Destinations #11 and #12: Dairy Day

I've worked as the "pizza chef" in two restaurants for the last year, so going elsewhere where others are in charge of making my pie is always slightly nerve racking. It's also nice to get away from pizza after living, sweating, and breathing the stuff for eight hours a day. However, the pizza I ate today was an absolute treat. The Margherita at Pizzeria Delfina (#17), I will go ahead and say, was the best pizza I've ever had.

First of all, there is no choosing between soft and crispy crust. Delfina's crust has crisp bubbles on the outside and is hot, soft and airy on the inside, steaming when you pull the slices apart. The sauce tasted so fresh that for a second I forgot it was winter and thought I was biting into a mid-summer ripe red tomato. It had large spots of melted fior di latte mozzarella, and was dotted with fresh basil. This pizza was so bright, so flavorful (including the crust) and so light, I just had to be one of those obnoxious customers that asks a million questions of the waitress, such as, "What exactly do you put into your crust" and "How exactly do you make that sauce of yours." Understandably, the waitress did not have all the answers, so the chef emerged from the kitchen to talk pizza with me.

Ordering a simple Margherita took a lot of restraint on my part while on the menu there was a clam pizza, as well as the "amatriciana," pizza with caramelized onion and guanciale (aka pork jowls). I am incredibly thankful that I stuck with the margherita... I wouldn't want anything extra taking way from the flavor of those simple ingredients.

And what better way to end a pizza lunch than to eat some ice cream! So off we went to Humphrey Slocombe for #46 on the list, secret breakfast ice cream.

I'm guessing the "breakfast" refers to the cornflakes and the "secret" refers to the bourbon. In any case, the bourbon flavor was surprisingly fantastic, but I needed more bourbon to cut the sugar. The sweetness of the ice cream was a bit overpowering (as I find is the issue with a lot of ice cream) and the crunch of the cornflakes got lost in the soft creamy ice cream. This was one of those cases, like Mission Street Chinese Food, where their signature is not necessarily their best. My companion, and my biggest blogger fan (that's right, I have a fan) ordered the chocolate and smoked sea salt ice cream. Now that blew my mind.

After the ice cream, and pizza, I was happy, but my lactose intolerant stomach was not. (I decided several months ago that rather than avoiding dairy, it is a much better option to ignore/ deny lactose intolerance and suffer the consequences). So to ease my pains, I headed to Magnolia, again, for yet another strong beer.