Max's

Max's pizza located downtown in the Luckie Marietta district boasts the only coal oven pie in Atlanta.

The restaurant is cool but it's in a kinda touristy area. I got the feeling people from conventions and hotels downtown are the folks eating here. We ordered a bottle of wine and the waitress had a real difficult time opening the bottle. I think she was new.

I was hungry and boy did we order some food. The pies are big. 16" is like an extra large pie. I wanted to see what the coal fired oven was all about so I ordered up a classic pie, their margherita, to see if I could distinguish any coal fired flavor. We also ordered another one of their specialty pies, a sausage, goat cheese motz, roasted red onion and basil. Mmm, don't those ingredient go well together? Gotta give some props to Max's for putting this combo together. Just reading it on the menu made my mouth water.

The margherita was solid. Not special. That could be attributed to my lack of interest in the dough. The dough was short on flavor and not charred enough. I wonder what kinda temps that coal oven is workin' with? If an oven isn't hot enough it can be difficult to char the dough correctly without over cooking the toppings.

The sausage, goat cheese motz, roasted red onion and basil pie was very good. The dough was underwhelming like the other pie but what it lacked in dough it made up in an insane topping selection.

Max's pizza sauce is good, the ingredients fresh and the service fast. Overall I think it's just good. I'm not going out of my way to eat here if you know what I'm saying.

Jack's Pizza & Wings

Either they changed their wing recipe or I'm just really happy to be back in America cause that stuff was good last night. Baked wings with a peppery hot sauce. For real, I think they did step up their wing recipe since my last visit.

Come n' get it!

Zaxby's

On The Road

Zaxby's is my go to place when I'm road-trippin'. I'm sure everyone has had 'em so needless to say they are solid every time. The sauce is sweet and hot, the chicken cooked just less than "crispy". Yum.

Varasano's

Pizza His Way
I have been hearing a lot of noise surrounding the "authentic" Italian pies from Varasano's. A lot coming from the mouth, or rather keyboard of owner/restaurateur Jeff Varasano. So Friday night we went to check it out.

For a place trying so hard to be an authentic Italian pizzeria and uphold certain rules of how an Italian pizza should be made and even eaten (more on that later) Varasano's sure has an ass backwards atmosphere. It's like an authentic Italian pizzeria in a wannabe snooty midtown restaurant. Weak sauce.

I noticed two things upon arriving at Varasano's. One was Jeff Varasano sitting at the bar eating one of his own pies. This is a good sign right?? Or maybe this guy is so into himself that's all he'll eat. Another was that the place was virtually empty on a Friday night. Why would a place with all this hype be dead on a Friday night? I was about to find out.

When the waiter finally comes to your table he does one of those "Have ya'll been here before" and if the answer is no you get this ten minute speech telling you what pizza is. Sometimes these can be very comical, most of the time annoying.

At the top of the menu there is a hefty paragraph telling you about Jeff Varasano, his pizza and even recommendations of how to eat his pizza. Forks and knifes are frowned upon. Very interesting, not.

A real tasty caprese salad and it was time to pick our pies. We settled on a classic margherita with bufala motz and sausage with fennel and a white pie with ricotta and arugula. Not all pies come with bufala, in fact they have a margherita and a margherita di bufala. Now why would you do that?

I thought the pizza dough was a close 9 on the tasty scale. Real solid. As for the rest of the pies...I really wasn't too impressed with the white pie, I never really am. I need sauce! The margherita with sausage was ok. You can't go wrong with bufala. Really, I love the stuff. The basil was fresh and the sausage good. The sauce was bland and reminded me of a tomato puree. I've had better out of a can.

Varasano's has some work to do, but I doubt they ever will considering they already have the recipe for the "perfect pie".

Pizza On The Stone

Homemade Pie

Got a pizza stone Saturday. If you don't have one, get one.

This pizza killed most pizza I've had around town, and I'm not just sayin' that cause I made it. But I gotta give it up for myself, I'm pretty badass.

Pick up the dough from any pizzeria in town...they'll sell it to you cheap. We got the sauce at Fresh Market and it was very good. Bufala motz, freshy garlic, freshy basil (picked off the plant like 5mins before the pie went in), tomato, shrooms and spicy Italian sausage. Here are the pics...

Dugan's

Dugan's on Ponce
Dugan's is a sports bar on Ponce. I have been wanting to hit up these wings for a minute and finally did last week. I went over for a pitcher of beer, braves game on the big screen and some of their famous wings. They claim they have "Atlanta's Original Hot Wings".

This place has a huge bar and TV's everywhere. The menu has some kick ass specials. Man I love me some specials.

The wings are good. Nice size, cooked right and good flavor. They are hot and sauced up just right. Your basic hot wing done right is what they do at Dugan's. Check em out...

Fellini's

Fellini's...what to say that hasn't been said?
Fellini's could be THE most successful independent pizza chain in town, if not for sure the most well known in Atlanta. There is a reason for their success...consistent, simple, good pie.

The menu is classic and the combination's are right on the money. As far as pizza by the slice goes Fellini's can't be beat. Slices the size of your face loaded with toppings and extra cheese.

I had what I usually order when I do slices here. Spinach mushroom and a special. The spinach mushroom is topped with fresh spinach, mushrooms, garlic and extra cheese. They don't hold back on any toppings including the garlic. It is a super tasty slice, perhaps my favorite in town. The special is your standard "everything" slice, top it all off with extra cheese and wallah it's magic baby! The dough is typical, but good and the sauce is definitely on point.

Fritti

Fritti
Man it was a nice day yesterday, and today for that matter. After a bottle on the cafe di sol patio with Mal we decided to hit up Fritti right down the street in Inman Park for some pie. Noah was joining us. I was pumped to be eating with these folks.

Fritti is a fairly well known pizza spot in the ATL and has been for several years. I had eaten there when I lived in the neighborhood 3 or 4 years ago. I can't remember exactly what I thought of it. After all, I wasn't exactly taking into account I would be writing of it later. So I sat down with an open mind and an open stomach.

A bottle of Chianti and some calamari and our pie was on it's way. Mal and me got the Speck e Rucola...Smoked prosciutto, bufala motz, cherry tomatoes and arugula.

Noah ordered the Salame Piccante...Spicy salame and black olives.

It was kinda funny because the menu didn't say but Noah's had sauce and ours didn't. That wasn't too cool. We got a big side sauce for dippin' and it worked. Then we find out that they don't cut their pizzas. For real?? After the fact I figured out from their website that this was some Italian tradition or something. I've never seen it though. Are you supposed to just pick it up and bite into it? By the way, that doesn't sound like a bad idea. Or just go at it with your fork and knife? Or do what I did? Attempt to slice it up like a normal pie.

Look at this picture of Noah after he found out they wouldn't slice his pie...

The pizza was real good though. The cheese is that bufala stuff they have over at Antico, the smoked prosciutto was tasty, could of had more tomato and the arugula was super fresh. I really liked the dough also. Sweet and salty just how I like it. I had a slice of Noah's also and it was real good. I wouldn't have gone for the salami, but it was a good representation of what that pie could of been.

This place has a real good rap around town. I think the ingredients are fresh and the pies creative, but there's something they're not hitting. I left satisfied but thinking there could have been more.

Elwood's Pizza

These chicks can flip pie...
Saturday evening I met some folks for some pizza at Elwood's, around the corner from the Brookhaven MARTA station.

This place is good, nothing special. We ordered two pies...One a spinach, mushroom, garlic. One chicken, feta, black olive. I dunno, I didn't order that one. The dough was standard, I like more salty sweet. The sauce was good. The pies were cheesed up nice. The spinach pie could have used more garlic. A slice of the same spinach, mushroom, garlic combination at Fellini's kills Elwood's attempt at the classic pie combo.

One thing I noticed when I first walked in was that it was all chicks working at this pizza spot. I mean tossin' dough and all. I don't see this much and it was super cool. These girls are good too, all the pizza was cooked perfect and tossed just right.

Larry - Sugar Hill, GA

Homemade Pizza Oven
Here are some pics I found of a dude in the burbs who made his own wood burning pizza oven. Looks f'in badass, he could use some practice tossin' dough though.
Dad, can I build one at your house?

R. Thomas Delux Grill

Uber Heady
R. Thomas is on Peachtree between Buckhead and Midtown. Big neon sign, you can't miss it. Kinda a quirky place...from the parrots and cockatoos chillin' in cages outside to the hippie/bohemian vibe going on inside.

Open round the clock and I don't think I've ever been so confused by a menu. Not the food on the menu, but the actual menu. Check it out at rthomasdeluxgrill.net, it's in some funky kinda order that threw me for a loop.

The menu kinda reflects the hippie vibe of the restaurant. Lots of organic this and that, solid veggie menu, etc. My wings were from free range chickens. That's cool and all, but I need some meat on my bones! These wings are tiny matched up against other wings around town. Check these out...the drum and the flat combined are the size of the wings at Fox Bros.

I must say though, the wings are pretty tasty. They are slow-roasted, char-grilled and tossed in some sweet kinda hot sauce. Not that hot at all but very good. That's homemade blue cheese you see there too. Put the wing in the blue cheese and eat em' both up.

Char-grilled wings are good, and I really don't see them much. Try it out.

With all this said...I officially give the title of headiest wings to R. Thomas.

Antico

Antico Pizza was crazy good.

This place is right over the connector, on the west-side, over by Georgia Tech. Totally worth the short drunken cab drive it took to get us there.

I checked out the Antico website after hearing some chatter around town and a write up in Creative Loafing. I really didn't know what to think...Was the pizza thin, crispy, thick or soft? Do they have LOTS of cheese? What's the dining room like?

When we got to Antico we quickly learned they don't serve alcohol, its BYOB :)! Although we came empty handed we were quickly directed to a gas station down the street. A short walk and we were all set.

When you walk in Antico something seems very familiar and comfortable. It is super laid back, community seating. This means you are sitting or standing wherever with whoever. I love it. People sparking conversation and poppin' bottles all around you.

Okay, on to the pizza. We ordered the Capricciosa. Bufula motz, artichoke, mushrooms and prosciutto. This thing was so good Mal, Bridget and me killed it in no time, then ordered another. The second pie was the San Gennaro. Sweet red pepper, bufula motz and some spicy sausage. Both pies were cooked perfect, good ingredients and pizza sauce that I think I could drink it was so good. The crust was soft and crispy, what? It was sweet and salty. I know I was a little tipsy, but I think I really like this place a lot!

Here is a pic of the ovens and these super long peels they use to throw the pies in them. This was the first time I have seen peels this big. They're like 15ft long!

Savage Pizza

It was a Saturday night and three fine ladies joined me for some pre-game pie at the Little Five Points staple, Savage Pizza. We were headed to see my favorite local band Lloyds Rocksteady Review at the 5 Spot (http://www.myspace.com/lloydsrocksteadyrevue). The pie was good but the show turned out to be a flop (just a bunch of Marley covers, it was Marley’s B-Day, wasn’t really the band I had seen a few months earlier). Anyhow, here’s my review…

The restaurant is comic book themed. Walls covered with classic comic book heroes and villains. Action figures and all.

The pizza reflects the atmosphere. Creative pies with a variety of different sauce concoctions and toppings.

At Savage there is no pizza by the slice (After 4p.m.). Just hand tossed pies: small, medium and large. You can choose your own sauce and create your own pizza, or order from the many tasty selections already on the menu (http://savagepizza.com/locations/little-five-points/little-five-points-menu/menu-little-five-points).

Mallory and I split a small pie. They are 9”, 4 slices and enough for two. If you’re really hungry you could go for a medium. We chose the Bolognese from their list of specialty pies. It comes with the red wine marinara sauce, Italian sausage, sun-dried tomatoes, red onions, mushrooms, parmesan and mozzarella cheeses. Jenny and Bridget split a small pie with spinach, artichoke, red onions, olives and jalapeno. I think, I might be forgetting some stuff but for the most part I think that’s what they ordered.

The pies came out smokin’ hot. Perfectly round with consistent crust. Toppings proportioned nicely and well baked. Whoever tossed these pizzas knew what they were doin’! That red wine marinara is delich’! Me and Mal really dug our pizza. We scarfed that pie down. The mozzarella was tongue tingling tasty and the other ingredients like the sundried tomatoes and Italian sausage complemented nicely.

This wasn’t my first time eating Savage, and I can tell you I always leave satisfied. This time was no exception. The pizza was great!

Shout out to Jenny, Bridget and Mal. Nothing beats dinner with a group of sexy ladies and a few pitchers of cold beer!