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There's no way to put it diplomatically. I'm a full-blown pizza snob. I was raised on Manhattan's oversized, chewy-crusted, oozy-stringy-cheese laden and tomatoey triangle-slices. Since moving out of the city many years ago, I have lamented the sad lack of the grand old pie of my memory in whatever geographical region I found myself. Spare me pizza crust that crunches like a cracker or whose fluffy texture resembles Italian bread! Get that sugar-sprinkled tomato sauce off my pie! Stop browning my cheese!
As close as we are in Fairfield County to New York, I've always found it a bit puzzling that the pizza here rarely resembles the one that can be found just an hour down the road. Every once in awhile, I'll discover something close through a referral or a roll of the take-out menu dice but invariably, second or third orders from the same promising spot come up short. Consistency appears to be a problem with Connecticut's pies, the flavor, texture and balance of cheese to sauce swinging wildly depending on who's got the pizza-maker's hat on on any given day.
Recently, however, I've found two examples that have stood the test of re-ordering over multiple visits. At New Canaan's Cava Wine Bar, where exceptional pastas like panzotti a dish of chubby, handmade pasta pillows filled with an exquisite roasted veal stuffing and scented with brandy, fresh thyme and rosemary are transcendent, it might not occur to diners to try a pizza. Think again, my friends. The broccoli rabe and sausage pie here is stellar. The thin crust is slightly crisp but provides the chew I look for, and the sauce offers just the right salty, tangy tomato flavor with nary a sweet note to be found. The crumbled sausage is homemade and flavored generously with fennel and red pepper flakes that give it the kick it needs to stand up to the crunchy, lightly bitter greens. While the personal size and wood oven give the dough a slightly different feel than the Big Apple version, nonetheless, it works.
Up in Fairfield, Pizzeria Molto's got their pie on as well. Two versions are offered here, one that the menu claims to be New York-style (don't they all?). The joke's on me, though, when a terrific pepperoni pie emerges from the authentic pizza oven. The flavor of the zippy sauce, fragrant but not too heavy on the oregano is properly salted, the slightly thick and gooey mozzarella, and the thin slices of spicy, oily pepperoni are sublimely on target and once again, the crust is toothsome, just the way it is in the city. A sample from the pizza-maker of the brick oven version reveals another good pie. This one, made simply with fresh mozzarella and fresh tomatoes yields slices that are naturally sweeter and lighter. The crust is crunchier from the brick surface. Its a whole different animal but a comely one nonetheless.
Snobbery notwithstanding, in the absence of a trip over the Triboro Bridge, Cava and Molto get me closer to my childhood pizza than I've ever been before.
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