Bella Pizza on Geary

The exceedingly nice people at Bella Pizza are clearly trying in earnest to make a decent pizza. That must be applauded. Their ingredients are not particularly low grade and the end product is not dissatisfying. With some changes to their ratios, this could be an acceptable walking-down-the-street-and-feeling-hungry-for-a-slice slice.

CHEESE: Too much, but it's real mozzarella, at least.

SAUCE: Neither sweet nor salty. Entirely serviceable.

CRUST: It serves its purpose, but is otherwise unremarkable. Another cornmeal job that is too flimsy to hold the weight of the cheese. No discernible char or tooth.

Just missing the magic intangible...

Try it for yourself.

Bella Pizza

4124 Geary Boulevard (between 5th & 6th)

San Francisco, CA
Neighborhood: Inner Richmond

(415) 668-4150

BEEN SLACKIN' ON THE BLOG...

but eating a whole lotta pizza.

Coming Soon:

Pizza Politano
Fist Full of Flour
The Pizza Place on Noriega
Piccino
Escape From New York
Una Pizza Napoletana
Giorgio's
Delfina

Stay tuned...

Flour + Water

Holy smokes, this place is amazing. As you likely know, this isn't necessarily a pizza place, but it is rather an establishment that serves many varieties of incredible treats, pizza amongst them.

The menu changes daily and everything is good. I can't recall exactly which non-pizza selections we ate, but it definitely included two pastas. The selected pie was a salsiccia pizza. All plates were highly excellent.

CHEESE: Straight danks.

SAUCE: White pie!

CRUST: Excellent char. The crumb is a little chewy (too much rising time?) for this style of pizza, especially toward the top. Maybe I got a thicker pie... Crust was still great, just stating that it was the only thing holding this pizza back from sheer and unbridled perfection.

The only downside is that this place is pretty expensive. Not sayin' it isn't worth it, but it's expensive.

Glad that pizza napoletana is available here (miss you Paulie Gee's, Roberta's, Motorino), but the search continues for a satisfactory slice.

Flour + Water

2401 Harrison Street (at 20th)

San Francisco, CA 94110
Neighborhood: Mission

http://www.flourandwater.com

Nizario's Pizza

Pretty much sucks.

Obviously, the best thing that this business offers is not the pizza but the opportunity to buy something relatively hot and relatively edible until 2 a.m. daily. It would be surprising if the majority of their business was not done between 11 p.m. and 2 a.m. Do they make that much money during those hours that they're not worried about how much more they could be making by selling a better product steadily throughout the entire day??? Maybe they just don't care.

But why, when it is so easy, so incredibly easy, cannot one establishment west of New Jersey make a halfway decent slice? Full disclosure: I am an east coaster. But I'm also a human being! A human being with needs! Needs of sauce and (high quality, not high quantity cheese), and bread that doesn't have cornmeal on it, for the love of all that is right and true. Seriously, California, what is your problem with the cornmeal? Cut it out, it's disgusting.

CHEESE: Wayyyy too much. Low grade. Oily and tasteless.

SAUCE: Barely there, but not bad. Probably the best component.

CRUST: Mostly uncooked with a slight tooth to the bottom.

Bottom line, this is some hot greasy slop, but certainly not the worst pizza I've eaten in SF yet.

Best eaten when drunk.

Nizario's Pizza
3840 Geary Boulevard (between 2nd Ave & 3rd Ave)
San Francisco, CA 94118
Neighborhood: Inner Richmond
(415) 752-7777
http://www.nizarios.com