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The Great Pizza Quest: The Best Pizza in Philly

Posted by Jason Sheehan on June 24th, 2011

Like all great plans, this one started with one simple, crazy idea: what if we really tried to find the best pizza in Philadelphia?

What if–damning all cost and better judgment–we just started eating and didn’t stop until we knew for sure what the best was? What the worst was? And where everything else fell in between? What if we took notes, cataloged all our opinions, and simply ate and ate and ate until there were no more pies to try?

Three months and more than a thousand pizzas later, we have our answer. We know what the 50 best pizzas in Philadelphia are. We know who has the best crust and the best sauce, who does it best at the table and by the slice. And now, you can, too. In this month’s issue of Philadelphia magazine, we have the top 50 pies in the region all laid out nice and pretty for you. But what’s more, we also have an entire website now devoted to nothing but pizza in Philly–the good, the bad, the brilliant and the inedible.

This is where you go when you’re looking for a Friday night delivery pie in your neighborhood, when you’re looking for a joint that serves slices in Manayunk, when you want to check out that weird little strip mall joint down the street that you’ve always been hesitant to try. We have maps, pictures, a slideshow, a list of Philly’s top 50 pies (and 100 best as well), and a database of over 500 pizza restaurants that you can search until you find exactly what you’re looking for. It’s all there. It’s all waiting, just for you–everything you ever wanted to know about Philadelphia pizza, all in one place.

Enjoy.

The Great Pizza Quest [Philadelphia magazine]


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    This entry was posted on Friday, June 24th, 2011 at 5:30 pm and is filed under Food Nerd News, From the Magazine, Guides, News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.

    • http://mainlinepizzaquest.blogspot.com/ West Chester and Main Line Pizza Quest

      OMG. Well, I guess you wanted controversy, now you got it. You’ve amply demonstrated that while you may have gained weight trying all those pizzas, you surely gained no knowledge. What, no Papa John’s? What a colossal let-down.

    • cleevus

      i actually thought this was going to rank pizza, not pander to every douchebag that has a pizza on their menu. i should know better. it’s philly mag.

    • Pizza Expert

      The Brooklyn Pie at Piccolo Trattoria is by far the greatest pizza ANYWHERE (Philly or otherwise). They have a few locations in the Philly / South Jersey area: http://www.piccolotrattoria.com

    • Willie

      What a stupid, wussy way to go about it – don’t actually rank the 50 best plain pies on merit, we’ll wuss out and rank on individual components. Why would I care if someone has the best freakin sauce if the rest of the pizza sucks? Or good toppings, but soggy crust? What a ridiculous waste of time.

    • Brad

      Cleevus and Willie are correct. This is terrible.

    • Michael G

      Might as well be called the great advertiser quest.

    • h

      This should have been called “”best pizza not in Philly….and a few Philly places thrown in”

    • jay

      Jason Sheehan, you’re obviously quite proud of this piece, you’ve been hyping it up a lot. So why didn’t you issue a top 10,25,50 whatever OVERALL pizza?

    • coward

      Jesus christ. Don’t you same people get tired of seeing yourselves type? Bitching about everything these Philly Mag people write. If Philly Mag can do no right, stop reading it and wasting your time commenting and crying. If they would have ranked the pizzas this comment board would just be littered with you people bitching about how it was ranked! If it means so much to you people than go to school, learn how to write, and apply for a job at a magazine and be the perfect writer you think you can be. Til then…shut the fuck up and just let it go. Read it, enjoy it. Don’t enjoy it, whatever, but man the criticism. Just CHILL….Are you perfect at whatever it is you do in life? Doubt it. It’s just a magazine and pizza is pizza. At least they put in the work to research these pizzas, there are helpful parts of this article. Everyone is such a pizza expert. Guess what…you don’t live in Naples, you live in Philadelphia. Maybe there is no perfect pizza? Stop disecting pizza and eat the damn thing. Unless pizza is horrible, it’s pretty damn good. It’s pizza!

    • jay

      dude come on now. I am not questioning the ranking. I don’t care enough. I question not having a ranking, especially given none of Jason’s hype indicated that there would be no ranking. Kind of like debate over The Killing’s ending, to be fair, we weren’t ever explicitly promised an overall ranking, we just assumed there would be. Maybe we’ll come back for next season’s pizza list in the hope of getting a resolution.

      But Top 50… there isn’t any top 50. There’s a “collection of 50 restaurants that do something related to pizza well.”

    • Willie

      Coward, you wrote the longest and angiest reponse to this yet you’re telling everybody else to chill? Dude, take your own advice.

    • RP

      BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

      This an absurd letdown, anyone who reads this blog could throw 50 places together and categorize them into one of these five categories.

      The pizza database with the 20 word reviews is by far the best part.

    • cleevus

      there are so many inept and innacurate statements in this piece, it makes you wonder how they don’t get sued for using the word “magazine” in the title. the more i read, the more dissapointed i am in myself for thinking this would actually be well done. and, coward, you can suck it.

    • J

      This is all Bart Blatstein’s fault. No, wait, I mean Shola’s fault…

    • Meow

      Lickety Split on south street is the best pizza.

    • FatGuyGolf

      Any list that leaves off Philly’s best pepperoni pie in Philly (at Renzi’s in Bridesburg) cannot be trusted.

    • Phillytomato

      Hi, I have been a subscriber to Philadelphia Magazine, on and off, since 1977 and I can not believe your two writers do not mention Gatea’s Pizza on Castor Ave. in North East Philly. Gatea’s has the BEST Tomato pie, bar none in the Tri-State area. I think in years past, they have won the Best Of Philly from your magazine.

      I can still remember in 1977 when the “Older Italian” women were making the same tomato pie, from the small bakery on the 4900 block of Wakefield Ave., in Germantown.(the north west part of Philly) The taste is still the same, only the name has changed. The old bakery was called Scaleas, back in “the day” and they sold the recipe at least two times, that I know of. Currently, the same recipe is being used at the Castor Ave store.

      I am sure many of your readers remember seeing the women make the tomato pies in the large baking pans, pouring the oil from the five gallon metal cans, and spreading the sauce and then placing the tomato pie in the ovens. I remember the bakery and the process, like it was yesterday !

      I guess since Mr. Lipson is on vacation, the magazine is going “to pot’ !!! Thanks for many enjoyable reads.

    • barryg

      Tomato pie is not pizza and should not be compared with pizza…
      Lorenzo’s (on South) makes the best slice list and Dolce Carini gets a negative writeup? Lorenzo’s topping is barely classifiable as cheese and Dolce Carini is one of the few real NYC-style slice shops we have…
      Frano Luigi’s is not even reviewed…

      This is not controversial, it’s drivel.

    • Nicole

      Someone might want to let Iannelli’s know that their circular pizza was mentioned in the list. We called on Friday to pick up a pie before the Phillies game and weren’t able to get one. We settled for tomato pie with cheese melted on it. It was good for sure, but we would have liked to have had the special order pie.

    • Dustin

      Lorenzo’s? Really? That is some of the worst pizza I have ever had.

    • PIzzaballdropped

      Dear Philly Mag, and Foobooz for that matter,

      When you say the 50 best pizzas in Philly, please actually describe the 50 best pizzas in Philly next time. I realize most people that subscribe to your magazine live in the wealthy suburbs. But here’s where foobooz should come in. Lots of us online poors enjoy the blog. I have never wanted to purchase a magazine that has, in equal parts, ads for plastic surgeons, high-end dog boutiques, and profiles of people / restaurants / businesses who paid you profile them.

      Foobooz, since you allowed yourselves to be purchased by a magazine with a readership based in the Main Line and South Jersey, things have been increasingly less about anything really Philly.

      Let the magazine pander to the 6-figure suburbans. Foobooz, bring back your city insights, please. It’s a big town and those of us that actually LIVE here would like to know about pizza in our city.

      Respectfully,
      Pizza Lover, and City of Phila resident

    • North East G

      It seems like the north east is ignored in these lists. My favorite pizza place is a newer one called “via napoli”.

    • mikez

      The “fine dining” pizza section is the biggest joke, way to pander to your advertisers. Philly Mag your readers aren’t that dumb.
      Right now my favorite thin crust in the city is Zavino, outside the city limits I’m a big fan of Toscana in Cherry hill. Pizza by the meter is out of this world.

    • what ?

      You are Nuts, Tacconelli’s and Marra’s are great !
      But Jules thin crust in Newtown is not pizza. it’s some Mutant form of it. It is like sauce on pita bread ! ECCH !

    • http://mainlinepizzaquest.blogspot.com/ Pizza Quixote

      I enjoy Jules Thin Crust, just don’t think of it as pizza. Same for that doughy casserole in Chicago that they call pizza. I enjoy Ragu and a slice of Kraft processed “cheese food” melted on a toasted English muffin, too, but it ain’t pizza!

    • anonymous

      There are three pizza joints on the spring garden between 15th and 16th. John’s is by far the worst- how could that make the list?? (especially since it was listed FIRST for pizza on a paper plate.)

    • Seriously?

      When did Philadelphia geographically include South Jersey and the burbs? I was looking forward to a quality list but was quickly disappointed and horrified when Lorenzo’s made the list. That pizza barely qualifies for food when you’re drunk at 3AM. This is a travesty.

    • John

      The absolute BEST Pizza in South Jersey is VITO’S Pizza of Mullica Hill. They have the best tasting Pizza Sauce I’ve ever had. I’ve been searching for a decent pizza since I moved from South Philly 40 years ago, and Vito’s has the best I’ve ever tasted in my 78 years.

    • http://mainlinepizzaquest.blogspot.com/ Pizza Quixote

      Tell ya what, John. Ordinarily, I’d never choose a pie by its sauce, but Philly Mag did and I tried one of their picks — Marzano’s in Exton PA. Click on Pizza Quixote (name above) and you can find my review. Bottom line, it’s great sauce on a so-so crust. How is the crust at Vito’s?

    • Sweet Nothings

      Franzone’s? Really? If you like high fructose corn syrup on dough…

    • R U Serious

      I tried Pizza Palace based on your recommendation. And how was it? Let’s just say I will not consult this mag again for it’s food expertise. The pizza tasted somewhere between high school pizza and frozen. Best crust? It was practically stale. The plain and buffalo chicken were just plain gross. Who puts celery on a pizza? And it should have bleu CHEESE, not blue cheese dressing. Speaking of which, the cheese on the plain was brown, hard and tasteless. And they were no larger than 12″. Apparently Philly Mag gets paid off for these reviews.

    • Pizza God

      Take the challenge!

      I’ve eaten pizza at just about every restaurant on Philly Mag’s list of 50. I even had Osteria’s Parma which the author seems to gush over, calling it, “the best pizza in Philadelphia, … from Limerick to Jersey and back again, … and we’ll fight anyone who says different.” They are $20 for a large pie which is only 12 inches. I could eat about 5 of these to myself, but spending $100 to fill my belly just doesn’t fit into my budget. Is it tasty, yes, but if I have to hit up a sandwich joint afterwards, you can’t call it “the best pizza in Philadelphia!”

      The best pizza in Philly is Marra’s Pizza Alla Bianca – sharp provolone, broccoli rabe, sweet sundried tomatoes (perfectly contrasts the bitterness of the broccoli rabe), sausage, roasted garlic, and olive oil! It is crack – brick oven, crust cooked to perfection, authentic ingredients, and a large feeds me and two of my fat friends! And, it’s cheaper than Osteria! They have been making this pizza for almost a century now, I think it has been perfected! I never ever have left there not 110% satisfied! You also get the classic South Philly service, so leave your princess crowns at home! FYI, I even dumped two hopeless girls for not liking this pizza (the one preferred some Stephen Starr joint and the other preferred Papa John’s – which definitely constitutes grounds for a “kick to the curb”)!

      I dare anyone to take this challenge, including the author, the misguided tongues that compiled the top 50 list, and you – Osteria’s Parm, which doesn’t even crack my top 25, or Marra’s Pizza Alla Bianca, which is God! Not to sound arrogant here, but this is the only place where this quote would ever be appropriate, so I’m going to use it; in the words of the late Joey Vento (who needed to improve his product, which wasn’t even the best on the block), “If you disagree with me, then you’re probably part of the problem!”

    • Pizza God

      Yes, that’s right, I said Marra’s has been making this Pizza Alla Bianca for almost 100 years now! It’s so big that Chris Christie couldn’t even polish one off!

    • Kohlera

      Lorenzo’s… really? REALLY?
      I can’t say what’s the best, just what I like.
      I do adore Barbuzzo’s Uovo pie, & NYPD’s white pie w/ tomato & spinach and Stella’s Tartuffo pie, but Lorenzo’s? You must’ve been drunk when you put that in there.

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