Brooklyn Pie Co.
8127 Mesa Ste. B-202, 346-1414;
2711 La Frontera #330, Round Rock, 512/255-1414
Daily, 10:30am–9pm
www.brooklynpie.com
Located in a strip center, this pizzeria is decorated with items that try to evoke a New York City of the past. The website tells us a story about how David Ross wanted to be the first Jewish-American to open a pizzeria, and the recipe was discovered in the mid-1940s. My guess is that Ross wasn’t the first Jewish-American pizzeria owner, and the two strip center locations hardly evoke post-World War II New York. But all of that aside, Brooklyn Pie asserts that it serves a true New York-style pizza.
It offers pies in 10-, 14-, and 18-inch sizes, with prices ranging between $8 and $30; there’s a large choice of optional toppings in mostly moderate price ranges, and between 10:30am and 5pm you can get pizza by the slice. We went with the spicy Sicilian sausage for the sausage option, a sliced vs. crumble-style sausage.
The pie seemed to take a long while to emerge from the kitchen. Regardless, the crust was chewy and dense, with an indented furrow where the pizza wheel had tried to cut through it. It could have been caused by a dull cutter, but taste and texture indicated otherwise. The sausage was not spicy and did not produce the kind of flavor a Sicilian would be proud of. The sauce was lackluster, and the cheese tasted full-milk and was applied as it should be. To top it off, my dining companion bit into some hard foreign object that cost him $600 in dental bills. Not our favorite.
This article appears in September 11 • 2009.
