One Year Anniversary: Return to House Pizzeria

We've been Pizza Adventuring for a year now, so we thought we'd take a minute, relax, and go back to the place where, in a booth by the window, Ian and I hatched this blog.  That place is House Pizzeria and we can't even pretend that we're impartial here.

This time we decided to get the new special Cauliflower & Ricotta pizza (and we were half-way through it before we even remembered to take a picture).  It has roasted cauliflower, a little shredded mozz, black pepper, capers, ricotta cheese dollops, and cracked green olives (really just pitted green olives).  It was good.  I'm not going to say it's the best pizza I've had there (I will readily admit that I like my pizzas saucy), but the flavors worked very well together; the salty ingredients and pepper balanced the more mild ricotta and cauliflower.  And, as usual, the sourdough crust was amazing.

Looking back at the last year of adventuring, I'm proud of it!  I'm proud that we managed to get through 42 pizzerias (that's 3 1/2 a month!) and look forward to another great year, there are no shortage of places we have yet to try.

-Karin

Adventure #42: Italo's Pizza

[Update 8/24/2013: Italo's is no more : (]

Italo's. Have you heard of it? Karin and I hadn't. Its name was whispered to me by a coworker, and in the weeks before we made it here, I heard the name whispered in the wind, in back hallways. . . or was it all in my stomach?

Adventure #41: Reale's Pizzeria

Before I give my impressions of Reale's Pizza & Cafe as a whole, I'll start with the pizza since that's what brought us there to start with.  The pizza was ok.  I don't think we had any complaints.  We went with The Roasted Pie which is topped with roasted peppers and onions, fresh garlic, and olive oil.  The garlic was strong, really strong, punch you in the face strong, which I dig.  The peppers were tasty.  The sauce was not non-existent, but wasn't distinctly flavored.  The biggest comment we had about the crust, which was pretty standard, was that we really wanted some extra virgin olive oil to dip our crusts in.

Adventure #40: Pizza Land

Get your Indian food! Get your kebab! Get your. . .pizza? All is available to you at Pizza Land, on Burnet between Anderson and 2222. In addition to kebab and biryani, you can get fish masala, chicken nuggets, and spaghetti. Terrified yet?

Adventure #39: Promise Pizza

When we saw that ATX Gluten Free was having a Gluten Free Pizza Week, we jumped on the chance to try something new.  If you didn't know (and I didn't either), gluten free means wheat (and rye and barley) free.  I knew that gluten is the thing that gives dough stretch and chewiness because, if you've ever made pizza dough, you can see the gluten strands webbing the dough when you stretch it to transparency.  It's why flour, when wet, becomes dough instead of just wet flour.  Gluten is also a problem for people with Gluten Sensitivity and Coeliac disease (both of which do horrible things to your intestines).

There were several options around town for us to try a gluten-free pizza, but we decided on Promise Pizza.  I won't spout their official stuff, but everything about Promise Pizza seems to say "organic food is clean food."  I don't necessarily subscribe to that attitude, but from the sterile metal decor to the designation of drinks as "bio-fuels" and the use of company-owned Smart cars as delivery vehicles, it's clear that they are serious about it.