On my previous trip to New York, I did get to eat New York style pizza at a place called Naples 45 (see my post entry here). It was a very good wood-fired pizza, but the restaurant lacked the ambiance of a true little New York pizza joint. When I went to New York for the AES Convention this past fall, I had a goal to eat at an authentic New York pizza joint. However, that idea got shot down by colleagues early on. "This is New York," my colleague Ian told me. "They have all these world class restaurants and you want pizza?"
It looked like I was going to get shut out in my quest for pizza in New York City until a late night encounter with two other like-minded souls who also wanted to try a good thin crust New York-style pizza. The only problem was that it was too late for a sit down meal at a pizza joint, and I'd already had a big meal earlier in the evening. So we did what nearly every red-blooded New Yorker has done at least once in their life, we went for a slice of pizza at 2 Bros. Pizza, one of the hundreds of "by-the-slice" shops that are all over the greater New York City area.
There appear to be six 2 Bros. Pizza locations in Manhattan, the original one is on St. Mark's in the East Village (hence the "St. Mark's" above the logo on the sign above). The one I went to was just up the street from our hotel on 8th Ave. at the corner of 37th St. (see map).
We had finished dinner one evening and went back to Cooper's Tavern for a night cap. We met up with Trent and Ian from Moog Music, who work for the makers of the famous keyboard synthesizers and they joined us in the bar for a Scotch. Trent and I got to talking about how we had both wanted a real New York pizza joint experience. "But nobody wanted to go with me," Trent said.
I said, "I'm in the same boat, buddy. No one here wanted to get a pizza." My colleague, Ian, sneered at me when I said that.
Brian from Lauten Audio told us, "There's a 'pizza-by-the-slice' place just a couple blocks up the street and I've been told it's where all the locals go."
I said, "I could go for a slice of pizza. I mean, I'm full, but I could squeeze in a slice." Trent and his colleague, Ian, immediately said they'd do it, too. So we left the bar and walked two blocks up the street.
2 Bros. Pizza is an open air pizza place with pizzas cut into large triangular slices resting (not for long, as we found out) on shelves in a heated glass case. The large pieces are placed on a paper plate that isn't big enough to hold the full slice.
It was around 11 p.m. when we ordered our slices and it was actually pretty busy in and around that 2 Bros. Pizza location. I ordered a sausage and pepperoni slice, as did Trent. Ian sort of looked through the glass case before deciding to also get a slice of the sausage and pepperoni. Ooops! Too late, man. By the time the pizza guy had scooped out two pieces for Trent and I, two other people had ordered sausage and pepperoni and it was all gone. The pizza guy said, "I'll have another sausage and pepperoni in about five minutes." Ian looked into the case and saw a meatball pizza. He took one of those.
The crust was thin and pliable, allowing us to to "fold" the pizza as New Yorkers do to eat it more easily. And from the first bite, I was in heaven. It was a good, greasy pizza and the sausage had a great fennel taste to it. The pepperoni was tangy and had a nice little bite to it. And the mozzarella cheese was a nice caramelized golden brown and tasted fabulous. Overall the pizza was just outstanding. I sort of wished I would have been able to have a beer with it - it was that kind of a pizza where a cold beer would have been a great compliment to the pizza.
Ian (left) and Trent (right) from Moog Music thoroughly enjoying their 2 Bros. Pizza slices.
The great thing about all of this - the slices were $1 buck. That's right - a dollar. Two pieces of the pizza would have been enough for most people to make a full meal. It was a wonderful thing.
All right, so I didn't get to go to an authentic New York pizza joint. Or did I? With hundreds of these little "by-the-slice" places throughout New York City, this is the way most New Yorkers get their pizza fix. Still, I'd love to be able to go to one of the old venerable places like Ray's, John's or Lombardi's. I figured that maybe one of these days Cindy and I are going to have to come to New York and do the tourist thing. That's when I'll be able to have a good pizza in an authentic New York pizza joint.
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