It's Getting Hot In Here: 800 Degrees Opens in Westwood

2012 looks to continue one of the biggest LA restaurant trends of 2011: gourmet pizza, especially in the Neapolitan style.  The first contender to open is 800 Degrees, from Adam Fleischman, the owner/founder of Umami Burger.  I was invited to try the pizza just before it opened and I think Fleischman will have another hit on his hands.  The pizza is good, but moreover it is an amazing value.  The ability to have a handmade Margherita pizza for only $6 is mind boggling.

Customers enter the line near the entrance and are offered their choice of three base pizzas: Margherita ($6) with crushed tomato sauce, fresh mozzarella, parmigiano reggiano, olive oil and basil; Bianca ($5, white pie) with fresh mozzarella, garlic, oregano, olive oil and sea salt; or a Marinara ($5, sauce but no cheese) with crushed tomato sauce, garlic oregano and olive oil.  Oregano, chiles and garlic are all available as free add-ons.

Once they select their base pie, patrons have a choice of about 30 toppings, most of which are $1, including a variety of proteins, cheeses and vegetables.  Note that rock shrimp, proscuitto, truffle cheese and artichokes are $3.

We began our sampling with two variations on the Margherita pie.  Above just garlic was added.  Below, with cherry tomatoes, pine nuts and carmelized onions.  Both were enjoyable and were prepared speedily.  In case you were wondering, 800 Degrees is the temperature of the pizza oven, and due to the high heat, the pizzas cook in only one to two minutes.  By the time you are through the line after customizing your pie and perhaps getting a salad to go with it and paying, your pizza will be ready.  It is that fast.  Everything about a meal at 800 Degrees is easy - a few choices which can be customized any way you like (this is not one of those no substitutions, no changes, no exceptions joints), fast service and reasonable prices.  Even the soda machine can mix and match literally hundreds of flavors, depending on your mood.

As mentioned above, the toppings are incredibly reasonably priced.  Below is the Bianca with meatballs (beef), which are broken up into small bits once you order, and an additional cheese.  I will certainly be back to try more variations as the convenience factor, price point and quality are an impressive combination.  Pizza, toppings and a beverage for $10?  You could pay more in a mall food court for a far inferior product.  800 Degrees is using ingredients from good producers; even the eggs are from organic free-range chickens.

For dessert there is Gelato from LA Creamery.  The pistachio flavor was the hit of our group, although the cookies and cream was rather popular too.  The gelato is also only $2.50 per scoop.

Below, the literal Ferrari of soda fountains, produces endless varieties of beverages.  Vanilla root beer is my recommendation.

The pies are rolled to order from balls of dough before they are cooked in the wood burning oven:

Another bonus is that 800 Degrees does both take-out and delivery in addition to dine-in and you can order online on their website.  Quality, convenience and value and most importantly a good tasting pizza?  Watch out Westwood Village.

800 Degrees: 10889 Lindbrook Drive @ Westwood Blvd, Westwood Village. | 424.239.5010 | 800degreespizza.com

Milo and Olive: Josh Loeb and Zoe Nathan's Pizzeria Opens in Santa Monica

Santa Monica based restaurateurs Josh Loeb and Zoe Nathan of Rustic Canyon, Huckleberry and Sweet Rose Creamery have opened their latest outpost in their burgeoning Santa Monica constellation, Milo & Olive.  The restaurant, named for their one year old son, first opened two weeks ago serving breakfast and pastries and began serving pizza this past Thursday.  The close proximity of the restaurants is reminiscent of Danny Meyer's collection of restaurants from Union Square to Madison Square Park in Manhattan.  The chef is Evan Funke, who still helms Rustic Canyon, but is at Milo & Olive full time as it gets off the ground.

In addition to pizza, the menu contains sections for "veggies and grains", fish, meat and salads.  The restaurant only has two eight seat communal tables and an eight seat bar that faces the kitchen, so be prepared to sit with others.  On Sunday evening there was already a wait for a table and takeout, so this is not a hidden find.

Free Range Chicken Meatballs from the meat section of the menu are served in a roasted tomato sauce with arugula on top.  The chicken meatballs are moist and flavorful but the secret weapon in this dish is the tomato sauce.  It is spicy in the best way, with a pleasing ting to it but not a blow your tastebuds effect.  I sopped up the remaining sauce with some of the pizza crust.  If Milo & Olive bottled this sauce, I would buy it.

Chef Funke recently came back from a three week trip to Italy where he tried thirty pizzas as well as dozens of other dishes.  One thing he learned was that in pastas that do not use cheese, bread crumbs are often used to the same effect.  Funke applied this technique to his Fusilli with eggplant, black olives, sweet peppers and toasted bread crumbs.  The bread crumbs act almost as an aged parmesan, providing  a textural contrast to the pasta.  The fusilli noodles themselves were the longest I have ever eaten.  The pasta, a long curlicue, is like a rotini on steroids in that the length can be a foot long, and the curls trap the sauce within them, ensuring every bite has depth of flavor.

The reason for coming to Milo & Olive for dinner is the pizzas.  Funke said that not only each region, but often each town would have its own style of pizza making, and as such he has not sought to emulate any particular style but rather make his own sui generis type.  His pizzas cook for approximately eight minutes in the oven; these are not the 90 second quick cooking with intense heat pies.  Arugula, farm egg and anchovies can be added to any pizza for a small surcharge.  When presented with the option of a farm egg, it behooves a diner to take advantage.

The Margherita pizza ($14) (above) was made with fresh mozzarella, tomato sauce, basil, olive oil, sea salt and the aforementioned egg.  The egg was runny, which made for good spreading across the pie.  The crust held up with no limp center to the slices.  The sauce was less spicy than the marinara used on the chicken meatballs and the cheese was lightly sprinkled on top.  This is a pizza pie I can recommend and is my new favorite west of the 405.  As a bonus, the restaurant is open until 11 pm seven nights a week, which is a boon to the neighborhood.

Note that there is no signage, so look for the line of hungry people and a blue oven you can see through the plate glass windows.

Milo & Olive: 2723 Wilshire Blvd, Santa Monica. Phone: 310.453.6776.  Website: miloandolive.com

Second Take: Ilan Hall Develops the Menu at Urbano Pizza

Last month Ilan Hall, the chef of The Gorbals in downtown LA and the winner of season 2 of Top Chef, has joined Urbano Pizza Bar, the downtown pizza spot that opened this summer to positive reviews.  At Urbano he has partnered with Chef Josh Moser on expanding and revamping the menu (he is still at The Gorbals as well).

Hall is excited to be working with the huge oven, saying "you have a lot of freedom with a wood burning oven.  We want to use the oven as much as possible.  There are two ovens and we can't just be using the wood burning ovens for pizza."

He has changed the flour to a higher gluten blend, which makes the crust of the pizzas crisper.  Hall and Moser have also been using leftover pizza dough to make open-faced sandwiches.  Below is the meatballs with warm pizza bread, which was delicious.  The meatballs are made with all beef and the sauce was full of flavor.  It is great to see pork-free meatballs on a menu.

The margherita pie ($12) is made with fresh mozzarella, hand crushed tomato and petit basil.  The pie was well executed.  The crust was firm enough and the sauce again was good; I would have preferred just a little more of the mozzarella cheese.

The Testa Verde pizza ($13) is one of the more unusual pizzas I have tasted in that it uses Irish cheddar as the base.  There is no tomato sauce on this pie.  Instead, baby spinach and herbed ricotta as well as the aforementioned cheddar are the toppings.  The cheddar was surprisingly good, mellower than I was expecting and I preferred this pie to the margherita.

Hall and Moser's collaboration is bearing fruit and they have been experimenting with putting more and more dishes into the wood burning ovens, including potatoes, lasagna, artichokes and corn.  The wood used in the ovens is almond wood, which is reasonably priced, less smokey and doesn't pop.

My favorite pie is the Mushroom Ricotta pizza with mushroom oil, eggs and bottarga.  The eggs are runny and delicious and ample enough to coat the pie.  The mushrooms are enhanced by the mushroom oil and the whole concoction is a decadent pie worth going out of your way for.

If it is on the menu when you go, a visit to Urbano is not complete without trying the Nutella dessert, pictured below.  It is made with fresh pizza dough with carmelized raw sugar, sweet ricotta with cream, sweetened and creamed nutella.  I am not a dessert guy, but I'd happily have this on a regular basis as it is not too sweet but the chocolate comes through.

All in all, Hall has rounded out the offerings at Urbano, enhancing the pizzas and expanding the menu with fun and approachable offerings.  There is a happy hour from 5 - 7 pm with six dollar margherita pizzas and four dollar draft beers, both of which are great deals.  Urbano is a great addition to the downtown dining scene and at dinner it is easy to get a table.  At lunch they also offer pizza by the slice, which is priced at $6 for two slices.  Tables are communal.

My visit was hosted.

Urbano Pizza: 630 W. 6th St @ Hope St, DTLA.  Phone: (213) 614-1900.  Web: www.urbanopizzabar.com

The Magical Taste of Mystic Pizza

Mystic Pizza is the passion project of Lawrence, the pizzaiolo by night, office worker by day.  He is the Clark Kent of pizza makers, with a secret identity known only to a select few.  To the rest of the city he is the enigmatic "Mystic Pizza", a covert neighborhood dealer of homemade hand-tossed pizza.  He has been perfecting his craft and doing a series of pop-up pizza making at parties and events.  You can find him this weekend at Artisanal LA at Santa Monica Place.

Mystic makes the sauce and the dough from scratch and uses the highest quality cheese.  This is truly the definition of artisanal.  Seeing Mystic work is like a piece of performance art as the dough goes up in the air and spins.  My favorite part of the pizzas are the sauce; I'd happily buy jars of it to use as pasta sauce and as something to dip bread in, if they were available for sale.  On a recent pop-up party at his Lair, Mystic was selling several types of pies and I couldn't resist the margarita.  I was hungry and took a bite before photographing, so that should give you an indication of how good it smelled.  The pies were cooked on a pizza stone on a bbq and cooked up in under two minutes.

Mystic sources most of his ingredients at the Farmers Market and can make both vegetarian and vegan options.  He does cater private events, but can otherwise be found in the Los Feliz / Silverlake neighborhood, so his appearance at Artisanal LA brings him to an entirely new part of town.  Welcome to the Westside Mystic!

Follow Mystic Pizza on Twitter and on Facebook to learn more.  Email at MysticPizzaLA@gmail.com

Object of Desire: Breadsticks at Vito's

Last month a friend and I caught up over some slices of pizza and an order of breadsticks for lunch at Vito's on La Cienega.  The pizza we had was mediocre.  Perhaps only ordering a whole pie fresh is the way to go?  In any case the saving grace of the meal was the order of breadsticks.  They were garlicy and had oil and parmesan on them.  The texture had a nice chew, not flimsy but not too heavy.  These were great.

The waitress warned us that there would be a wait for the breadsticks, and I am glad that we waited as they were the highlight of the meal.  They arrived after our pizza and were very much worth the wait.  At this point I'd go back to get the breadsticks and skip the pizza.

Vito's Pizza: 846 N. La Cienega Blvd, West Hollywood.  Phone: (310) 652-6859  Website: www.vitopizza.com

The New San Francisco Treat: Una Pizza Napoletana

Una Pizza Napoletana is a craftworks as much as a pizza restaurant.  No humble pizza parlor, Una Pizza is the creation of pizzaiolo Anthony Mangieri, who makes each 12 inch pie by hand.  The menu is short with only five pizzas (only four of which were available the night I dined there), and there are no substitutions or alterations, so ordering is easy and quick.  The pizzas are available only by the whole pie (no slices) and arrive at your table uncut.  The pizza oven only holds three pizzas at a time, so Mangieri pulls out the dough, three wads at a time and constructs the three pies before placing them one at a time into the custom pizza oven.  Una Pizza Napoletana is open just four evenings per week, Wednesday through Saturday nights, and the restaurant opens at 5 pm and only stays open "til the dough runs out", so if you arrive too late you may literally be out of luck.  The artisan pies are $20 each; making pizza the old fashioned way with top of the line ingredients is not cheap.

The first of the pies to arrive at our table was the Bianca, which had Buffalo mozzarella, extra-virgin olive oil, fresh garlic, fresh basil and sea salt on top. This white pizza had no tomatoes or tomato sauce and was completely white.  The crust had a good char on it, burned/blistered in some spots but not overly so.  Without any tomato products, the taste of the Buffalo mozzarella shone through loud and clear.  The sea salt, which is a topping on all of the pies, was noticeable and enhanced the flavor.

Next was the Margherita with San Marzano tomatoes (made into a tomato sauce), buffalo mozzarella, extra-virgin olive oil, fresh basil and sea salt.  Margherita pizzas are usually my "tester" pizzas at a new spot as they are deceptively simple with nowhere to hide if it isn't right.  Quality ingredients and a proper ratio of cheese & tomato sauce to crust is essential.  I enjoyed this pizza a lot but I wish the tomato sauce had more flavor.  I would have loved some herbs in the sauce, as opposed to just tomato puree.  The amount of cheese was spot on, enough to get some in every bite, but not so much that it was all you tasted.

Surprisingly enough, my favorite pizza was the Marinara, with San Marzano tomatoes (pureed into a sauce), extra-virgin olive oil, oregano, fresh garlic, fresh basil and sea salt, but no cheese.  The oregano flavor and aroma was strong and as this was the most assertively flavored pie, perhaps that is why I enjoyed it so much. Both the oregano and the garlic worked well with the basil and tomatoes and the charred dough to create an amazing pie.  As someone who loves cheese, I hadn't expected this pie to be in the running for my favorite, but it was wonderful.

The last pie of the night was the Filetti with fresh cherry tomatoes, buffalo mozzarella, fresh garlic, extra-virgin olive oil, fresh basil and sea salt.  There was no tomato sauce beneath the cheese, as Mangieri felt the halved cherry tomatoes on top were enough.  The texture and sweetness of the tomatoes were a pleasant contrast to the soft melted cheese and the dough.

Mangieri is certainly a minimalist, both in terms of his food and the space.  The short menu, with each pie only having a few ingredients/toppings and presented simply and unsliced.  The physical restaurant itself is spartan, appearing as if it could have been a loading dock or auto garage before he converted it into a small pizzeria with half of the space dominated by the pizza oven and the space in front of it where Mangieri creates his art.  Part of the experience is reminiscent of performance art, with a single artist standing in front of an audience creating their work and only a small percentage of the floor space devoted to seating (with the oven only able to handle three pies at a time, more seating would just increase the wait time from ordering to receiving your food).

In a move that created a ruckus in foodie circles, Mangieri closed his New York pizzeria of the same name to move it to San Francisco.  With only approximately 150 pizza pies per evening available, the restaurant frequently closes before its 10 pm stated time and also often has long wait times.  On Saturday just after 5 pm, there was no wait at all so my party was able to walk right in and sit down.  I don't know if the initial buzz has died down or we were just fortunate.  If you get there too late, you will be confronted with the sign below:

Photo courtesy of Una Pizza Napoletana website

Una Pizza Napoletana: 210 11th Street, off of Howard in SOMA.  No reservations.  Phone: (415) 681-3444.  Website: www.unapizza.com

Lucifer's Pizza: The Devil Made Me Do It

Lucifer's Pizza proprietor Adam Borich does not look like a cast member of Comedy Central's Ugly Americans, the show about demons, zombies, vampires etc, although he does serve some devilish pies. Unlike my underwhelming experience at Antica Pizzeria, Lucifer's Pizza in Los Feliz exceeded my expectations. The shtick at Lucifer's is that you can get your pizza any spice level you like from zero to blazing.  (Note the chili pepper graphic below.)

Not only can you customize your level of spiciness but you can opt for Gluten Free or Vegan, which are great options when dining with friends with dietary restrictions.  Unlike some establishments (you know who you are), changes and modifications are politely accepted. Want to hold the bacon on the chicken basil pesto? No problem.

On a recent visit, my dining companions and I began with the margherita pizza.  The crust held up well, the sauce was flavorful and the cheese did not overwhelm the pie.  Overall a very good start to the meal.

We opted for gluten free for the Chicken Basil Pesto, which had chicken, sun-dried roma tomato, cashew nuts, basil pesto & black pepper (we nixed the bacon). This pie also had the "fiery" level of spiciness.  This was my first gluten free pizza and I'd be happy to eat another one if they are all like this.  I am a big pesto fan and the sauce was good and with the chicken and cheese on the pie, this dish was certainly a meal.

Overall the pizzas at Lucifer's were solid.  They get definite bonus points for offering the gluten free and vegan options, as it is great to see that in a restaurant that doesn't celebrate mock meat or absurdly healthy food.  The ambiance is just OK; it appeared that the majority of their business was takeout or delivery.  Would I rush across town from the westside for this pizza?  Not unless I was with my gluten free friends.  But if I found myself in Silverlake, Echo Park, Los Feliz etc, I'd happily encourage my friends to join me for a few pizza pies.  With its flexible menu including the option to raise the spice quotient up to satanic levels, Lucifer's is a welcome addition to the neighborhood.

Lucifer's Pizza: 1958 Hillhurst Avenue (Los Feliz). Phone: (323) 906-8603.  Website: luciferspizza.com

Antica Pizzeria: Underwhelming

Antica Pizzeria in Marina Del Rey is known for the most authentic Neapolitan pizza available in Los Angeles. They offer two versions of their signature margherita pizza: one regular and one DOC with imported ingredients.

On a recent lunch I opted for the Pizza Margherita DOC made with San marzano tomato , fresh buffalo mozzarella, basil and Grana Padano imported cheese. It was bland.  I am a big fan of margherita pizza and it is often my "tester" pizza at an establishment that is new to me.  The crust was fine, with a little char and it held up well but the pizza lacked any real flavor, especially the sauce.  I've had passed Hors d'œuvre bruschetta or pigs in a blanket with more flavor. It was disappointing.

What I love about margherita pizza is its simplicity, there is nowhere to hide if something isn't up to snuff. I don't doubt that they use good ingredients but the whole was less than the sum of its parts. Very disappointing as Antica has an excellent reputation, but the pie that I had was unremarkable in every way, except that it had significantly less oil than most pizza pies. This is no rival to Pizzeria Mozza.

Gjelina: A Winning Patio & Menu

Gjelina on Abbot Kinney in Venice has been a tough reservation since it opened in late summer 2008. Travis Lett is the chef; he had previously been at NineThirty, the restaurant in the W Westwood hotel. In particular, Gjelina is known for its thin crust pizzas and for its patio in the back of the restaurant.



Last month I had a late lunch on the patio - on a beautiful day it is one of the most comfortable spots to eat in the city. We shared the Shaved Asparagus, Shallot Confit, Farm Egg, Sottocenere & Parmesan Pizza, the Burrata with an Olive Tapenade Crouton, Arugula, Lemon & Green Olive Oil appetizer and a side of Garlic Grilled Broccolini with Chili & Vinegar.

The burrata was delicious and a great way to begin the meal. The crostini with tapenade was crunchy; it had been toasted just shy of burning to give it that great texture. The burrata was smooth and rich. We ate every bite.



The pizza was thin crust and came to the table with a beautiful runny yolk. I have a soft spot for dishes with a runny egg component, so this was a must order. The sottocenere cheese is a cheese with truffle in it and the taste came through, which was a good thing. The pizza crust had a good char and chew to it. I'd order this again.

Lastly we shared the broccolini, which had a little kick due to the chili. We needed some green stuff amidst all the cheese and this dish delivered, cutting through the other flavors with sharp clean veggie and chili tastes.



We drank a domestic dry Riesling from Upstate New York, which had the crispness we needed to go with the food.

The ambiance is comfortable and Lett's menu is market driven. Like many restaurants that have opened lately (such as Animal), Gjelina will not modify items on the menu. The menu states "changes & modifications politely declined" and "we support local, sustainable & organic practices whenever possible." Gjelina has a certain way of doing things, and thats fine by me as long as the food continues to taste as good as it did on this visit.

Pizzeria Mozza - an enduring hit

When Pizzeria Mozza opened in late fall/early winter of 2006 the buzz was deafening - a collaboration between hometown favorite baker and author Nancy Silverton (La Brea Bakery, Campanile) and television personality and New York restaurateur Mario Batali and his partner Joe Bastianich, riding the first wave of thin crust pizza momentum. Reservations were hard to come by and the line to eat at the wine or pizza bars was long at all but off hours.

Several months later its grown-up sibling the Osteria opened in spring 2007, and amazingly for a fickle town, both restaurants are still packed and serving quality and delicious food. The Mozzas have the staying power of Balthazar, Keith McNally's New York City restaurant that redefined the bistro and has been perennially packed since it opened more than a decade ago.

Some friends were visiting from New York post-Coachella and we made our ritual stop for pizza at Pizzeria Mozza on Monday. I had the Margherita pizza with mozzarella, tomato & basil and added an egg because isn't everything better with a runny egg? (as a non pork eater I have made runny eggs my substitute.) I began with the bone marrow because it was on the menu. My dining companions ordered the brussel sprouts, the Burricotta and the Fennel Sausage pizza. The sausage pizza looked like a meat lovers pizza - heaping portions of sausage on the pie. The burricotta had buratta cheese with ricotta cheese within it. I tried a piece of the cheese and it was rather good but I may prefer the traditional burrata.

The bone marrow was very rich and came as 3 cylinders, served with greens, salt, garlic and 2 toasts. A third toast was ordered (not sure why it doesn't automatically come - it should). It was good, very rich and better with the accompaniments but not as good as the bone marrow at some of the french bistros such as Church & State and Comme Ca. The marrow, while rich, was just not as flavorful as at those other restaurants.

The pizza however was top notch. The margherita (pictured) was a thing of beauty and the egg yolk ran over the pie in a very appetizing way. The crust was blistered but not burned and the ratio of sauce to cheese was to my liking as neither overwhelmed the other.

Service at the bar was knowledgeable. We were never rushed and the bartender brought over several wines to taste before we selected a carafe.

We arrived at 1:30 pm and were able to get seats together at the bar, but every tables was occupied. Note that although the brother of one of my dining companions is an investor in the restaurant, Mozza did not know of this connection. Disclosure: I once worked for a very brief time in an Italian wine shop in Manhattan owned by Batali & Bastianich.

Pizzeria Mozza is located at 641 N Highland, at the corner of Melrose. Phone: 323. 297.0101 Website: http://www.mozza-la.com/pizzeria/about.cfm