dhammer53

If you call a day or two ahead, and if they answer the phone, you can pre-order a pie that should be ready within 20 minutes of your arrival. Cash only.

Agree 100%. Here's the reason why, the square slice has the crunch, and the regular slice doesn't.

Elderly? Dom is 78, and has been making pizza since I was a kid. He's been in the same location since the mid/late 60's. He's the only person making pizza, and Dom makes it on Dom time (slow).

Totonno's is pie only, and worth the trip. IMHO, it's a close second behind Di Fara's.

I can't go away for a few days to return to a pizza discussion.

I've been to Di Fara's dozens of times over the year. Is the price hi, yes. $5.00 a slice. A pie is about $32 - 34 IIRC. Worth every penny as far as I'm concerned.
Dom uses only the best ingredients imported from Italy. While you wait, you watch this master make pie after pie. He doesn't use the typical cheese most pizza places in the city use. He cuts a fresh piece of mozzarel (as we say in NY) from a clear package. The cheese is packed in water. He then shaves the cheese onto the pie. Before he places the pie in the oven, he sprinkles olive oil from an old tin gold container onto the pie.

Man, that oven is hot because the pie is ready pretty fast. Dom then pulls the pie out of the oven with his bare hands and prepares it for slicing. But before that, he takes more fresh cheese and more olive oil, and gives the pie a little extra. He then takes a scissors and cuts some fresh basil on the pie.

If you've been waiting 20 or 90 minutes (N.B, check their hours and days of operation), you're mouth is watering. You've watched the pies being made. You've been smelling the pizza. you're hungry. When it's finally your turn for a slice (or a pie), you're about to jump out of your skin.

Instructions for taking your first bite (of sicilian). It's hot, so be careful. Close your eyes, open your mouth, put the slice in your mouth. After a long wait, you're finally ready. Now you're smelling, then the crunch comes, and now finally what you've been waiting for. The taste. ^

A few of us have been to Di Fara's. Many of us have been to L&B Spumoni Gardens as mentioned above.

So next time you want to head to Brooklyn, please PM me. You don't have to twist my arm to go to Di Fara's.

dh

maortega15

So I'm leaning torwards Di Fara. I was in Brooklyn recently to visit the Transit Museum and didn't have a problem so this one should be no different.

Anything specific I should go for and the best time to go to avoid long lines? A friend of mine says that it'll take 2 hours just for a pizza. I remember waiting on line once for the iPhone 3Gs. I waited for 6 hours the first day it came out!

Anyone know the price as well?

Thanks again gang.

SJC AA

Go on a weekday, arriving about 1/2 hour before they open. You'll have a short wait this way.

Prices are high, about double normal neighborhood pizza places.

Mary2e

My preference versus all these popular places, is to go to a local pizzeria in the neighborhoods. You'll find each neighborhood might have a different style of making it and the flavor will also be different. While many people wax poetic about Spumoni Gardens, I personally don't care for it (sorry Dan), though many, many people love it. Their pizza is a function of their neighborhood and in some cases, what they grew up having.

If you can believe it, it took about 15 years of living in NJ to find a place that made the pizza the way I grew up eating it

The issue, of course, is that if you're making a day trip to try the pizza, unless you have a neighborhood recommendation, you're pretty much stuck with the popular places.

Dan - if you can believe it, my mom makes homemade pizza just like DiFara. No need for me to wait on line

NYCRachel

They used to take orders over Facebook and via email the day before. I'm not sure if that's still a thing, but I'd look into it.

Quarky Quark

Maybe this question needs a new thread but will try here first, who knows?

I have something stuck in my head, ever since I saw a Chicago-style deep dish pie on a tv show I've been wanting to try one. Now I'm not going to make it to Chicago this year, but I will be in NY (and Boston) in Nov.

So my question is, is there somewhere in NY I can go to get a reasonably authentic and tasty Chicago-style pie? Eat in is preferable over takeaway given it will be cold, but I can live with either. Happy to travel by metro as needs be.

TIA for any recommendations.

guv1976

Wirelessly posted (BlackBerry: BlackBerry8530/5.0.0.1030 Profile/MIDP-2.1 Configuration/CLDC-1.1 VendorID/417)

I don't know how "authentic" it is, but the Uno's chain is represented in NYC.

SJC AA

No, you really don't want to. And it doesn't belong in a thread about pizza. Especially in the New York forum.

guv1976

Wirelessly posted (BlackBerry: BlackBerry8530/5.0.0.1030 Profile/MIDP-2.1 Configuration/CLDC-1.1 VendorID/417)

SJC AA

Just the mere mention of Chicago-style "pizza" in a thread titled after Di Fara is an abomination.

Here's the last word on this unholy comestible:
http://thedailyshow.cc.com/videos/8o83j9/tower-record

Quarky Quark

Fair enough, but I still want to try some. I can't live according to other people's wishes

I may very well come back here and report that it's vile and call it all sorts of nasty names, but I'm keeping an open mind.

Having said that I have read through this thread and am keen to give some genuine NY pizza a go also. Some googling took me to this place, which seems somewhere kinda in the middle between our two schools of thought.

http://spumonigardens.com/

Any views on this place? They do a Sicilian pie that seems reasonably deep dish and it has decent reviews on Tripadvisor.

Universal

Chicago pizza is terrible. However, if you're going to try it, it needs to be in Chicago, not NYC.

themicah

L&B Spumoni Gardens is pretty good (it's all about the sauce IMO). It's not nearly as greasy as Chicago style pizza, but quite different from the typical NY-style Neapolitan pie and way better than most of the rock-hard reheated Sicilian slices you'll find at many slice joints around NYC. I'm not sure it justifies a schlep out to Bensonhurst the way DiFara's justifies the trip to Flatbush, but if you find yourself out there already, definitely stop in and try it.

Everyone else is right that Chicago-style pizza is (1) an abomination and (2) not something you should even consider eating while in NY. That said, if you really, really want to try it, and can't actually get to Chicago, Uno Chicago Grill does have a couple of NYC franchises (as mentioned upthread). And Uno is a corporate chain descended from the original Pizzeria Uno in Chicago, where deep dish pizza allegedly originated.

SJC AA

L&B is great, but bears about as much resemblance to Chicago-style "pizza" as a breaded chicken breast does to fish and chips. Same color, same shape, but totally different inside.

There's a place called Emmett's that is probably the closest in NYC to Chicago-style "pizza," but you shouldn't waste an NYC meal on it.

stimpy

Not to hijack, but since there are NYC pizza lovers here what's the best pizzeria in Manhattan, given that I'll be staying on 55th and 5th?