Johnny Rad's

We went to Johnny Rad’s on September 13, 2010. We ordered a couple of small pizzas as opposed to large ones because this was actually more cost effective and allowed us to have more variety. Usually it is cheaper the other way around. The small offered more slices that other small pizzas we have encountered. These were not personal pan pizza smalls. The small is 11” and the large is 15”. The owner came over to us and explained the difference between the small and large pizzas. The larger pizza allows (obviously) a larger canvas for the toppings. 10 oz versus 8.5 oz. Also he explained that the crust dynamics was very different between the sizes. I think an important quote from the evening should be brought to everyone’s attention now:

“The crust is really good. I want to eat it.”

This is fantastic! Some people never seem to get down with the crust of pizza and their plates inevitably become a crust wasteland. We’re not going to talk about those people now, we are going to talk about Johnny Rad’s crust. It is really good. It really is crust you want to eat.

I am going to give a personal tip on how to ensure crust enjoyment. The trick is to save about an inch of actual pizza and fold that over the crust. Say goodbye to eating only bread and say hello to being able to savour the texture and flavor of the dough.

We ordered:

-The El Gato, a white pizza with garlic olive oil, fresh basil, mozzarella, ricotta cheese, and sea salt.


-The Pesto Vitello, fresh pesto sauce with sliced tomato, fresh mozzarella and sea salt.


-The Tilt Mode, tomato sauce, mozzarella and ricotta, sliced red onion, baby spinach and arugula, and olive oil.


-The Templeton (with vegan cheese), a classic Marinara style pizza with tomato sauce, fresh garlic, oregano, olive oil and basil.


The El Gato was not just salad put on pizza, it provides a nice balance of vegetables to pizza.

Some concerns were on the pepperiness of the pizza, more specifically on the size of the peppercorns which some people found to be still whole and were hard to eat. I didn’t really experience this and could chalk it up to a non-functioning pepper grinder. If this is intentional, then this is a warning to future patrons: The pepper corns will be whole, so just be prepared. Ultimately it’s going to be ok.



The atmosphere was alright. We did happen to go during a televised Ravens game, so it was loud, but it emptied out by 9:40. Johnny Rad’s has a semi-punk/skateboarding theme going on, but not to the point that you wouldn’t want to go there if you were over the age of 22. Overall the employees were very nice and the pizza was in fact pretty “rad”. I definitely would go back to Johnny Rad’s and would recommend it.



If you’re looking to eat some good pizza and try some place new, check out Johnny Rad’s. It’s also across the street from the Patterson Bowling Center! (Hint: That would make a really good date).

7 out of 8 slices.

Pizza News: 7 Worst Pizzas in America

7 Worst Pizzas in America

Worst Pizzas in America

By David Zinczenko
Sep 20, 2010

Eat This, Not That

When pizza was first invented, back in some long forgotten Italian village, it was a nearly perfect slice of nutrition: A thin crust of carbohydrates for energy, slathered with tomato sauce for vitamins and minerals, and topped with calcium-rich, protein-boosting mozzarella. It was like a food pyramid in pie form!

So what happened? How did this healthy Italian invention acquire a reputation for being so terribly unhealthy? Well, to start, American food manufacturers got their greedy little hands on it. As we began researching the Eat This, Not That! book series, we discovered marketers were up to all sorts of mischief that has made it easier for Americans to gain weight—doing creepy things like loading the top up with fatty meats, infusing the crust with hidden cheeses, and otherwise turning the healthy pizza pie into a Big Mac with crust. Mama Mia!

It’s too bad, too, because pizza is a staple of American life. During last year’s Super Bowl, Papa Johns sold more pies than there are people in Delaware. And it’s only the third-biggest pizza chain (Papa Johns, not Delaware). So if you want the best of both worlds—the health benefits of the Italian style and the football-rooting fun of the American way of life, then you need to know which pizzas should be showing up at your door at halftime—and which should get called for a 15-pound penalty.


#7: Worst Supermarket Pizza
DiGiorno For One Traditional Crust Supreme Pizza
790 calories
36 g fat (14 g saturated fat, 3 g trans fats)
1,460 mg sodium

No, it’s not delivery, but it is dangerous. This is how DiGiorno handles the personal pie: with 60 percent of your day’s sodium, 70 percent of your saturated fat, and more trans fat than you should consume in an entire day. If your heart had a voice box, it would be screaming in outrage.

Eat This Instead!
Stouffer’s French Bread Deluxe Pizza (1 pizza)
430 calories
21 g fat (7 g saturated)
820 mg sodium


#6: Worst Multi-National Pizza
California Pizza Kitchen Tostada Pizza with Grilled Steak (1/2 pie)
840 calories
16 g saturated fat
1,649 mg sodium

With a caloric heft like this, you’d expect this Tex-Mex pie to be massively portioned. It’s not. The big fatty price tag draws not from size, but from the combo effect of tortilla chips and ranch dressing. Switch to the equally interesting Four Seasons Pizza, which carries artichoke hearts, salami, mushroom, tomatoes, onions, and two cheeses, and you drop nearly 400 calories per half-pie serving.

Eat This Instead!
Thin Crust Four Seasons Pizza
480 calories
9 g saturated fat
1,567 mg sodium

Bonus Tip: Take a look at the weapons of mass inflation being whipped up in the labs of the mad fast-food scientists: The 20 Scariest New Restaurant Foods! Be afraid—be very afraid!


#5: Worst Single Slice
Sbarro Stuffed Pepperoni Pizza
960 calories
42 g fat
3,200 mg sodium

Sbarro serves up elephantine slices, so you should know better than to order one that essentially consists of two of those slices folded one atop another. In this one wedge of pizza, Sbarro manages to pack in nearly as many calories as you’d find in four pepperoni slices from Pizza Hut! You want to survive the Sbarro super-slice challenge? Stick to a regular pie, nix the pepperoni and sausage, and limit yourself to one slice.

Eat This Instead!
Fresh Tomato Pizza
450 calories
14 g fat
1,040 mg sodium

Bonus Tip: Sure, pizza has the potential to inflate, but it’s certainly not the only food to cause widespread weight gain. Case in point: The 15 Worst Burgers in America. You'll also learn which burgers to eat instead, so you can enjoy your favorite foods and still lose weight—without ever dieting.


#4: Worst Specialty Crust Pizza
Pizza Hut Stuffed Crust Meat Lover’s Pizza (2 slices, 14” pie)
960 calories
52 g fat (24 g saturated, 1 g trans)
2,780 mg sodium

Around the perimeter of this pie is what essentially amounts to a hula-hoop ring of cheese. Gross, right? But it's not just cheese. Also inside that ring: two types of sausage, ham, beef, and bacon. The impact of all those salt-cured meats is more than a day’s worth of sodium in each two-slice serving—oh, and as much saturated fat as a dozen Extra Crispy Drumsticks from KFC! Here’s a simple mnemonic device: Stuffed pizza = stuffed potbelly. Stick to thin crust and lean meats and you’ll live to eat well another day.

Eat This Instead!
2 Slices Thin ‘N Crispy Ham & Pineapple Pizza (2 slices, 12'' pie)
360 calories
12 g fat (6 g saturated)
1,080 mg sodium

Bonus Tip: To see more proof of how wayward beverages can utterly destroy your diet, check out the 20 Worst Drinks in America. Many of these disastrous drinks contain more than a day's worth of calories, sugar, and fat!


#3: Worst Flatbread
Cosi Chicken Gorgonzola with Fig Flatbread with Traditional Crust
1,073 calories
41 g fat (9 g saturated)
1,057 mg sodium

At first blush, flatbread seems like a healthy version of pizza—especially when it comes adorned with fanciful toppings like Gorgonzola and figs. But let this be a lesson: Just because it’s fancy doesn’t mean it’s healthy. Cosi’s traditional crust is essentially the same carpet of bread you might find underneath a circular pie. The rules of pizza selection apply to flatbreads as well: Lean toppings, light cheese, and thin crust.

Eat This Instead!
Margherita Flatbread with Thin Crust
451 calories
26 g fat (13 g saturated)
328 mg sodium


#2: Worst Thin Crust Pizza
Domino’s Brooklyn Style ExtravaganZZa Feast Pizza (2 slices 16” pie)
1,180 calories
60 g fat (27 g saturated)
3,420 mg sodium

To be fair, Domino’s Brooklyn Style isn’t promoted as thin crust, but it was created with fold-ability in mind. That requires slices that are soft, thin, and—in Domino’s case—massive. The typical Domino’s pie comes sliced into eighths, but order the Brooklyn-inspired pie and you’ll get only six slices. What happened to the other two slices? They were absorbed—along with their calories, fat, and sodium—into the other slices. Your better option is to build your own pie on a legitimate thin crust. Top that pie chicken and chorizo and you cut out 730 calories. Do that a couple times a week and you’ll cut close to two pounds of flab per month.

Eat This Instead!
Thin Crust Grilled Chicken and Chorizo (2 slices, 14” pie)
450 calories
20 g fat (7 g saturated)
1,030 mg sodium

Bonus Tip: Eating healthy on the go is far easier than it sounds. Check out these 9 Ways to Lose Weight Eating Fast-Food for body slimming tips that don’t cost a minute of your time.


#1: Worst Pizza in America
Uno Chicago Grill Chicago Classic Deep Dish Pizza (Individual)
2,310 calories
162 g fat (54 g saturated fat)
4,920 mg sodium

Wait, wait, wait. This is a one-person pizza? Yup. All 2,310 calories are destined for one soon-to-be expanding belly. This pie has been a perennial pick for us over the past three years, and the reason is simple: No other personal pizza in the country even begins to approach these numbers. It breaks every single caloric recommendation on the books, and it does it under the guise of a must-have “classic” dish. With the country being plagued by obesity, Uno should have the decency to banish—or significantly improve—this dish.

Eat This Instead!
Cheese and Tomato Thin Crust Pizza (Individual)
840 calories
33 g fat (15 g saturated fat)
1,770 mg sodium


ps this is a picture of David Zinczenko, the author of this piece. I don't really believe that he ate all those pizzas himself, but that's just me.

Gil's Pizza

I have driven past Gil's on Belair road many times and had been wanting to stop by for a while. After an exhausting trip to IKEA, we decided we needed sustenance; we needed Gil's pizza. No dining in here, this place only does carry out. They only serve pizza and one size of it. They do offer "double dough" as an additional topping. We were told that this is not Sicilian style, but an additional ball of dough added; same diameter, only thicker. We ordered a mushroom pizza. They put the topping under the cheese.


A plain tomato and cheese pie costs $9.25 with each topping costing an additional $1.25.


Gil's has been around since 1958. Sadly Gil is no longer with us. The current owner bought it about 8 years ago. It took him two months of non-stop pizza eating for it to get kinda old, I feel that pizza is one of the few foods that I could eat everyday and not get sick of it. He says he still eats pizza once a week. He has been making pizza for almost his entire life. Perhaps I am making that up, but Gil's pizza is definitely on it.


There was a comfortable balance of crust/sauce/cheese. After ordering the pizza, we stood at the counter and watched him roll out the dough, put on the topping, and put it in the oven. It really connects you to the pizza making process. This is the pizza that you imagine when you say "I just want pizza, no messing around." While the trend of Baltimore pizza tends to be on the thinner crust side, Gil's crust is of a more traditional thickness. This pizza would be perfect with soda and/or beer.




Real cheese. No nonsense.

7.5 out of 8 slices



Gil's Pizza
5132 Belair Road
Baltimore, MD 21206
410-483-4847

Pizza Everyday - Big City Zza

In New York City this past weekend I had three pizza experiences, each one being significantly better than the last. First stop, Coney Island.

This "school cafeteria" style slice was $3. Pretty terrible, but being very hungry after doing stuff all day and not eating helped a bit. Still, it deserves 1.5/8 slices.

The slice from this place, where a can of Coors Light costs $4.50, is pictured here.

After going on the $5 "Spook-A-Rama" ride (soooo worth it), my friend Jac picked up this gem for $3. Same price as the previous slice, but like 10 times better. 4/8 slices. (Note the actual cheese on this one).

Finally, the next night we went to a real Pizza place, John's Pizzeria on Bleecker Street (where, as Vanilla Ice suggests on their website, they should "Keep Making the 'Dope' Pizza.") Yes, Vanilla, the pizza was "Dope". We got a large cheese and it totally hit the spot, aka the emptiness in my stomach, and was priced well. $14. It was a 7/8.

Next meeting

Our next meeting will be on Monday, September 13th at 8:30pm. Will will be dining at Johnny Rad's. It is located at 2108 Eastern Ave right by the Patterson Bowling Center.

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=155006271192585&ref=mf

Pizza Everyday - Next Level Homemade Pizza

Yesterday I realized that I wanted some pizza for dinner and decided to use the items in my kitchen and garden, instead of money, to make it. I googled "pizza dough recipe" and just used one at random. I forgot how easy it was to make pizza dough at home, it takes like no time to prepare then you just walk away for an hour while it rises. When it was ready we added olive oil, salt/pepper, garlic, tomatoes and basil (from garden) as well as fresh mozzarella (which, admittedly was purchased from the store for this very purpose).

It looked real good:



But once baked, it looked even better:



And then eating it was a f'ing dream:

As you can probably tell, it was quite doughy and messy. I suppose if one wanted thinner crust, they could just use half the amount of dough or a larger pan. Either way, if you like kneading and pizza and eating delicious things, homemade dough is the way to go.

Two Boots Pizza

We went to Two Boots Pizza located at Power Plant Live on August 18. The name refers to the fact that Louisiana and Italy both resemble shoes. It was a damp night. The ambiance of the place was feathers and beads, New Orleans, and part Hillary Duff as Elizabeth Cady Stanton. We ordered two pizzas. The ORCHIDIA, which was our choice of five toppings. We created a white pizza with eggplant, garlic, artichokes, sundried tomatoes, and spinach.


The spinach appeared to have been the frozen kind as opposed to fresh. The eggplant on the pizza was breaded and was a much welcomed surprise. A knife and fork were required to eat this pizza as we did not trust the crust to withstand the topping weight. We had an overall positive experience with this pizza.



We also ordered the "Tony Clifton", which was red pepper pesto, wild mushrooms, vidalia onions, and mozzarella. The pesto was dabbed on top of the cheese, while the regular sauce was underneath. Some thoughts about this pizza: "There is a lot going on in my mouth".


The appearance of this pizza was questionable, but the majority of our group throughly enjoyed it. Our waiter said this was one of his favorite pizzas.




The crust is thin in a different way than other Baltimore thin crust pizzas (perhaps because it originated in New York?). It was crispy on the edges with a doughy consistency under the cheese. The dough is dusted with cornmeal. Though we only ordered vegetarian pizzas, Two Boots offers ones with crab, crawfish, sausage, and other cajun delights.

The service was prompt and our waiter was very friendly and accommodating. Even though we were there at 6 pm, there really weren't any other eat-in customers. The Power Plant Live area seems like a strange place, with activity around lunchtime and later in the evening. They do have a pizza by the slice option from an outdoor stand for patrons of the nearby bars. Two Boots pizza does have a liquor license. They also have other non-pizza options; we did not try these things. I feel that when the location opens up by MICA, it will be more accessible/successful than Power Plant.





We give them a 6 out of 8 slices mainly due to the fact that they use frozen spinach.

Zella's Pizza

oops this took a long time to post! I still can taste their delicious pizza though

We went on June 7 2010, a Monday evening, which is buy one, get one pizza night. We ordered Olive's Roasted Eggplant, a Margarita, Chicken Pesto, and Portobello Pizzas. The seasonings available on the table were parmesan cheese, red pepper flakes, and oregano. The Eggplant pizza had two reports of pits in the olives, but we decided that it was still delicious. This does point to them using fresh olives as opposed to canned.







The Chicken Pesto pizza had very light pesto and we thought they should either up the pesto content or take it out of the name.



In general the pizzas had a lot of crust to them, but the crust was very good. It was fluffy rather than dense or gummy. The pizza was structurally sound, the dough was able to support large quantities of toppings. The Margarita and Portobello pizzas were also excellent.




Zella's offers a full bodied pizza and on Mondays they offer a lot of bang for your buck. Go before 7 to get a dollar off on your drinks. We were very happy with our experience and I can't wait to go back. The service was very fast and the ingredients were fresh (better pizza???)



Some quotes from the night:
"Good texture, kind of scratching the roof of my mouth."
"Oh my God, I love pizza!"

9.5 out of 10 only due to the disappointment with the pesto pizza.



see more picture's at Jaime's Flickr
Baltimore Pizza Club @Zella

Meeting change

Last minute change:

the Pizza Club meeting will be happening on Wednesday, August 18. Same time, same place.

Pizza News: The life-saving qualities of pizza

The life-saving qualities of pizza
Research – from Italy, would you believe – suggests that pizza can be good for your health

Marc Abrahams Monday 16 August 2010 16.30 BST

Tasty: the benefits of Italian pizza. Photograph: Massimo Borchi/Corbis

A series of Italian research studies suggest that eating pizza might do good things for a person's health.

These benefits show up, statistically speaking and seasoned with caveats, among people who eat pizza as pizza. The delightful statistico-medico-pizza effects do not happen so much, the researchers emphasise, for individuals who eat the pizza ingredients individually.

Back in 2001, Dario Giugliano, Francesco Nappo and Ludovico Coppola, at Second University Naples, published a study in the journal Circulation called Pizza and Vegetables Don't Stick to the Endothelium. The thrust of their finding was that, unlike many other typical Italian meals, pizza does not necessarily cause clogged blood vessels (atherosclerosis) and death.

Silvano Gallus of the Istituto di Ricerche Farmacologiche, in Milan, has cooked up several studies about the health effects of ingesting pizza.

In 2003, together with colleagues from Naples, Rome and elsewhere, Gallus published a report called Does Pizza Protect Against Cancer?, in the International Journal of Cancer. It compares several thousand people who were treated for cancer of the oral cavity, pharynx, oesophagus, larynx, colon, or rectum with patients who were treated for other, non-cancer ailments. Several hospitals gathered data about what the patients said they habitually ate. The study ends up speaking, in a vague, general way of an "apparently favourable effect of pizza on cancer risk in Italy".

A year later, in a monograph in the European Journal of Cancer Prevention, Gallus and two colleagues wrote that: "Regular consumption of pizza, one of the most typical Italian foods, showed a reduced risk of digestive tract cancers."

Also in 2004, another team anchored by Gallus published a monograph called Pizza and Risk of Acute Myocardial Infarction, in the European Journal of Clinical Nutrition. As you would expect from the title, its purpose was "to evaluate the potential role of pizza consumption on the risk of acute myocardial infarction". Gallus and his team "suggest that pizza consumption is a favourable indicator" for preventing, or at least not causing, heart attacks.

Gallus is in no way claiming that pizza prevents all ills. A Gallus-led study called Pizza Consumption and the Risk of Breast, Ovarian and Prostate Cancer appeared in 2006 in the European Journal of Cancer Prevention. These types of cancer are thought to arise differently than the kinds believed to be warded off by pizza. The study puts its message bluntly: "Our results do not show a relevant role of pizza on the risk of sex hormone-related cancers."

The Gallus studies all hedge their bets a bit. Each says, in one way or another (and here I'm paraphrasing them): "Pizza may in fact merely represent a general indicator of the so-called Mediterranean diet, which has been shown to have potential health benefits."

All of this pertains to Italian-made pizza, metabolised in Italy. No matter how accurate the scientists' interpretations turn out to be, there's no guarantee that they hold true for foreign pizza, or for any pizza eaten anywhere by foreigners.

• Marc Abrahams is editor of the bimonthly Annals of Improbable Research and organiser of the Ig Nobel prize

http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2010/aug/16/pizza-save-life-improbable-research#send-share-box