#96 O4W

October 24th, 2018

Duluth, GA

A recent work trip took me down to Atlanta. I really didn’t have too much time to explore in my schedule, but I got to my hotel around 7:30 on Wednesday evening, which left me enough time to head out for pizza. My first thought was to go to Antico, which would have been a 25 minute car ride. But instead, I decided to go for a 35 minute car ride North to Duluth, to O4W.

I am so glad that I did. I didn’t end up getting there until a little after 8:30 pm, which meant that I was almost the only one in the restaurant. I pretty much had my pick of table. It was a little chilly out (for Atlanta, anyways), or else I maybe would have considered sitting outside. While O4W also serves slices, they only serve full pies for dinner. So, a full pie it was. I didn’t take long to decide what to order – the Grandma pie came highly recommended.

It felt like it took forever for the pie to come out, but it really was probably only 15 minutes.  I hadn’t had dinner on the plane, so I was definitely hungry.

O4W makes “New Jersey” style pizza. I’m not sure what qualifies it as “New Jersey” style, because the only style that I know that is typical of NJ is Trenton-style tomato pie. Their Grandma pie was more like what I would consider a NY-style Grandma pie. I guess that they call it “New Jersey” style because the founder was trained in NJ.

Whatever style it is, the Grandma pizza is delicious. It was absolutely worth the long car ride, skipping dinner on the plane, and eating by myself in the restaurant right before closing. It’s topped with a good amount of homemade sauce, fresh mozzarella cheese, and plenty of fresh basil, all on a thin, not-too-crispy square crust. I loved that it wasn’t covered in too much cheese.

I didn’t eat the whole pizza (although, I probably could have). I brought some back to my hotel and then even managed to save a few slices to take home to Eric on the plane two days later. While O4W made the list in 2016 and 2017, it was left off the list last year. We’ll be voting for it again next year.

To visit:

O4W Pizza
3117 Main St
Duluth, GA 30096

#45 Varasano’s and #26 Antico

 January 14 and 15th, 2016

Atlanta, GA

We went on our first pizza road trip last January, when we drove down to visit Eric’s brother in West Palm Beach, FL. We went a couple of hours out of our way to make a stop in Atlanta, which had two pizza places on the list.

We left our house at 5:30 in the morning to begin our drive. Luckily, the drive was uneventful. We didn’t hit much traffic, except for a little bit around Washington, D.C. We listened toa lot of podcasts. As the day went on, we had to keep the stops to a minimum because we were really trying to get to Atlanta in time for dinner at Varasano’s.

We parked at the restaurant right at 9 pm, just about an hour before closing. We were two of the only people in the restaurant. After over 13 hours in the car, we were starving. We ordered the Nana (on the right – the traditional margherita) and the Chica Bella, which had arugula, ricotta, and a pinch of lemon juice. Both were very good, and you can see that the crust on these was chewy and slightly charred. You could really taste the sourdough. We could have used a glass of wine or two, but we still had to find our way to our hotel.

   

After a good night’s sleep, we got up and headed over for lunch at Antico. We were almost the first ones in line here (are you surprised?). We ordered one of the House Special pies. It was a white pie with mozzarella, caramelized onions, and roasted mushrooms topped with a drizzle of truffle oil. While the pizzas here all looked fantastic, it’s a very no-frills type of restaurant. You can’t get any half-toppings, only full pies, and you sit at family-style picnic tables in a back room. We heard later that the back room didn’t even used to have seating, and everyone would have to squeeze into the front. It is definitely not a big restaurant.

We certainly aren’t complaining about this, though. We liked the picnic-style seating because we had a great view of the pizza oven and the dough room. The pizza was amazing, and ends up pretty high on our personal lists (#22 on Barb’s and #39 on Eric’s). We also liked that it was served on a baking sheet, just like the New Haven pies that we are used to.

We were pleasantly surprised by how good Atlanta’s pizzas are. We’d go back to Antico anytime. It almost makes us want to drive down to Florida again, just so we could stop there. Although it would probably be easier to convince Eric to fly there after all the road tripping that we’ve done this year.

The 2016 list does have one new Georgia pizza place listed in Duluth. So who knows, maybe we will just have to go back!

To visit:

Varasano’s
2171 Peachtree Road
Atlanta, GA 30309

Antico Pizza
1093 Hemphill Avenue
Atlanta, GA 30318