NYC Day 1 – Post #4 – Pizza! Pizza!

LOMBARDI’S PIZZA
32 Spring Street
Soho/Manhattan NYC
Aug 11 2009

Come on, admit it! You’ve been slogging through today’s other three posts, anticipating this one. You recommended we go for pizza at Lombardi’s, or you heard me talking about it. Well, here it is. The photos, our review, and a brief detour to another famous food eatery that was….well….virtual. Maybe it is only really there in Second Life.

First, apologies to Dave, my Facebook buddy, because we were admonished this week to talk about things other than food. But this is my blog, not Facebook, and honestly, how can you go all the way to NYC, and then not talk about food a little bit?

Our day began with naps because we arrived at our acommodations at 7 am, after an all nighter on Virgin Atlantic. The problem with Virgin is it is too nice! The clubby lighting, the really nice flight attendants, the food and drink, and the on-board internet and TV/movies/etc. really deter you from sleeping. We got about 90 min of sleep in the 4.5 hour flight. We were surprisingly rested when we arrived at JFK, and found our luggage, got on the Sky Train, and got all the way to the Jamaica station from Brooklyn/JFK without incident. Then, we got on the right subway and got off and to our brownstone without getting lost. No repeats of the “three chocolate croissants” incident in Paris three years ago, and no rain, thankfully, though at 6:30 am it was already plenty warm.

So, we took a long nap, and when we got up at noon (9 am our time!), our singular goal was to get back on the subway and find the vending machine restaurant, Bamn! (Their exclamation point, not mine). We found the location, cleverly obscured in Google street view by a big Ryder truck. Perhaps that would have been our first clue, had the truck been in a different location.

Their website boasts amazing automat (vended) food, at low prices. Reviews on Google abound, and somehow, my eye skipped right over the entries that said “closed.” So, when we finally found the address, it was a T-shirt shop/Vietnamese sandwich shop 🙁

We headed across the street to a nice Italian restaurant and had some air conditioning with our spaghetti bolognese and margherita pizza. This pizza was very good, though I would have preferred more basil. Thankfully, no fresh slices of tomato on it, and a nice firm, but thin, crust.

We did our day of sightseeing and then got ourselves back to Lombardi’s on Spring Street for the real thing for dinner. There was a little bit of a wait (20 min), but well worth it. We had the caesar salad which had a really nice creamy dressing with a hint of anchovy. Claire had breadsticks, which we both rated 7 of 10. Okay, but I wouldn’t order them again.

The pizza was fantastic! They deserve an exclamation point in their name.

I was going to just have plain cheese, so I could compare to my favorite NY pizza place in Berkeley, Arinell’s. But I couldn’t resist having my usual: pepperoni, sausage and mushroom. I am glad I went for the triumvarate of toppings. Claire was glad they had garlic powder and oregano shakers for the cheese pizza.

The crust was thin and baked to crispy perfection with blackened undertones on the bottom. The sauce was there, but not obtrusive either in flavor or quantity. The cheese was….well, it is cheese….on pizza. It appeared to be hand picked little pillows of cheesy goodness that made a nice cushion for the toppings. On the “cheese only” side of the pie, you could see the basil chiffonade mixed in with the mozzarella. Nice touch.

The toppings were really good. Very small diameter pepperoni, which allows for the edges to be all crispy and even a good part of the middle. The Italian sausage was sweet and tasty, and the mushrooms were there all co-mingled in, not falling off and dry.

I would give Lombardi’s a 10 out of 10. Cash only and adequate service. They leave you alone with your pizza to just enjoy. And no refills on sodas, but they still charge $2. for a fountain coke.