Last weekend my brother was in town with his car, so of course I wanted to show him some of New York’s finest pizza’s, but I also wanted to catch a ride to a pizzeria that is otherwise a pain to get to by subway. We chose Di Fara Pizza at 1424 Avenue J here in Brooklyn, which has topped a good number of pizza rankings in the last several years, as anyone who’s seen their walls of collected magazine and paper articles can attest.

The critical thing to remember about this place is that it’s a little pizzeria that suddenly got big press coverage starting sometime in the last ten years or so, despite having been around for closer to forty. This had significant impact on our pizza eating experience, as I’ll explain below.

The Pizza: 8
If I’m not mistaken, this is one of the few top pizzeria’s in the city that doesn’t use a brick oven to make its pies. Trust me when I say that this is in no way a bad thing. The pizza was delicious and perhaps the best part is that you can see the chef, who’s been making pies here for decades, ply his craft. Every ingredient and topping is sliced fresh right in front of you, and added with care before the pie gets put in the oven. The result is a pie with a delicious thin layer of mozzarella baked evenly over hand-made sauce with a slight drizzling of olive oil and topped with a flavorful and aesthetically pleasing portion of basil. The one thing that detracted from this pizza slightly is actually the exact same problem that Lombardi’s pizza had: the crust was soggy in the middle despite being thin and expertly charred everywhere else. As before, I’m forced to dock a point from an otherwise incredible pie.

The Toppings: 7
The toppings were tasty and we could see that they were fresh, as they were added literally right in front of us, but they weren’t as ubiquitous as many that I’ve had recently, and just aren’t particularly transcendent enough to get past simply being “very good” in my book. Really nothing special if you’ve had some of the city’s top pies before.

Other: 2
I regret this, but the truth is that Di Fara Pizza is another instance of an excellent pizza marred by a frustrating eating experience. As I said earlier, the chef makes each pie fresh, right in front of you, which is great. The downside is, he makes everyone else’s pies fresh right in front of you too, and the novelty wears off quickly when you’ve got a dozen orders ahead of yours. The fact that the pizza oven itself can only hold 2 pies at a time doesn’t help move things along either. We went at lunch time, about 1pm, and all told, we waited about a half hour in the congested line that was jutting out the door when we got there, and perhaps another half hour after that to get our pie.

I’d been warned by several pizza critics that it might take a while to get the food at Di Fara, and that they don’t necessarily serve the pies in the order you arrived, but even knowing this, the reality is frustrating and tedious. The place is small and cramped, your standard hole-in-the-wall with seating for maybe 15 people at a stretch, which ordinarily would be okay for a pizzeria if you didn’t have to spend an hour there waiting before you even get your food. This singular annoyance detracted considerably from the experience.

The Bottom Line
Don’t go out of your way. The pizza is good, yes, but the location is remote to most NYC commuters unless you have a car, and even if you can get there easily, you may be having second thoughts after the long wait for your food. I think that if you arrive on a really off-time, like 11:30 in the morning or something, you might not have to wait, but even a few orders ahead of you can back up the entire line by maybe 10 minutes a piece, so budget your time accordingly.

Hard to imagine New York City without a pizza place on every block, isn’t it? But believe it or not, NYC was not always the bustling pizza metropolis we know and love today. In fact, it is widely believed that pizza surfaced on the streets of the big apple in the early 1900s, and if the legends are true, we have one pioneering pizzeria to thank for it: Lombardi’s.

Most New York Pizza enthusiasts will have heard the name Lombardi’s before, perhaps owing as much to it’s reputation for serving top quality pizza to this very day, as to its broad acknowledgment as being the first pie in the city. A few weeks ago, I decided that it was time to step beyond the vale at 32 Spring Street in Manhattan and find out what this famous slice of New York was really made of.

The Pizza: 8
The pizza at Lombardi’s was actually quite delicious, in keeping with it’s reputation. While I can’t vouch for what it may have tasted like in the paste, the current incarnation of Lombardi’s pizza was definitely one of the better pies in the city, but perhaps not quite a top tier competitor. The sauce was exceptional with a precise balance of basil working to compliment the tomato base. The cheese was Buffalo Mozzarella, as I’ve come to expect from many of the top pizza joints, but it was sliced thin and spread across the pie liberally, scoring some nice points over the competition. I docked some points for the crust however, because it was soggy and droopy in the middle. Once you eat past this, the crust is foldable, but the fold didn’t help me on those first few bites. Without consistently crunchy and foldable crust, I had to knock this pizza down to an 8 despite its otherwise near perfect design.

The Toppings: 9
The toppings were my usual, pepperoni and mushrooms, which always make a delightful combination. This occasion was no exception, and i was especially pleased with the quality of the mushrooms. If you’re a mushroom lover, you probably dig that slightly pungent flavor, and these mushrooms took their flavor to the next level. Absolutely fantastic! The pepperoni was also good, cooked to a nice crispiness as only the top pizzeria’s in the city can without drying it up.

Other: 6
Not unlike the digs at Patsy’s, this is a full blown restaurant with tables and a waiting staff. What was very different from Patsy’s was how packed it was. We dropped by around 6:15 and had to elbow our way to the hostess where we put our name down for a table with about a forty minute wait. This wasn’t honestly too surprising, given Lombardi’s reputation and the dinner hour rush, so we backtracked and waited in a nearby bar until we thought we could go back and claim the table. Incidentally, there is a bar at Lombardi’s that you can wait at, but it seemed cramped and crowded, so we didn’t make the attempt.

Once seated, the service was like clockwork, but definitely no frills to be had here. The place was far too crowded and the staff far too busy for anyone to fuss too much over any one table, and we were seated in the basement area with the wine along with several other parties, so it we didn’t see our waitress much anyway. Fortunately, we decided to keep it simple, and our pizza came in a timely fashion.

Price wasn’t any more of an obstacle than it is at any of the top pizza places, and the food is definitely worth the indulgence, but they aren’t cutting you any breaks, especially when payment is cash only. Overall I’m only giving this place a rating of 6 for the “other” category because of the combination of hectic dining and no credit cards.

The Bottom Line
Try it during off-hours and bring cash. While everything was good, it could have been so much better if we’d been able to sit at ground level without a wait. Take away the slightly hectic atmosphere and I’m sure that you’ll have a much better time here.

Since I haven’t posted in a while, here’s a quickie to wet your appetite as I dive into yet another round of pizza exploration. As I may have mentioned in the past, I’ve been using one very comprehensive list of top pizzeria’s in NYC in addition to my own research and questionares. This Pizza Bible, as I’ve come to know it, has led me to some of the best pies in the city, and now that I’ve finally found the online version, it’s time to share its knowledge and wisdom with all of you. So now, compliments of Time Out New York, I give you The Pizza Bible! May it lead you to the promised land as it has me.