably pecorino. Either way, it wasn't really working so good. It added an unnecessarily sharp flavor to the slice, that stood out in a bad way and just generally distracted from what would've been a decent, if over priced, slice of artisanal pizza. Ann said, "you know that old adage 'less is more?' They need to learn about that." And she's right. If this slice were less busy it'd be great, but I still wouldn't come here because it would still be too expensive. At least Artichoke's $4.00 slice is HUGE.

Rating:

Points off for ridiculous price and also ruining something kind of okay. Would've been like a 5.5 or 6 otherwise.



South Brooklyn Pizza - $4.00
122 1st Ave (7th & St Marks)
New York, NY 10003

4 comments:

  1. @anonymous why arseholes?

    The mozzarella alone on one slice at SBP is likely as pricey as the total ingredient costs on a slice from most places.

    Is this place the greatest ever? Certainly no. But I'd rather pay $4 to eat one slice here than the 1.5 to 2 slices of greasy horseshit that same $4 would purchase at the majority of crappy slice shops littering NYC.

    Harvester, I'm with you and ananymous that the whole virgin thing is super annoying! --K

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  2. I actually thought the virgin comment was really funny and I liked how conspiratorial it was! Also, whenever borderline creepy behavior is perfectly executed by a True Weirdo who does it with style and panache so as to not actually creep me out, I am generally impressed.

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  3. @pizzablogger - they're assholes because they are trying to be like Artichoke, in the way that the location on 14th street is a hole in the wall and they got all this press and became what they are - so SBP is trying to be like them - not that I like Artichoke but that's besides the point

    Re:ingredients - ya that's possibly true

    Re:$2 slice - I'd probably still get a $2 slice cause they're assholes

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  4. I think you're wrong about this place. There are many pizza places in the city to hate on. This shouldn't be one of them. Yes, they charge a lot for a slice and yes, there have been times I've cursed them out for being too expensive -- but other than that, the slice is delicious. Put it this way, if the slice was a buck or buck and a half less -- it would be a steal and the line would be down the block. It might not be an everyday slice, but it's certainly worth it as a treat. Plus you can load up on roasted garlic and hot peppers...it's a pretty damn good slice. Not to mention, they busted my friend's balls when we came in too.

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