Sunday, March 10, 2013

Grimaldi's Pizzeria in Brooklyn, NY

Small Regular Pizza with Mushrooms and Extra Basil

A New Yorker that I was chatting with on the flight over here was mentioning that this place under the Brooklyn Bridge was the place to go to for New York pizza. It was cash-only, no reservations, and interestingly, no pizza by the slice. And the original location usually had long lines (1 Front Street, 718-858-4300), so I intentionally waited until late Sunday night in the hopes that it would be better. Fortunately, I was able to walk right in.

The pizza was fine. It wasn't mindblowingly good like Mozza, but it was a decent thin-crust New York pizza complete with requisite shakers of garlic powder, dried oregano, and chili pepper flakes on each checkered tablecloth. The key was the fresh garlic: just enough to give it an edge, but not so much as to overwhelm it (nor fuel dragon breath). That Brooklyn Lager went down perfectly with it all too. Alas, I won't make any huge effort to come back here though. This was just one of those things that I had to try, and then leave it at that.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

You loved Shake Shack and hated Grimaldi's, argh! I found Shake Shack @ all the locations to be underwhelming and would take 5 Guys or Wendy's. And I hate krinkle cut fries. The thing I like most about Shake Shack are the "concretes" - which back in Texas we would call a Blizzard (of Dairy Queen lineage)

Although I haven't been to the relocation, Grimaldi's is the quintessential NY pie. Grimaldi's belongs with the cadre of the old guard like Patsy's, John on Bleeker's, Lombardi's, Totonno's, and LB's Spumoni Gardens. (I won't mention DiFara's, cause that's pizza @ a different level) The new guard is split between revival of the NY style (like Best Pizza in Williamsburg) and reverence for the Naples style like Keste and Motorino.

The typical slice of yore is @ Sal and Carmine's, or Joe's. And the newly reimagined slices are more like Best and Artichoke's.

I'm about a year away from living in nyc and miss it dearly. Glad to hear you did partake in some of the city's best.