foodbitch
Looking To Break Free From Your Current Pizza Rut? Grab Yourself A Pie From One Of These Five Great, New-To-Dallas Pizzerias.
How much pizza is too much pizza? Is there even such a thing? Nope — not in Dallas, anyway.
Since the beginning of the year, at least five brand new pizza spots —Â Peasant Pizzeria, Perfect Union Pizza Co., Sixty Vines, Midici, and Pizzeria Testa — have started clamoring for the attention of area pizza lovers. And more interesting, they’ve each done so with differing attitudes and approaches, with their resulting pies ranging from classic Italian-American and New York-style fare to Neapolitan-style offerings.
Let’s take a closer look at each of these, shall we?
Peasant Pizzeria (Oak Lawn).
Peasant Pizzeria quietly entered the Dallas pizza landscape by replacing a taco spot called Q Tacos at Macho’s Cantina on Cedar Springs in Oak Lawn back in January. Along with an inviting patio, this place boasts a large menu stocked with oven-baked meats, fish and pizzas, plus daily house specials and plenty of old-school Italian vibes. Though it looks it, it’s worth noting that the pizza at Peasant is not Neapolitan, as the dough is lighter and its pies take a little bit longer to bake in the oven. But it’s all very tasty and chic, the latter of which should come as no surprise to the socialite set: Any restaurant that comes from Robert Colombo — the creator of Sfuzzi, Trece and Villa-O — is bound to offer plenty of people-watching opportunities to go along with the food.
Perfect Union (Highland Park).
Now that celebuchef Nick Badovinus has steak, seafood, burgers and gastropub-style dining on lockall across the city at this point. So he was bound to try his hand at pizza sooner or later, right? Perfect Union is that attempt, and it’s boldly entering the fray from a somewhat testy spot in Highland Park Village where several concepts have come and gone in the past few years. With Badovinus at the helm, though, this concept seems likely to stick. It helps, of course, that Perfect Union utmost aim is to become the simple, fun and casual — yet elevated — missing piece to the HPV puzzle. In true Badovinus style, the spot has a throwback vibe — it’s decorated with surfboards, a motorcycle and shiplap while ’80s and ’90s cult classic movies play on the TVs — and the straightforward, locally-sourced fare is handled with care. Closer to New York than Neapolitan, Perfect Union’s oven-baked pies boast stiff and crunch crusts, and are topped somewhat sparingly with cheese and sauce in a less-is-more approach. But unique builds like the Scampi (a white pie with rock shrimp, vodka sauce, red onion and pea tendrils) and the Jonny Slapps (guanciale, egg and those same pea tendrils) ensure that Perfect Union is obviously not your typical pizza spot.
Sixty Vines (Uptown).
A second location of Sixty Vines in Plano has finally made its debut inside Uptown’s Crescent Hotel, taking over the space that once housed the tired happy hour spot Palomino. Now, the prime real estate is once again infused with fresh new life, not to mention forty wines on tap, a full menu not limited to Italian dishes (read: kung pao brussels sprouts!) and creative pizza topping combinations, like fig with prosciutto and squash blossom with lemon-herb goat cheese. Lunch and brunch service have already begun, and a patio featuring a second bar and a retractable roof is set to open this summer. In other words, Sixty Vines is about to become the Uptown hotspot Palomino hadn’t been in years.
Midici (West Village).
Now open in West Village, Midici is a Neapolitan-style pizzeria chain with gorgeous gilded ovens and a focus on real-life socializing. A full bar certainly helps, as do desserts that beg to be shared, such as the Signature Nutella Calzone that’s stuffed with warm Nutella and soft, warm berries. The pizza at Midici is made of very few ingredients and baked quickly in a high-heat oven — the whole process takes just about 90 seconds at around 1,000 degrees — and the result is a blistered crust, similar to what you might find at Pie Tap.
Pizzeria Testa (coming soon to Lower Greenville).
Opening later this month on Greenville Avenue in the former Wayward Sons space, Pizzeria Testa is the second location of a popular Frisco spot with a simple, but effective, business plan. Pizzeria Testa keeps its focus on imported Italian meats, fresh-baked bread made from simple ingredients, pizza oven-roasted veggies, a curated list of Italian wines, house-made Italian desserts and bona fide Neapolitan pizza ovens that barely that more than a minute to cook their pies. Though it may be the latest “Certified Neapolitan” spot in a town that used to have just a few such places, Testa clearly aims a little higher than being just another member of the pack.