Famous Ben's Pizza of SoHo

Yikes! it's been a week...I forgot to blog this :( 

Lara had a week off work and was nice enough to come meet me for lunch one day. Now, I've been wanting to blog Ben's Pizza for a long time - there's a debate in my workplace about whether Ben's is any good and since this has been going on for awhile now, I'm gonna review it already.

ayyyyyyyy

There are plenty of tables here but it's always very crowded at lunchtime so I try to avoid it. There's an outdoor sitting area (but on the sidewalk- I hate that - I'd rather sit on one of the benches by the fake park when it's nice out bc at least  it's recessed from the street and people walking by aren't like on top of you). We waited until 1:45 and there were plenty of seats available inside. Phew.

I got a plain slice! $2.75

while Lara opted for the fresh mozzarella. I respect that - it's just not how I personally roll.

Both good-looking slices!

 

I have zero complaints about this pizza - I suppose there could have been more sauce as it was a very cheesy slice, but I definitely enjoyed it the way it came. There was just the right amount of grease to make it yummy and not gross and this is the FIRST slice where I don't have to say "not enough salt in the crust". GREAT crust! Yes, perhaps a little thick for some people, but not as thick as Pomodoro's for sure, and just the right thickness for me. So mazel tov, Famous Ben's Pizza of SoHo. I will request you for my birthday pie - I am excited to see how you taste with olives and broccoli.

Lara's review:

At Ben's Pizza I ended up getting the Mozzarella Slice for $3.  I typically gravitate towards slices that are sauce heavy - often picking slices that don't have any cheese at all.  For the purposes of Joanna's blog, however, I thought it made the most sense to get something that has all of the typical pizza ingredients.  

Anyway, it was delicious.  The sauce was kinda sweet (but I like that) and heavy on the garlic (I like that too), and the cheese was easy to bite into so I wasn't like I took a bite and the entire piece of cheese came with it.  That did happen with the basil though, which was fine.  My slice wasn't greasy but I don't really like greasy pizza so it worked out.  Oh and the crust was fine, but not really noteworthy aside from needing to write something about it for the sake of this review.
My only real gripe about the place was that there isn't a napkin dispenser on each table.  Luckily, being a professional, Joanna noticed it immediately and brought some napkins back to the table from the front counter so I was able to use some of those.

Famous Ben's Pizza of Soho

177 Spring St. (corner of Thompson)

New York, NY 10012

I want it so bad I could barf

Lucali: Citysearch's Best Pizza 2007 from Citysearch on Vimeo.

Joe's Pizza

We had an impromptu pizza party at work today to welcome a new staff member, but I didn't have my camera with me so no pics :(

We were supposed to get it this time from Original Ray's on Prince Street (which is what I get if I'm at Sweet & Vicious and need food), but were totally dicked over when we called to order and were told that they wouldn't deliver to our office. We were like, huh? it's like 5 blocks, okay..."Ladies, that's a dealbreaker." 30 Rock - LOL...anyway...pizza.

We ordered three pies: plain $20, broccoli and black olive $26, and meatball $22.

Here is an example of what a plain slice might look like at Joe's

image borrowed from loremipsum on Flickr

The plain was OK. Nothing to complain about but nothing special either. I was insanely into the veggie slice. Yum yum yum. Meateaters loooved the meatball.

Reviews from my coworkers (I make them fill out surveys at pizza parties - so what?):

"Great pizza"

"Very good stuff"

"The one with broccoli and olives is very good!"

"Meatball is the best. Broccoli and olives great - no complaints"

"A fine slice"

"Love this place!"

"Very satisfied. Great texture, nice toppings, good sauce and not too much cheese. Perfect package, like a woman with big hips and a small waist :) meow!"

"Top of the list right now. Let's go"

Joe's totally rules the school right now, obvie.

My boss put this chart together of our pizza parties on Excel. Amazing!!!!

Pros: Taste

Cons: Delivery took an hour, They charge you for spice container things, I found a piece of pepperoni on my veggie slice (which is why one must examine food carefully)

Joe's Pizza

7 Carmine Street (btwn Ave of the Americas and Bleecker)

New York, NY 10014

Cafe Rustico II

Last week I did karaoke with my work friends at iBop. 

That place is cool because you can bring your own beer and order a pizza right to your room, which of course we did. 

Bud Light 40s + pizza + karaoke = best night ever?

I apologize for the crappy pic, there was like, a black light or something

A large pie is $16. A slice at the place is $2.50.

pretty much I'm a loser

So I can't really give this pizza a proper review since I had my 2 slices about 6 beers into the evening...but from what I, and everyone else there, remember it was really good. 

Seriously, I highly recommend it if you're ever in the area. No joke.

Cafe Rustico II

25 W. 35th St (btwn 5th and 6th Ave.)

New York, NY 10001

Lenny's Pizza

Image stolen from the Slice blog

So I was in Park Slope on Monday and had an hour to kill before recording. It was pouring and this place is right by the studio so I stopped in. Technically I'm only supposed to review Greenpoint pizza, but I make the rules here and decided now I just do whatever. This place has a good reputation, I don't know why. 

I got a plain slice $2.50

The asymmetry of the fat crust bothers me

Fine. It looks good - it always does, right? Looks can be deceiving. Folks, for those of you who are into it, Lenny's is a thin crusted slice. I am not one of these people who are into it, apparently. The crust was so thin that the sauce  just made it soggy. The sauce was good, but listen - I don't want a soggy slice. And although not as greasy as the slice from Russ, this is still an intensely greasy slice. The cheese is good - no complaints. Will there be a day where I complain about cheese? I dunno. So I had this mush of a slice of pizza and when I got down to trying to enjoy the fat end crust, I just couldn't. This crust tasted the most like cardboard out of all the slices I've reviewed so far. Needs more than salt to fix this one. 

I like that there's a good amount of seating in the back and God knows I love wood paneling. The old guy who works there (is that Lenny? I don't even know...) was nice, cracking jokes that I had to politely laugh at since they were directed at me since I was the only one in there and while Hot 97 blasting over the speakers is not my thing, they played T.I.'s Whatever You Like, which of course you know made me happy because you guys know me so well; however, credit cannot be attributed to the establishment for that one. Run-on sentence much? I don't even bother editing apparently...Sorry dad.

Pros: A lot of places to sit, Lunch special of 2 slices and a small fountain soda for $4.50

Cons: Crappy pizza for realz, my Diet Coke fountain soda (which they don't put any ice in) tasted like root beer halfway though. 

Lenny's Pizzeria

594 Fifth Avenue (btwn 16th St and Prospect Ave)

Brooklyn, NY 11215

dream dude? dream pizza

This movie was posted on the Slice blog, thought I'd share. This is where I'll go for my post-Passover pizza

Russ Pizza

So I met up with Christine on Saturday for GPC #3 after she'd looked an apartment. I'd never been here which is kind of ridiculous, but I think I've always been turned off by the amount of people it looks like are in there on line since it's such a narrow entrance? When I got there there were a bunch of people waiting around, this doesn't seem like fastest place and I get the impression they don't really care.



 I don't think I knew they had seating in the back in the way that Italy Pizza also does. The seating area is pretty substantial and it seemed like most of the people who were on line were taking their pizza to go and not hanging around like us.



Plain slice $2.25 



This slice is not from a fresh pie, and it needed to be heated up. It took longer to heat up than it should when I'm hungover and want pizza AND as you can see, it's smaller than the Schmook's slice. I have to say I really liked it though; the cheese was salty, the sauce was good - it reminded me of one of the Park Slope pizza places I used to go to growing up. Smiling, I think? The crust was okay; it was crispy and wasn't undercooked but it could have used more salt. The main issue here is that this is one helluva greasy slice. Christine did "the dab" - seriously, check this out:



Kind of gross, but listen, we got another slice to share just to be sure and we got a slice from a fresh pie. It kind of does make a difference. It was still amazingly greasy, but very good.



What else?




Pros: Yum, my favorite so far on the GPC
Cons: Slice too small for amount I want to eat, slow service, fountain soda tasted like crap and the large isn't large enough



Russ Pizza
745 Manhattan Ave (Btwn Meserole and Norman)
Brooklyn, NY 11222