Venezia’s Pizza

Things are slowly returning to normal around the house, although the Christmas holidays tend to make everything a little out of the ordinary. Most people had a four-day weekend, but, of course, I didn’t as the State doesn’t close for the day after Thanksgiving. They might as well have, it was nearly abandoned.

Anyway, it was the holiday weekend that lead me to try Venezia’s Pizza.

Since my disappointing discovery that all the Round Table Pizzas in Taiwan appear to be gone, I’ve been meaning to go to Phoenix’s one remaining Round Table since we got back. We arranged to meet some friends who live in the area on that far and distant shore. (It’s just before you drop off the end of the planet or hit Albuquerque, whichever comes first.)

Upon arrival, it was closed. Everything appeared normal inside, it was just closed. (I tried calling them this evening and the phone just rings off the hook. To quote virtually ever character in Star Wars, “I have a bad feeling about this.”)

We altered our plans and didn’t have pizza until later than evening, far, far away on Pecos Rd at Venezia’s Pizza.

Before I commit commentary on this pizza, let me just point out that I did not eat a proper control pizza and do not consider this to be an “official” Lone Locust review. We had the pizza as take-away and it was extra-large, two things that always diminish the quality of a pizza.

For starters, it wasn’t fully cooked: No shock there, no one ever manages to get a 16“ pizza cooked through to the middle, that’s why I review smaller sizes.

However, the rest of my opinion is favorable. It’s one of the few pizzas I’ve had in a long time that you could clearly tell in the taste that everything was freshly made in the restaurant. OK, I doubt they actually made the mozzarella in the store, but both the crust and particularly the sauce were fresh and didn’t come from Sysco Food Services.

In that respect, I liked it, and will have to go back for a proper review soon.

Venezia’s has three locations, all on the east side of the Phoenix metro area.

The Extra large cheese pizza was $11.25. (Our usual pizza pricing comparison is based on the smallest pepperoni pizza per inch and would have been $0.08.)

Preliminary conclusion: warrants further study

[Revision 3/11/2006, Follow-Up Review]

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