Tag: buffalo

#74 Bocce Club Pizza

February 17th, 2018

Buffalo, NY

We saved the highest ranked Buffalo pizza place for last. After we checked out of our hotel, we drove down to Bocce Club Pizza and got there right at noon when it opened.

Bocce Club Pizza was opened even before La Nova, in 1946, when the owner bought a pizza oven after WWII. It originally was a bocce ball club, with courts in the yard and sandwiches and drinks inside. In the 1980’s, it became the first restaurant to offer take-out pizza in Buffalo. It still seems to have most of its business as a take-out pizzeria because the only seating area is a few stools at a high counter along the far wall.

Here, you can order a full or a half pizza, which is nice. We ordered a half size, topped with half meatballs (honestly, we were getting a bit tired of pepperoni).  We were not surprised to see that they also serve wings but unfortunately we didn’t get to try them. We have only so much stomach space.

This ended up being our favorite pizza place in Buffalo. It was just as heavy on the cheese as the first two, but the sauce was a bit sweeter and the crust was fluffy without being overwhelming. We thought it was really similar to the slab pizzas that we had in Maine.

We didn’t quite finish this pizza either and had to take some leftover slices to go in the car. These Buffalo pizzas are heavy! (And the baby bump in the photo on the left means that I don’t have as much space for pizza anymore to begin with). But Eric enjoyed them the next night for dinner and said they held up pretty well.

After lunch, we hit the road to head down to Cleveland. The last two places on this mini-road-trip coming up next week!

To visit:

Bocce Club Pizza
4174 Bailey Ave
Amherst, NY 14226

 

BarbaraLeave a comment

#90 La Nova

February 16th, 2018

Buffalo, NY

After our first pizza stop, we headed up to Niagara Falls. There really isn’t too much to do around Buffalo, aside from visiting the Falls. Especially in the middle of February. The good part of timing the trip like this, though, was that there were very few people at the park and we had great views of the snowy falls! We didn’t stay there too long, because it was cold and windy, and more importantly, we had more pizza to eat!

Our second pizza stop in Buffalo was at La Nova. La Nova has been around since 1957, which is pretty impressive. It claims to be the largest independent pizzeria in the US (although I don’t think they’ve updated their website because the last time we checked, it was only ranked at #20). It probably looked exactly the same back then as it did when we stopped in for dinner. The whole restaurant has a very 50’s-vibe, with red tables and walls and old pictures everywhere. Not surprisingly, it also claims to have some of the best wings in Buffalo. It was clear when we were there that La Nova has a huge local following, even with all of the other pizza places around Buffalo. For a Friday night, the place had a huge delivery wait line, and plenty of people who stopped in for slices.

We decided to sit down and eat, since we didn’t feel like just bringing a couple of slices back to our hotel, and we wanted to see some more of the local scene (which included a homeless woman on drugs coming into the pizza place every 15 minutes to harass the customers and staff). We ordered a small cheese and pepperoni, and Eric also ordered a side of the wings.

The verdict: not as good as our first pizza stop of the day, Deniro’s. The crust here was a little thinner but it was topped with the same amount of cheese, which oozed off of the pizza like crazy. This also could have been because we couldn’t wait for it to cool down to dig in. The pizza at La Nova was a little more greasy, maybe partly due to the good number of pepperoni they threw on. You can see that yellow grease in the picture above.

Eric said the wings were good, but they weren’t the “best he’s ever had”. But then again, we definitely aren’t wing connoisseurs, so we should leave that up to others to debate.

Overall, we thought this would be the perfect pizza place to order food from after a late night of drinking or while watching a football game. It wouldn’t be our first pick to eat on a regular Friday night, mainly just because the cheese made it SO HEAVY. We couldn’t even finish it (although we may have been able to if we also didn’t have to try the wings).

To visit:

La Nova Pizzeria
371 W Ferry St
Buffalo, NY 14213

BarbaraLeave a comment

#89 Deniro’s

February 16th, 2018

Depew, NY

Apparently, Buffalo, NY has a big pizza scene. We were not aware of this until we read the 2017 list. We also didn’t know that there was such a thing as “Buffalo-style” pizza. Since there were 3 pizza places on the new list that were located around Buffalo, we decided that a road trip there this year was necessary. Talking with Arthur Bovino (who pretty much created the list, in case you didn’t know) over lunch the other day also convinced us. We really had to see what the fuss was about. 

We decided to take our mini-road trip over this past long weekend. We started out from NJ early on Friday and made it out to Buffalo around 1 pm. Our first stop: Deniro’s.

We were very excited to get out of the car after our 5 hour drive, but a little bummed that the pizza place didn’t have any seating. They had a little “seat” along the window, so we sat/stood to eat our half-pepperoni-half-plain pizza. We went with a medium size, since we were getting more pizza in a few hours for dinner. It ended up being plenty of pizza for us, and we actually couldn’t finish it. If you know us at all, this is HIGHLY unusual. We almost always finish our pizza.

So what, exactly, IS Buffalo-style pizza? It has been compared to Detroit-style, but we didn’t think it reminded us of that at all. It’s also been compared to Sicilian, which we don’t think is quite true either. Yes, the pizza has a thicker crust and a hefty amount of cheese, but that’s about where the similarities end. The pepperonis are thick and the sauce is somewhat sweet, and the pizzas are round.

Eric said that the pizza at Deniro’s reminded him a little bit of Pizza Hut. This isn’t necessarily a negative comment (as someone pointed out on instagram), because he associates Pizza Hut with his childhood. (Although, we should also add a disclaimer here that he hasn’t had Pizza Hut in about 10 years). Deniro’s is definitely comfort food – heavy, cheesy, and doughy. I disagreed with his comparison, though. The crust is similar and they are both cheesy, but this cheese was more flavorful and the sauce was better.

We felt pretty full after this, so we went for a walk around Niagara Falls. We had to make room for our second Buffalo-style pizza on the list that we had planned for dinner. It was a decent start to our road trip.

To visit:

Deniro’s
2251 George Urban Blvd
Depew, NY 14043

BarbaraLeave a comment