Maffei's Restaurant: "Meh-ffei's Pizza is more like it."

When Tonie and I walked in, Maffei's Restuarant was really busy and seemingly full of jerky customers. Like, everybody was complaining about something. Having spent a large portion of my adult life working in the service of somebody else and bearing the brunt of Entitled Yuppie Ire, my solidarity is generally with those being yelled at and my first inclination is to side with the poor dude being yelled at. I didn't even think about it, I just assumed that we walked into a pizzeria full of assholes.

The slice they served me looked decent enough, but as soon as I folded it over, the cheese flopped off in one cohesive strip. Total Texas Chainsaw Massacre. It made me think of Phil Hartman's character in the Mr. Belvedere Fan Club. Total grade A sociopathic psycho shit. And that was just looking at it.

I took my first bite of this slice, and lo and behold, it was ice fucking cold. So I says to the guy behind the counter, "what do you think about actually fucking cooking this thing?" And he puts it back in the oven.

While I was waiting for my pizza to get cooked, I noticed this awesome pizza clock on the wall, and directly below it, a plaque declaring that Maffei was a "Battle of the Boroughs^TM Finalist as presented by Pizza Expo^® and Pizza Today^®. In case you don't remember Ben Trogdon's excellent contributor post from a few months ago, here is a description of Pizza Today^® in his words:

Pizza Today is a trade magazine that focuses on the financial end of the pizza business, never actually writing about the taste of anything. They’re about cutting costs, building a pizzeria’s brand, and addressing issues like whether or not managers should hire people with facial piercing and neck tattoos.

He is pretty spot on. Pizza Today^® is an industry magazine and is not actually about pizza deliciousness, as is evidenced by the fact that they gave this shitty place some kind of award. Even after the pizza came out of the oven, it was still pretty mediocre, although it was a lot better, and the guy STILL didn't manage to cook it all the way. Heave ho.

There were these cool pictures of this charmingly ugly baby, though:

Rating:

This slice would've been like, a 5 if they had cooked it right the first time, and a 4 if they had cooked it right the second time.

Maffei's Restaurant - $2.25

688 Avenue of the Americas (at 22nd)

New York, NY 10010

ps. this entry looks CRAZY because Blogger kind of sucks lately. I will fix it for aesthetics when I get home later later later on.

Cavallo's: "True American Spirit."

So, not too long ago, I got to go out and eat pizza with Slice Harvester's old friend Caroline Paquita and our friend Johnny Coast. Johnny is a grown up crusty living the dream, who makes handbuilt bicycles, and is probably the sweetest person I know, and no amount of dreadlocks and tattooed gauntlets can disguise that fact. I have barely known Johnny for years and he has always just seemed like the absolute nicest guy on Earth. And waddaya ya know? I wasn't wrong about that shit because I am a good judge of character and fuck you if you don't believe me!

Our first stop was Cavallo's Pizzeria, a tiny, cramped hellhole on 7th Avenue. Not cozy-cramped, but claustrophobic-cramped. I forgot to take a picture of it, but the logo is like, a naked babe riding a horse, which is totally weird. Although I guess 'cavallo' probably means 'horse' in Italiano, right? Whatever. This place was weird.

When I got our slice back to the table Caroline and Johnny had gotten for us in the very back of the room, Caroline was quick to point out the top of the red pepper shaker to me. It was a Gatorade bottle with the label torn off, and the top looked like it had had holes burned into it by a cigarette, or more likely, by a soldering iron. Either way, what it looked most like was some kind of orifice stricken with disease. Totally unappetizing. Caroline said this showed the "true American spirit," of bringing you bad quality things for as cheap as possible with no regard for anyone's health or well-being. There was some speculation at the table as to whether or not we would touch a dick that looked like that on the end, and we all agreed that maybe on Brad Pitt, but probably not even then.

The slice here was not especially good, although it did have it's moments. According to my notes, "this pizza is a mystery wrapped in an enigma, drenched in sugary sauce with poorly melted cheese." This shit tastes hella synthetic and the first half was way undercooked. The crust was the only saving grace. "This crust is okay," Johnny told me, "and I don't even like crust. I think it stems from back when I was an oogle and would eat the pizza bones out of the trash all the time."

This reminded me of a time some years ago where I was sitting with my good friend Matthew from Chattanooga, TN, waiting on Bedford Avenue for a bus to come and take him back somewhere before I road my bike home. We had been sitting around at the water drinking 40s and while waiting for the bus, stopped by Anna Maria's on Bedford to scrounge some half eaten slices out of the garbage can. We each got enough to eat to whet our appetites, but no more, and sat down, sort of dejected, at the bus stop. And there we saw it, like a shiny beacon of awesome nourishment, some miscellaneous frat boy was passed out on the steps of the bank with a pizza box in his lap. We crept over as stealthily as possible and, with the tips of our fingers like we were playing pick up sticks, we daintily opened the top of the box... and what valiant deeds we had committed I know not, but in that golden dawn we discovered an Entire Untouched Pizza! Thank the Great Pizzaola for her benevolence!

Once again, with ninja-like dexterity, we removed the box from the slumbering giant's lap. He shifted... he snored... but did he awaken? No. We sat on the steps next to him and ate that whole pie as the sun came up. And when we finished we threw the crusts back in the box, because we'd already probably eaten a whole pie worth of crusts from the trash, and we once again delicately placed the box back into our new friend's lap. Almost immediately afterwards the bus came and spirited Matthew away, and I road my bike the long way home, dreaming deliriously of our benefactor making his way back home with such a story, "dude, Bro, I totally went out to Brooklyn last night, right? And like, I was totally at this crazy bar and got so drunk. Dude it was crazy. All the chicks had tattoos. And bro, I got so wasted, I bought a whole pizza and I ate the whole thing and I passed out on the sidewalk with the box in my lap, bro! And I fucking woke up, and I was STILL HUNGRY, dog! How crazy is that shit?!"

Rating:

Cavallo's - $2.75

324 7th Ave (28th & 29th)

New York, NY 10001