Ok, a little bit of a puff piece as I get back into the swing of blogging. That’s a joke, for reasons which will become apparent in a moment. You see, I always love pushing Oakland and the East Bay in general, and I want to tell you about a place I found. Having lived in New York City, and being born in Buffalo, one thing I always missed was some good pizza. I mean the good stuff. There are a few respectable New York-style pizza places in SF but a) I don’t live in SF anymore and it’s not worth the trip for pizza, and b) meh, they’re not really that good.
But all that changed when I found Slice House. Slice House is a small chain; there are (I just looked it up) around 30-35 locations, the vast majority of which are in the Bay Area and down near LA (though for some reason there’s one in Tennessee, who knows). It’s run by somebody who’s supposed to be famous but I never heard of the guy, but let me tell you: he knows how to make a pizza. In fact, one of the thing that impresses me about the place is that he knows how to make a bunch of different styles of pizza. On any given day there’s a rotation of pizzas but there’s always a few of what they call New York style (traditional pizza with a fairly flat big slice, tomato sauce, and healthy amounts of toppings), Detroit style (kind of a deep crusty bread with lots of cheese but not always much sauce), “Grandma” style (a thick chewy dough made on a metal grating), and a few other different styles and varieties. All of them are amazing but my favorite is the New York style, and my favorite of that style is the Wiseguy; sauce and cheese, pepperoni and sweet sausage, green onions, then little dollops of a soft cheese that’s kind of like ricotta. Chef’s kiss. For better or worse, the one I go to the most is right next to where I take spin classes down in Castro Valley. So, you know, burn off the calories and then pack ‘em right back on.
Anyway, holy crap is the pizza good. Just the right amount of soft and chewy, with a slight cornmeal for texture, amazing sauce and cheese, a real pizza oven to warm the slices back up. Slightly sweet but not too much so, nice and salty, plenty of tasty toppings and super fast service. Not cheap, but not the worst, and they have specials. If you think the Bay Area doesn’t have much good pizza, I encourage you to try them out.
