The front of Bardolino Pizza at 1505 Lexington Avenue
I was up at the Museum of the City of New York one night for a special event and I stopped in for a quick dinner. They advertised outside for a special for two slices of cheese with a soda for $6.00 and I was so happy for a reasonable meal.
The delicious Pizza Dinner Special for $6.00
It always amazes me when I try a small pizzeria and the food is just mind-blowingly good. Not only were the slices over-sized and loaded with gooey cheese that strung when it is pulled but the red sauce that the foundation for the pizzeria’s dishes is excellent.
I could tell by the tiny chunks of tomato that the sauce was made fresh and you could tell in the consistency and flavor of the pizza. It is far better than the many places I have pizza in New York City.
The interesting pizza selections at Bardolino’s Pizza.
I was so taken by the pizza that the next night I was visiting the Metropolitan Museum of Art and walked an extra ten blocks to try a Meatball Parmesan hero ($10.00) for dinner. It was also excellent.
The excellent Meatball hero loaded with their delicious red sauce.
Yum!
A fresh chewy hero roll lightly toasted with a large portion of freshly made meatballs sliced inside the roll and topped with more of their delicious sauce and loaded with lots of mozzarella melted on top. The sandwich was out of this world and made such a nice dinner on a cool night.
Their menu has very fair prices.
The menu has many items under the ten dollar range and being so close to the projects a block up the road (the restaurant is on the northern border of the Upper East Side and East Harlem), that they have to keep the prices at a certain level to cater to the mixture of customers that they have to cater to.
The lunch and dinner specials that they offer.
There is something for everyone here and it attracts people at all hours. I was amazed how many people were coming in for complete meals as they were getting off work at 10:00pm.
It is a great little pizzeria and very underrated.
There are many pizzerias all over New York City but some stand out more than others. There are some that are just so unassuming, and you would not think twice about going to eat there. This is what I thought of King Pizza of Harlem until I stopped there last year for a quick lunch when I was walking “The Great Saunter”, the 32-mile perimeter walk of Manhattan.
It was raining like crazy last May and I needed to stop in to get something to eat and get out of the rain. I have passed this pizzeria so many times and never stopped in. I am glad that I did. The food and service are excellent.
I have only tried their pizza, but they have so much more on the menu with sandwiches, garlic knots, calzones and stuffed rolls and baked pastas. It is their pizza that I enjoy every time that I come here. Their slices are a little pricy at $3.00 for a slice of cheese and $4.00-$4.50 for a specialty slice but you get a slice that can feed two people very easily.
The Cheese pizza here warms you up on a cold day.
Their tomato sauce is what really makes the pizza here. The sauce is the base for all of their delicious dishes and has a nice flavor of fresh tomatoes, olive oil and spices. It really brings out the flavor of the pizza.
A slice here can feed two people it is so large.
When I was walking “The Great Saunter” again in June, I stopped again as I needed the carbs for such a long walk and the lunch really filled me up. Two slices can be a lot on a hot day. Still the pizza is consistently wonderful, and I did not need to eat again for the rest of the day.
My lunch recently at King Pizza with a slice of cheese and a slice of the Ground Beef. It was like eating four slices of pizza.
The owner who I have met many times at the restaurant sold me on the Ground Beef pizza that had just come out of the oven. The ground beef was cooked with spices and what tasted like red wine. This gave the pizza a more complex taste to it and was a real surprise. I was very impressed.
The Ground Beef pizza is worth the trip up to West 145th Street.
The slices here may be a bit more than most of your Dollar Pizzerias and other neighborhood spots but the quality of the pizza, the taste and the size of the slices make it a real deal for both lunch and dinner. With most of their sandwiches and pastas under $10.00, the restaurant is a real hidden gem of good food and service within the boundaries of the SUNY campus that is just blocks from it.
I have always been impressed by this small pizzeria and you will be too when you dine here.
I love exploring Greenwich Village. Here and there tucked into corners are all sorts of interesting stores and restaurants. One of the standouts is Village Pizza at 65 Eighth Avenue. This small hole in the wall pizzeria offers delicious food and excellent friendly service.
The inside of the restaurant
The first time I tried the restaurant, I stopped in for lunch before classes at NYU. I had the most wonderful Meatball Sandwich ($8.95), in which you are served four large meatballs on a soft chewy roll with fresh marinara sauce.
The Chicken and Meatball Parmesan sandwiches are really good
The meatballs I could tell were home made as well as the sauce was made from scratch. You could really taste the fresh tomatoes and spices in the sauce. It was delicious. It was a wonderful meal and filled me up for a long day of classes.
On the second trip, I tried the Chicken Parmesan sandwich ($9.95), which was a nice sized sandwich filled with chopped Chicken Breast and topped with lots of Mozzarella Cheese and topped with more of their delicious Marinara sauce.
Though the sandwich was good, it would have been better if they had fried a fresh cutlet inside of using the chopped pieces that they use on the pizza. One or two pieces were a bit hard when you bit into it. This should have been freshly cooked for the sandwich. The bread was excellent though and it did taste really good.
I stopped in after class recently for just a quick snack and treated myself to a slice of sausage pizza which was excellent ($3.25). The slice was loaded with sliced sausage and mozzarella cheese. I asked one of the cooks if they made the sauce homemade and surprisingly he said no. I said it is spiced so perfectly I would have never know and he seemed pleased by it.
I also had one of their Pepperoni Rolls ($2.00) which is like a mini-calzone. It is stuffed with mozzarella and pepperoni and wrapped in a soft pizza dough. It was wonderful to munch on after a long day in class.
The sausage pizza is excellent
The pepperoni rolls make the perfect snack
I stopped in for a slice of Cheese Pizza recently and the prices have gone up in 2023. The Cheese slice was $3.50 and a Coke was $1.50 so there had been a slight increase in the prices. The pizza was still excellent.
My lunch on a recent visit
The Cheese slice is a little pricey but still delicious.
There is always a nice selection of pizza by the slice and all sorts of rolls, calzones and garlic knots to choose from. Even the full size pies are very fairly priced.
The prices here are really fair and you can get a nice meal for under $10.00 depending on what you order.
I have been coming to J’s Pizza for many years and had eaten here in the past after viewing the Halloween Parade in October. I just rediscovered it again when I started grad school in the neighborhood and forgot how good the food was when I dined here. The pizza slices are generous in size and their marinara and pizza sauces you can tell are freshly made and not from a can.
The sauces for all the meals here from the pizza, to the spaghetti and meatballs to the sauce that is the side to the many rolls and calzones is well spiced and has so much flavor to it. It really makes the dishes.
J’s Pizza counter is lined with pizzas and calzones
The wonderful garlic knots, Chicken and Pepperoni Rolls and Grandma Pizza
The Chicken, Sausage and Pepperoni rolls and fresh Grandma Pizza
The selection of pizzas by the slice are extensive
The menu is very extensive and what I like about dining here is that there are a lot of options if you are on the run. They have a nice selection of pizzas by the slice at later hours of the day and they are always so fresh. There is a nice selection of rolls and calzones as well if you want something a bit more filling.
The menu is extensive and very reasonable
The Daily Specials at J’s Pizza
Their prices are very fair and the portion sizes are generous with everything you order. I like the daily dinner specials even though they have raised the prices a bit they are still a great bargain if you are on a budget.
Many of the meals that I have had recently have not exceeded $10.00 or just a bit more than $10.00 with a drink and tax. You are not going to get a better bargain with the quality and size of the portion.
My first dinner there was this delicious Baked Ziti Pizza
With the creamy pasta and the rich sauce it was like eating two meals in one.
My second trip was for this wonderful Chicken Roll
The Tuesday Night Special is Spaghetti & Meatballs for $9.00
On a cold and rainy night at the end of the November, I stopped in after class for dinner needing some comfort food on this chilly evening. I ordered the Lasagna, which I was in the mood for (it is on the special at the end of the week but I need it). It was really good.
Layers of Lasagna noodles with lots of mozzarella cheese and ground meatballs. It could have used some Ricotta Cheese in it but still it was topped with their delicious sauce and served with a side of garlic knots. What better way to end this gloomy evening. Everything was delicious.
The perfect comfort food on a cold night. A Lasagna dinner with Garlic knots.
On a recent trip, I had a Cheese Calzone ($8.00), which on a cold night was the perfect comfort food. It was filled with mozzarella and ricotta cheeses. It oozed with cheese when I bit into it and served with their wonderful marinara sauce.
The Cheese Calzone was excellent
The calzone oozed with cheese
On a cool evening I stopped in and had a meatball sandwich ($8.00). It takes about ten minutes for one of their sandwiches but it is well worth it. The meatballs are fresh and have a nice garlicy taste to them and their marinara sauce is excellent. The hero roll was so fresh and chewy it really makes the sandwich. With a icy Coke, it was the perfect meal on a cold night in NYC.
The meatball sandwich
I love to stop here after school is over because it is one of the last restaurants that is still reasonable in the neighborhood. I stopped in for a Margarita slice and it hit the spot. The creamy fresh mozzarella with the fresh tomato sauce was the perfect antidote after a long Digital Marketing class.
If it is on the menu, get the Margarita pizza with the fresh tomato sauce and the creamy fresh mozzarella.
To add to trying all the stuffed rolls on the menu, I had to try the Pepperoni Roll ($4.00) with its layers of sliced spicy pepperoni in between the soft pizza dough. The perfect comfort food on a cool night in the City.
There are layers and layers of sliced pepperoni inside the soft pizza dough.
The Pepperoni Bread is excellent with some red sauce to dip in.
On a late night after a long class at school, I decided to stop in for a late dinner and they had the board of specials that I looked over. I ordered the Baked Ziti dinner and it was wonderful. The perfect lunch/dinner combo that filled me up after a long class.
The Baked Ziti dinner at J’s Pizza could have fed two people.
The Baked Ziti was loaded with mozzarella cheese and then topped with more cheese so it was layers and layers of cheese.
The Baked Ziti is amazing here.
They also give you a generous portion of garlic knots to sop up the sauce.
The service is really wonderful and the owner is really friendly to me when I come in on Tuesdays for dinner (Class night). It is nice that there are still places in Manhattan for wonderful reasonable meals.
I swear that Chelsea Papaya has been part of this neighborhood since the 1970’s. I have passed this place a million times and never stopped in to eat. Recently when I was walking around the rim of Manhattan for ‘The Great Saunter” walk, I needed an early start, and this place opens at 5:00am (please check their website for the changing hours).
Chelsea Papaya at 171 West 23rd Street specials
For breakfast that morning I knew I would need to load up on carbohydrates so I ordered a Breakfast platter. I had two very large pancakes with a side of bacon and two scrambled eggs ($7.95) with a medium Papaya drink. It was the best breakfast on this rare cool summer morning.
The pancakes had a nice malted taste to them and were crisp and fluffy. The eggs were sizzling hot off the grill with the flavor of clarified butter. It was quite a large breakfast and it lasted me for most of the morning and afternoon.
The breakfast here is excellent
The only problem that I had with breakfast was that you could not eat inside and I had to eat at one of the filthy outdoor tables that were available. They looked like the homeless had slept at them all night.
Chelsea Papaya is open all night
Recently I was in the neighborhood and stopped in for dinner. I had a hamburger platter with French Fries and a Mango drink ($8.95). This was a hearty meal. The burger was freshly cooked with a rich caramelized outside and a juicy inside. The tomato slices were good but the shredded lettuce there could have been less of and could have been fresher.
I tried the Fried Chicken Sandwich and it was much better. The Fries had just come out the fryer along with the Chicken Cutlet. Even though it had the shredded lettuce and tomato on top, they seemed much fresher on the second trip. I really enjoyed the meal. It had been after class and I really needed a good dinner.
The Chicken Sandwich and fries are cooked to order here
The Chicken Sandwich #4 Special at Chelsea Papaya
It was delicious!
The fries were a standard steak fry but they were cooked to order and crisp and hot when I bit into them. The hamburger was also topped with ketchup and mayo and the whole burger was a flavorful gloppy mess that tasted so delicious with each bite.
The Papaya and Mango drinks are sweet and flavorful and traditional in these Papaya chain restaurants. They will really cool you down on a hot day.
The breakfasts at Chelsea Papaya are excellent
The service is very nice and both the men who work the counter have been so friendly and welcoming to me. It is one of those typical New York restaurants that we are slowly losing to the bigger chains. These small restaurant institutions are what make up the Manhattan neighborhoods.
Previti Pizza has replaced Pizza Halal and has been fully renovated. It now has different owners and employees. The food is still excellent but more expensive.
I recently came across Pizza and Pita pizzeria when I was walking the borders of Murray Hill for my blog, “MywalkinManhattan.com”. The pizzeria was closed for seating but there was take out available. It is not the fanciest place to eat what it lacks in decor it makes up in the quality and portion size of the food and friendly service.
The selection of pizzas in the case at Previti Pizza.
I needed a snack and saw that they had just taken a fresh pie out of the oven for display and it looked really good. I got a slice and it was delicious. The sauce is really well spiced and you can taste the tomatoes when biting into it. They loaded on the mozzarella cheese and it was a nice combination of stringy and cheesy goodness as you bit into it. At $3.00 a slice and the size of the slice, it is really a bargain.
The Cheese pizza is really good but a bit pricey.
The Cheese pizza has a delicious sauce as a base and plenty of cheese.
I was so impressed by the pizza that I went back later that evening for dinner. I really was in the mood for a Chicken Parmesan hero and that is what I ordered. I watched how they put the whole sandwich together.
They got a fresh hoagie roll, sliced it and toasted it. While they were doing that, they fried out two large freshly breaded chicken cutlets and deep fried them and then they came out drained them and sliced them placing them on the bread. They topped it with a lot of their delicious sauce and lots of shredded mozzarella cheese. Then the whole sandwich was baked again for a toasted bubbly top to the sandwich.
Every bite was delicious and it was a very nice sized sandwich. At $8.95, it was a very fair price considering the size of the sandwich. It could have easily fed two people.
The service was very nice too. The counter guy was happy when I told him how much I liked his pizza. He seemed even happier when I came back for dinner and said I was so impressed by the pizza that I wanted to try one of their sandwiches as well.
I was recently back in Murray Hill to finish my walk of the neighborhood and I just wanted a snack. I got two of their Garlic Knots with a side of marinara sauce which was just $1.50. That was some deal because these large, doughy and chewy knots were loaded with garlic and spices. The marinara sauce if full of flavor and has a nice tomato flavor. It was an enjoy enjoyable snack.
The food case at Previti Pizza is filled with all sorts of rolls, patties and knots.
The Garlic Knots at the old restaurant.
The guys were really nice and seemed please that I was so happy with the food.
This amazing pizzeria I came across on my trips to lower Manhattan on walking tours and when going to Governor’s Island. It is located right near Fraunces Tavern and Stone Street right near Wall Street. It is a nice place to stop for lunch if you are going to Liberty or Ellis Island.
The first time I ate here, I just had a slice of sausage pizza ($3.75) and it was just excellent. The sauce has the right amount of spices in it and it is loaded with cheese. The ground sausage is loaded into the cheese and is in every bite when you sink your teeth into the slice. The sausage is a sweet sausage with the right amount of sage in it. I also tried their Sicilian Slice ($3.00) which had a nice soft pillowy consistency with lots of cheese and sauce on top.
The second time I had lunch at the restaurant, it was for one of their weekly specials. I had the Rigatoni with Meat Sauce with a garlic knot ($8.00) and a slice of cheese pizza ($2.75). Their cheese pizza is excellent too for you purists who don’t like anything on their pizza. It is the right combination of sauce and cheese and the place is so busy at lunch time that the slices were fresh and gooey.
The Cheese Pizza is excellent!
The Rigatoni was perfectly cooked and had a nice ground beef and pork meat sauce on top. They gave you about a half a pound of pasta and it was freshly cooked. The meat sauce had a nice rich flavor to it and was perfect to soak the garlic knot up with after the pasta was gone.
One word of advice though is do not dine here at night before closing time. I had such a mediocre dinner here that if I was not so hungry I would have returned the food. I really did go against my better judgement when ordering dinner at 7:00pm and not realizing that they close at 8:00pm. Although the food tasted really good and they make a delicious tomato sauce the quality of the food was not as good because it looked like it had been sitting in the steam table for about two hours. Everything was hard. The taste was there but not the same quality as it is when it is busy. These guys should know better than that.
Every day during the week, there are about three or four entrees that are on the specials priced between $8.00-$9.00 and it is a nice selection of chicken, beef and seafood dishes. The daily specials are served with a pasta or vegetable when applicable. The garlic knot is complimentary with the pasta dishes.
They have all sorts of specials to choose from that are really fresh!
The service here is a little rushed when they are busy but I have found the staff here to be very friendly and welcoming. They will not steer you wrong on any dish.
This is the perfect place to eat when exploring the Battery area or on a trip out to the island surrounding Manhattan.
*In 2022, the prices have gone up so please stop at the restaurants to check their prices.
I have eaten at many pizzerias in New York City for my walking project, ‘MywalkinManhattan.com’ but when I was finishing the Upper West Side, I came across Little Italy Pizza on the corner of 72nd Street and Amsterdam Avenue at 2047 Broadway. The food here is amazingly good and very reasonable.
It is not one of the ‘dollar slice’ pizza places that litter the City now. The slices here are priced fairly ($2.95-$20.00 for a full pie) and the slices are quite large. I have tried the cheese pizza slices twice and whether they are fresh out of the oven or just warmed up for you, the quality is excellent.
The pizza slices are very generous
The sauce has a rich tomatoey taste to it and is well spiced. That is what makes a pizza, the combination of sauce to the mozzarella cheese it is topped. Each bite is a gooey delight.
The Cheese Pizza Special for $6.99
The Sicilian slices ($3.50-$22.00 for a full pie) are just as good. These pillowy delights are also large in size and have a nice crunch to them when you bite into the slice. They are soft on the top and crisp on the bottom. One slice is more than enough for lunch.
Their Garlic Knots ($2.50) are really good. They are loaded with chopped garlic and butter and these five nice sized knows come with dipping sauce that really brings out the flavor. These make the perfect snack when you are hungry but not that hungry.
The garlic knots are really good
Their calzones ($6.50) are excellent. They are huge and could feed two hungry people. This small pizza is prepared like a turnover and is loaded with ricotta, mozzarella and Parmesan cheese, baked to perfection and served with a side of their delicious marinara sauce.
The Cheese Calzone
Each bite provides the right mix of cheeses and dough and to finish it off you can dip it in the sauce. This is the same for both locations I like visiting. It can feed two people easily.
I stopped in recently for dinner and had one of their Chicken Rolls ($7.00) and the roll must have been at least a foot long because they had to cut it in two to put in the to go bag. It could have easily fed two people.
The Chicken Roll can easily feed two people.
It was larger than the calzone. It was filled with mozzarella cheese and chopped chicken parmesan and it was more than a few mouthfuls.
Each bite of the Chicken Roll was delicious.
It was like a small chicken parmesan pizza that had been folded over and baked. It was the perfect meal. (Word of advice: ask for a second container of their sauce. One small one will not be enough.) A 20 oz fountain soda is $2.00.
At the University Place branch, I had the lunch special which is two Cheese slices and a large beverage, and the special is well worth it. The slices here were oversized and much larger than most pizzerias. The sauce was just as flavorful, and the slices were delicious.
The Little Italy Cheese pizza in Greenwich Village is excellent.
I tried one of their Pepperoni Rolls this evening ($7.00) and what a delicious meal it made on a cold night. Their rolls are rather large and can be shared by two people but I was so hungry that I ate the whole thing myself.
The Pepperoni Roll with their Marinara Sauce
The roll was stuffed with a large portion of pepperoni and mozzarella cheese and had been warmed up for me. The cheese could have been a bit more melted but the roll was well cooked and had a nice spicy taste because of the pepperoni. I really enjoyed the roll.
The stuff the pepperoni rolls with lots of ingredients
The only problem is that they serve the rolls and calzones with cold marinara sauce which their uptown branch does not do. Still it was delicious and filling. Sill it is a nice accompaniment to the rolls.
The Chicken Roll is just amazing. They put almost an entire chopped chicken cutlet tucked inside the chewy pizza dough.
The Chicken Roll lunch I had at the NYU location was excellent.
The service can be rushed at times when they are busy but still they get the food out to you quickly and they are as friendly as they can be in this busy pizzeria. The staff at both locations are very nice and accommodating.
The Chicken Roll is delicious here.
Little Italy Pizza menu in Greenwich Village.
The history of Little Italy Pizza:
Salvatore, the brother of the owner, observed and learned how to prepare grandma’s pies at a very young age. We later found out from a few of our older Italian customers that our pizza tasted a lot like “pizza alla casalinga’ (housewife-style pizza), “the king of pizza’s you’d get in Italy if you were invited to someone’s home.”
Among the men who left Southern Italy to find their fortunes making pizza my brother, Salvatore has many cherished childhood memories of pizza, made at home by mama and grandma. This pizza was modest, thin-crusted, strewn sparingly with chopped tomatoes from our very own garden and just a little cheese (because cheese was expensive, we were not rich you know), then baked in a pan, stove top style (mama had no pizza oven).
Well, this tradition is still with our Little Italy Pizza today! Only now we have lots and lots of cheese and a nice big oven! Mangia!
(Little Italy Pizza History-provided by the company pamphlet)
This new pizzeria opened in the heart of Chelsea in Manhattan that specializes in ‘Detroit style’ pizza, which is a type of Sicilian pizza that is baked in a deep dish with the cheese baked right into the sides of the pizza producing a caramelized edge to the pizza. Having gone to college at Michigan State University, I was introduced this this type of pizza at a restaurant named “Dooley’s” in the mid-Eighties. It’s nice to see it come to New York City.
Lion’s & Tiger’s (Named after two sports teams in Michigan) & Squares, a very clever ring in the fact that the pizza is cooked in a square pan in a pizza oven. These wonderful deep-dish pizzas are offered with a limited amount of toppings such as pepperoni, sausage and onion, vodka sauce, a spicy type of marinara, mushroom, black olive and the specialty mustard pizza. The topping are also loaded on so the price of the pizza is justified by the amount of sausage and pepperoni that tops these pillowy creations.
The first time I passed this restaurant, I was heading up to the Upper East Side to finish an entry on “MywalkinManhattan.com” blog and wanted a quick snack before I headed uptown. I could not resist the $5.00 for a plain pizza special they had on the outside board. The restaurant was trying to attract business and there was a nice crowd eating at the cocktail tables in the open restaurant (there is no seating here).
I ordered my pizza which had just been made and was reheated for me. Its cut into four generous slices and was a nice deal when on a budget. I ate the pizza on a table in Madison Square Park and bit into the cheesy hard edges of the pizza to taste of carmelization of the cheese with the spiciness of the sauce. For $5.00, you get a four slice pizza that can easily feed two people or one hungry person like myself.
The pizza is crisp on the outside and soft and pillowy on the side and perfectly cooked. The sauce has a nice combination of spices to it and matches nicely with the generous portion of cheese baked right into the dough.
The second time I visited the restaurant, it was mobbed! Word had gotten out and it was all over the Internet on Blogs and videos on YouTube. Customers found the restaurant with generous portions, good customer service and delicious food.
I ordered the Sausage and Onion pizza on my return trip to the restaurant. It was topped with a lot of sausage and chopped sweet onions $10.00 (see review on TripAdvisor) that made a nice combination of flavors. The sweetness of the onions played off the sage in the pork in the sausage and just to add to the flavor, they put a small swirl of maple syrup to top the pizza to bring out the true flavors of the toppings. They also give you a generous portion of sausage and it is layered into the cheese on the pizza.
The third time I visiting, I tried their pepperoni pizza ($11.00) that is loaded on the top with thickly sliced and curling spicy pepperoni. The top of the pizza has a complete layer of it and it is baked into the cheese and sauce. There was a large layer of cheese beneath the sauce. Each bite is a crunchy and spicy experience. The spices of both ingredients play well together.
The pizza at Lions & Tigers & Squares has brought a new type of pizza to the city only those of us who have lived in the Midwest know and now its time to share it with New Yorkers and tourists alike. There is no place to sit but there are cocktail tables inside the entrance to the restaurant. You have Madison Square Park to your left and the High line to the right to sit back and eat your pizza and people watch.
What’s nice about the restaurant as well is that they are open until 4:00am perfect for the after club and bar crowd who made need a late night snack to absorb alcoholic drinks.
I came across Make & Bake Pizzeria when I was visiting East Harlem for my walking project, “MywalkinManhattan” and I needed a snack. I had already visited Moe’s Grocery a few doors down for a ‘Chopped Cheese’ and I needed a slice of pizza.
I followed the school kids from the two schools across the street into the pizzeria and they really seemed to like the pizza here. Because the kids are from the housing projects that surround the school and this part of Second and Third Avenues, the prices at the restaurants in the area are very reasonable. Here the prices are more than reasonable, they are cheap.
A slice of cheese pizza here is $1.00, a soda and water are $1.00, a small cheese calzone is $1.00 and five large garlic knots with sauce on the side is $1.00. There is a limited menu, but everything here is under $5.00 with the exception of a full pizza and the most expensive on is $15.00.
The Cheese Pizza is delicious here.
The pizza here is very good. They load up on the cheese and it is nice and stringy when you bite into it. You have to be sure the pie is fresh. The sauce which is what I think gives the pizza its personality is nicely spiced and has a lot of flavor to it. The overall taste of the pizza is very good for a dollar a slice place. It is busy all the time so the pies have always been fresh when I have eaten there.
The garlic knots don’t last long either and they are nicely sized and are loaded with garlic. They come with a small side of their marinara sauce for dipping.
The Garlic knots are really good
The restaurant is nothing to look at and by no means fancy but the place is packed after school with both kids and their parents. It is obvious to me that they know most of their customers because the owner greets a lot of the kids by name.
It is not in a tourist area and can be a rough area at night if you don’t know this section of the City but if you are up at one of the upper ‘Museum Mile’ museums, this is not that far of a walk away. It is an adventure I can tell you that.
East Harlem Pizza:
I recently made a trip up to East Harlem as I have not been up here since the pandemic started. It was obvious to me that the owners of Make & Bake Pizza either closed or sold the place. They have now been replaced by East Harlem Pizza, whose owners have since renovated the place. It is now more updated and brighter.
The food is also more expensive that it was under the previous owners. Even though I could see that they have put a lot more effort into it cleaning it up and all, the prices have now doubled. It is still cheaper than places downtown but it is pricey for this neighborhood.
I had a slice of pizza, which was still pretty good. Not as good as the old owners but still good and it was $1.99 a slice. The pizza slice was oversized so it made up for the increase but their sauce did not have the same flavor as my many trips in the past.
The Garlic Knots went up to $2.49 for the five knots and the calzones and sandwiches have also gone up to between $6.99-$7. 99. The pasta dishes range from $7.99-$9.99. This is not breaking the bank but still a little pricey for this part of town.
Dining on a Shoestring in the New York City area and beyond. 