Chix's Addiction at The Crack Shack

The chicken explosions are everywhere. Within the past year, I'm hearing the rage about chicken this, chicken that. There are just no limits to it.

You got the KFC (Korean Fried Chickens), the Colonel (the Kentucky version of KFC), the chicken tenders (Raising Canes), Hot Chix (Nashville varieties are the big story of 2016 & 2017), and of course... the countless wings expansions on every possible corner of every major intersections in town. When will this ever stop?

Location of the interior with Bar on the left of entrance

The chicken sandwiches (chix sando, slang for my inner circle) are the bee's knees. Forget waffles, even donuts places must have them too. Don't ask, it does happened. Instagram can provides proof to those unthinkable possibilities.

Complete tray of Chicken, Sandwich and Deviled Eggs 

Which brings up an interesting scenario, does gastropub needs one too? You know... beer, wine, cocktails, hence they need chicken too! Yup, unfathomable becomes the reality. Chicken goes well with cocktails too.

Crack Shack, aptly named because of their delicious fried chicken, have recently expanded to Costa Mesa near the southwest end of the 55 freeway. The third incarnation of Crack Shack is the brain child of a popular Top Chef Contestant and Winner Richard Blais, with plans of expanding into Century City, Pasadena, Santa Monica, and one other LA location in the foreseeable future.

The cute aspect of this place was that you would literally need to line up in front of a shack like hut. Order in the shack first, then proceed to hit the two floors dining hall with a bar, which funny enough was nicknamed "the coop". Maybe I was just thinking it would be too cliche, but a giant rooster would greet you behind the grand entrance. This statue reminds me of the giant rooster that was guarding the yard at the Anaheim Packing District.

Original Chicken

The atmosphere bordered between a casual hangout for the family as it have a "play pen" on one side, an intimate dining with a fireplace, and a cross of hip hangout with jukebox like atmosphere that honky tonk its way at a bar serving cocktails. If you see the video above, it's quite a lively atmosphere with a degree of differences on each corner of the coop.

Coop Deville - fried chicken, pickled fresno chilies, lime mayo, napa cabbage, brioche with add-on of bacon

The chicken served here are very addicting with its own herbs and spices. What's unique about this place's menu was that everything evolves around chicken and eggs. The deviled egg served here was quite addicting, might I say like "crack?

Deviled Egg

With more chicken flying to the conscious mind of our today's youth, it undoubtedly will happen when it pairs with adult beverages. I do admit in that beer pairings are essential, but with the lively chic atmosphere provided here for cocktails, I was quite surprised on how well this mix match would do. I think the possibilities are endless and by the end of the night, I became a fan of this establishment.

Catchy part about coming here is the parking situation. Maybe it's because it was super popular right off the bat, but I can tell by the traffic congestion and spotted where the establishment is at. It looks like the neighbors does not like it one bit and probably requested someone in the parking enforcement be on the lookout for parking space violators. It can be petty at the OC sometimes.

Overall, I want to come back and maybe try it with their highly decorative crafted cocktails. Maybe daring enough to try their hot Firebird. At least it got me excited enough to give it another go, which most places are giving me the huh with the ho hum added on. Chicken is chicken, right? If this place can exceed beyond the gimmick, then I think they are within the realm of repeat visits.

Bad news for the neighbors...

Crack Shack
196 E 17th St
Costa Mesa, CA 92627

Revealing the Best French Dip Sandwich in L.A. @ Nate N' Al (Beverly Hills)

A few years ago, I made a promise on this blog that I would reveal my favorite place for French Dip sandwiches after I did a review on for both Cole's and Philippe The Original . It was a battle for supremacy on who was the inventor of the French Dip sandwich as both have stories on how they come up with au jus sauce and the way the sandwich was dipped in to invent that unique way of eating that sandwich.

Somehow I could care less on who invented, but rather on who has the best in town. My answer to this debate is Larry King's favorite breakfast joint in his neck of the woods.

Surprisingly, my favorite French Dip sandwich is at "Nate 'n Al".

The Front Counter at the deli section

My initial reaction coming here was that I hoped I didn't have to bump into Larry King or some old foggy pseudo celebrity because I wanted to take a few picture without them thinking I was part of TMZ snapparrizi that is usually outside stalking at Wolfgang's Steakhouse or Spago's. The charming thing about the place was that it looked as if they kept the place the same since they had opened in the mid 40's. The booth seats looked it belong on the set of the restaurant scene in the movie "L.A. Confidential" where many of the area depicts a vintage Hollywood set. The place doesn't feel old, it just gave the feeling of prestige...the older kind.

They still have a big selections of deli meat on board for take outs. I could had swore that every bald husky guy looked like Rob Reiner coming in and ordering various deli meat for their midnight snack. The selections of meat on display in the refrigerated counters can probably rivaled "Canter's" for their pick of the deli.

French Dip and potato salad - $14.25

Without further ado, we got to see the sandwich on hand and really debate about the selection I had made. The au jus sauce was not as sweet like Cole's or Phillipe's. What's so remarkable about the sandwich was the sesame bun. It was not very thick or harden like the other two because dipping into the sauce will obviously make the bread more soggy. Here's another benefit, you noticed the sauce is put on the side and not pre-dip.

That was a big plus in this humble reviewer's eyes. The bread itself is firm, but also fluffy enough to withstand the post dipping carnage of not disintegrating into smooshy texture like the potato salad that accompanied it. The beef also get a textbook grade of A for excellence from me for being flavorable before the dip in the sauce and an added component of the sauce enhanced the taste even more.

Sweet Pickles

The other big cool thing about coming here are the pickles that are served here. I think they can bottled it and sell it in the chain of supermarkets. Very fresh and crunchy. After you snapped this, the sweet taste reminded me of the pickled cucumber I had when I was a kid. Definitely wishing I could take some of these pickles back home if it was made available.

Noodle Pudding - $4.50

My big discovery of the day was something that elevated my horizon a bit when I saw the noodle pudding that was served. I knew with my curiousity, I got to order that. I later figured it out that it was also called "Kugel". As you can observed, it's baked like a sliced of an apple pie with layers of egg noodles that resembles a cut of pastas.  If you are asking me if I ever had a Jewish or Middle Eastern dessert such as this, I would be pleading as though I was a newbie and would have wrongfully guessed it looked like the popular Latin dessert of Tres Leches. The dessert was absolutely fantastic as I could not stopped eating this delicious food as I though I had never encountered before.

Since then, I had tried other Noodle pudding or noodle kugel, but alas not one of those places can match Nate n' Al's version of this traditional dessert. The pretender's version tend to either be too soggy like a Tres Leches or just had too bitter of a taste with too much of different different flavor taste. Can't figure it out if they had some secret milk ingredient they had where the other places are missing such component in this dish.

After the delicous meal, I wasn't going to leave empty handed and order another batch of French Dip sandwich.  Nope, they didn't pre-dip either. That's what I love about this place as they have kept the au jus sauce on the side. I also took home an order of hot pastrami sandwich as well since I want to compare that sandwich against "Johnny's" and "The Hat". Again, no comparison. Hands down I would give the nod to Nate n' Al's over the other two as well.

Hot Pastrami Sandwich - $13.50

The pastrami was much more flavorable and much tastier than the oversteamed versions that was served at the other two establishments. The rye bread and sweet pickles alone would smash the other two if a comparison battle needed to be done, but I spared the other two for further punishments as their sandwiches paled in comparison.

Before we all jumped in, considered this...there is a reason why Larry King can afford to eat like this day in and day out. The sticker shock will probably scared off most casual diners, but I do think the quality itself on all of the sandwiches and deli items are worth it. Plus they are catering to a certain crowd in one of most recognized zip code in all over the world. Regardless of the price, they are still packing them in, which is no longer a marvel to me because I can attest to why they are popular.

They still have the best French Dip sandwich in town and now I can add hot pastrami sandwich to the list as well.

Nate 'n Al Delicatessen & Restaurant
414 N Beverly Dr
Beverly Hills, CA 90210
(310) 274-0101

Can the Best Sandwich Really Exist in the West? @ Bay Cities Italian Deli & Bakery (Santa Monica)

For many years I have heard that the westside has a deli that carried the best sandwiches in all of L.A. This was a little Italian mart that carried many of the imported specialty items, groceries, and other prepared deli meats to take home for that wine tastings or for that perfect sandwich you had been meaning to create.

I guess this place will always be crowded in the weekend at all hours considering the private security guard doubles as traffic controller for their tiny parking lot. You might need to look around for other street parking in this part of the town, especially on weekends.

Walking through the door, I can almost immediately knew that the place was packed like sardines in a can and getting inside to the deli sections where the sandwiches and other hot items (pasta, meatballs, or hot plated items) will be an ordeal because of the sea of masses of people congregated in front of the counter hoping their numbers get to be called.

There was an intriguing part after a 40 minutes wait for my ticket to be call (yeah, I'm not fibbing about the long wait for a simple order or deli sandwiches). Apparently some joker who was a big fan of these sandwiches decided to come up with a sinister plan of buying a roll of ticket that is similar to what the deli was using. My guess was that he/she was tired of waiting for his/her turn to order her items, instead conveniently would have some forged tickets ready to cut in line. I only found this out when the guy behind the deli counter had to examine my ticket to make sure it's the same ticket that they have (small prints of the deli's name on the back perhaps? or some watermarks?).

I guess the sandwiches was that good for some bastards to hatch up that scheme.

The sandwiches that have gotten the raves from many of the die-hards of this deli was a sandwich aptly called the "Godmother". Quite proclaimed as the end all to be all in the land of the sandwiches. This particular sandwich had the ingredients of genoa salami, mortadella, coppacola, ham, prosciutto, and provolone cheese to complete the set with no substitutions on this order. I also put in the "works" where included all of the condiments of mayo, mustard (yellow, honey or dijon), onions, pickles, tomatoes, lettuce, Italian dressing & mild or hot pepper salad.

The Godmother with "the works" ($8)

Usually you can order the basic sandwich of bread, cheese, meat, and condiments to your liking. It would started off in the $4 range and goes up quite a bit with each ingredients added on. So, my preference would have been getting one of their creations as it was much cheaper in the long run and the right combination of cheese and meat seemed to be a big deal.

Speaking of which, I decided to also order a large order of Parma/Hamon Serrano sandwich which I decided to get it with a provolone cheese. However, the deli person talked me out of that cheese and recommended a different cheese. He was nice enough to give me test taste with a small piece of bread with sample of the cheese and parma serrano ham on it. I have to hand it to him, he was correct with the choice of the cheese to go along with that ham. Darn it, I wished I remembered the name of that cheese. It went very well with the parma serrano ham.

Parma/Hamon Serrano ($11.55)

I do enjoy both of the sandwiches that Bay Cities deli have proudly carried in their place as the two of the most popular sandwiches propped by their supporters. The sandwiches are well executed to the precisions in that the flavors of the meat and cheese were fresh. More importantly, the preset sandwiches of the combination of the meat, cheese, condiments, and bread all worked out well.

I can easily conclude that the parma serrano sandwich was one of the better ones I ever had. Was it the best in this town? Probably not, but it's right up there. I'll come up with the review for the best deli sandwich very soon.

Of course I probably need to consult with the crazy guy who was able to counterfeit the tickets so that I can cut in line. Oh, in a weird universe, I did had a celebrity sighting in that place when a former "The View" talk show host was in front of me by a few number to get her sandwich fix.

No, it's not Rosie O'Donnell. Think Asian.

Bay Cities Italian Deli & Bakery
1517 Lincoln Blvd
Santa Monica, CA 90401
(310) 395-8279

Grade:

Epic Bánh Mì crawl along Valley Blvd @ San Gabriel Valley

Before anyone start jumping up and down about the carbo overload, let's sit back and access on why I want to go through the madness of Bánh mì (in my fantasy world, this would be the name of my 2nd wife).

HUGE WARNING: It's a long review with visits of 7 places along Valley Blvd in San Gabriel Valley, east side of LA county. If you want a cheatsheet, go down towards the bottom of this entire section of review where I will give the recaps and final analysis of the 7 places I have visited.

Why in the world would I be obsessed with Bánh mì sandwiches? In my college days, I was a poor lad that didn't have much money to spend on finer things, especially on food. I cherish the value of the American dollar and would maximized it to its full potential. You can imagine that my buddy Kevin hated shopping with me at Costco when I demanded he bring his Cadillac because his car got a bigger trunk and we would be on a Saturday afternoon run for that Donkey Kong-sized box of Hot Pockets.

My world changed in an instant and the quality of my life improves when an ex-coworker of mine bought some supermarket made Bánh mì sandwiches for lunch. When I asked him how much, he told me to keep my money in my wallet as he played it off like a major baller. When I nagged enough, he told me that these 8 inch sandwiches were bought at a Vietnamese market in Westminster for 65 cents each.

My jaws dropped. I have never looked back since then.

For a quality Bánh mì sandwich, most places used a baguette sandwich bun and have all sort of veggie ingredients mixed with the choice of meat. The usual suspect for these veggies would include cucumbers, carrot, cilantro, onion, Chinese radish, and jalapeno pepper. To fill up the sandwich, the meat would includes from various pork pate, spam meatballs, grilled or roasted pork, shredded chicken, or just leave it alone with plain vegetable sandwich.

For my little Bánh mì crawl, I picked 7 of the more frequent sandwich shoppes along Valley Blvd in San Gabriel Valley area. I skipped Lee's Sandwiches because I detested them and would never acknowledged them until they improved on the quality of the meat for their sandwiches.

Let's break it down on the positives and negatives of each shop with a little recap at the end.

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Stop #1: Ba Le French Sandwich & Bakery

Scene: I supposed this place should have been a standalone bakery, but we are finding out it's a front for these sandwich shop these days. There is no dining area to speak of, where it's practically a take-out joint. The service was not bad, but having two cute girls working is always a plus for the gents.

Positive: Their #2 special of guess the meat sandwich is awesome! They don't have a name for that #2 special which I'm guessing it's two forms of pork pate and ham on the sandwich. Ba Le French is very generous on their veggie toppings, especially with the radish, carrot, and cilantro. Very tasty for a guess the meat special.

#2 Special

Check out their regular pork pate sandwich also. That was quite good with most of the sandwiches for less than $3.

Negative: No ambiance, no decor. Price of those sandwiches justify the low maintenance of the place. They pretty much want you to take the sandwich home and eat.

Ba Le French Sandwich & Bakery
1426 S Atlantic Blvd
Alhambra, CA 91803
(626) 308-3003

Grade:



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Stop #2: Banh Mi & Che Cali

Scene: Yay! It's a restaurant. You also can ordered just the sandwiches if you like as they have a register for take outs and small bagged items. One of the three stops in this epic crawl that have a dining room area.

Positive: When I first came here, they had a buy-one get-one free special on their ice coffee. To top it all off, they also had a special where if you buy two of their sandwiches of $2.50 or higher, you get the third sandwich for free. Some of the "economy priced" sandwiches are in smaller portion. However, if you are willing to spend a little bit more for the bigger sandwich, you can get a free sandwich out of it for the meal tomorrow.

Thit Nuong (Grilled Pork Sandwich)

My favorite sandwich is the Thit Nuong (Grilled Pork Sandwich) which was very tender and succulent. I also love the flavor of how they grill the pork for the sandwich. The toppings was very heavy loaded.

Negative: I didn't like their Ga sandwich (chicken) which was way too dry. One thing that didn't sit well with me was also their bread. It was too hard and crunchy. The way on how the bread was breaking, you would have thought you were eating a salad because you can break the bread like a crouton. I also hope that they can slice the pepper and cucumber into much more smaller pieces because the big portion was way too much to swallow in those big pieces.

Banh Mi & Che Cali
647 W Valley Blvd
Alhambra, CA 91803
(626) 293-8396

Grade:



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Stop #3: Banh Mi My-Tho

Scene: The place looked more like a mini mart or a liquor store. There is no way you can grab one of the two table situated outside of the place because some regulars would just socialized in front of the store all day long. It's best to go home with the sandwich or eat it in your car.

Positive: Long lines means something is about to get good. It definitely did not disappoint after what it seemed eternity when the sandwich was finally ready to be picked up. The BBQ Meatball sandwich is delicious! The meatballs are cut into smaller one quarter of a size with the vegetable toppings adequately sliced thin that made it even more enjoyable to eat. The bread wasn't as impressive as some of the baguette bakery stores, but the meat more than make it up.

BBQ Meatball Sandwich

The service was a major plus here as the young man manning the counter was polite to everyone and was on his toes taking orders and sending the sandwiches to the appropriate customers.

Negative: Not really anything major to report. The place was just tiny and because people are standing around waiting for their food next to the refrigerator section, which made it impossible to grab any drinks or get any other small items to go along with the sandwich. In fact I was thirsty afterward. I blamed it more on the loitering customers who are waiting for their orders than Banh Mi My-Tho. However, the small space was the contributing reason for that problem because they had missed out on potential extra sales.

Banh Mi My-Tho
304 W Valley Blvd
Alhambra, CA 91803
(626) 289-4160

Grade:


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Stop #4: Saigon's Bakery & Sandwiches

Scene: This place has all the reminiscences of a bakery. They have a full operation of baking ovens and a station counter where you can see the line cooks constructing those delicious sandwiches. Surprisingly, only two of these sandwiches have make their operation out in the open. As in for the dining area, only three small tables for a sit down. Like most of the others, it's strictly a take out joint.

Positive: This shop is my favorite Bánh mì sandwich shoppe at this installment of the crawl. Hands down they got best baguette where they bake it fresh, one of the more affordable prices at $2.00 (it used to be $2 even with sales tax included, but they increased the price by 17 cents), and one of the better deal in town. If you buy three of the sandwiches, you get a free loaf of long 24" baguette to take a home. Also, one of the friendliest and fastest service in customer service which was another badge of honor for them.

Free loaf of Baguette when you purchase three or more sandwiches

One of my favorite sandwich was their Vietnamese Ham sandwich which was loaded with the right portions of the assorted condiments and ham in the soft, chewy baguette. The ice coffee is a also cheap and delightful companion to whichever sandwich you get. Majority of the time, you will see customers walking out with at least three sandwiches, a free loaf of baguette, and an ice coffee.

Ham Sandwich

Negative: They need to have more room or space for dining. Maybe set up an outdoor patio? Otherwise, no major complaints from me.

Saigon's Bakery and Sandwiches
718 E Valley Blvd
San Gabriel, CA 91776
(626) 288-6475

Grade:

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Stop #5: Bale Banh M Coffee and Sandwich Shop

Scene: This place looked like a tiny donut shop with nothing more to speak of. Seriously, I'm not even fronting on this one. There is nothing here that will suggest a sandwich shop. Other than the sign, it would be a pass for me in most days. No dining area and really bare on the selections in the menu. Depressing to come here and makes you want to get out as soon as possible.

Positive: I'll give them this much, the meat loaf sandwich is a hit with me. Often times, this place get high raves from others for the excellent quality in the meat in the sandwiches and some good Vietnamese treats in the store.

Vietnamese Meat Loaf Sandwich

Negative: Oh, where do I start?

I have bad vibes about this place even before I made my payment for my order of sandwiches. It seemed like I had interrupted one of them from watching some sort of V-soap on a mini TV they have in the back. It took a while for them to make any of these sandwiches as I was just lounging around the small shop resembling a donut shop.

The sandwiches themselves have very skimpy amount of both the condiments and the meat. The baguette overshadows and swallow up the entire sandwich where you wouldn't noticed the meat or condiments sticking out from the baguette (not a problem with other places, except for Mr. Baguette). Usually, I complained about too much condiment from other shop, but this place really dialed it down on everything to make sure it is cutting every corners to keep the overhead cost down.

Comparing to other places, there is minimal foot traffic to speak of. I can tell they wanted me out there ASAP when they pretty much slammed the sandwiches in the bag and gave me the cue to go. It's like I have interrupted them at a bad crucial time. Man, I'll never go there again if I knew I am intruding on them from an important V-soap scene.

Bale Banh M Coffee & Sandwiches
725 E Valley Blvd
San Gabriel, CA 91776
(626) 571-5436

Grade:


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Stop #6: Banh Mi & Che Cali

Scene: Just like the same namesake west on this street, this place also have a big dining room with plenty of tables to enjoy your food. The only issue I have with this place was the sanitation of this place. Otherwise, it's a solid place to sit and eat at this pit stop.

Positive: I love their "Special" combination sandwich. I suspected just like others, it tend to stack with ham and pork pate to along generously with all the veggie condiments.

The Special Combination Sandwich

Negative: Just like their sister location, the buns was way too hard and was breaking like a salad crouton. It's not chewy like most of the others. I'm not expecting soft and chewy baguette, but at the same time it shouldn't be hard & crunchy like a toasted bread. The service could be a little bit more smoother. The construction of the bread is like a conveyor belt like in Lee's Sandwiches where people print up the order and constructed the sandwich right then & there.

The wait time was almost as long as Bale Banh M, but at least those ladies at BBM was a bit peeved when I walked in. These guys at Banh Mi & Che Cali had no excuses and they were really slow at churning out those sandwiches.

Overall, their prices were okay. If I wanted a better price and much more smoother service, I would hit up their identical namesake at Alhambra's location over this one.

Banh Mi & Che Cali
8450 Valley Blvd
Rosemead, CA 91770
(626) 288-5600

Grade:



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Stop #7: Mr. Baguette

Scene: Probably the cleanest local and most pleasing in terms of ambiance and decor for the sandwich shoppe on this tour. That's probably the big positive there on this venture.

Positive: Other positive on this final destination? I do love their iced coffee here, as also with their baguette and croissant as well. Considering they were also doubling as a bakery, it would be a good point to make sure they were immaculate at churning out these sandwiches. Their operation is much smoother run than their neighbor a few blocks away, Banh Mi & Che Cali.

Saigon Sandwich

Their Saigon Sandwich with a few variety of meat was also one of my favorite sandwich at this locale. Perfect place to dine in and relax for a quick meal.

Negative: Mr. Baguette charges an arm and a leg for their sandwiches. Their iced coffee was the one going over two bucks, so they set them up as the top echelon in the Bánh mì world. The other negative that I was very down on them was the fact they are too stingy on the veggie condiments in their sandwiches. Now, the meat are getting smaller and the prices are going higher. It does not bode well for them in the long term for me as a customer going in there.

Maybe they can justify it by charging extra for ambiance. For the people want to take it home and there will be plenty of take out orders, it really doesn't make sense for the small portions anyways. Definitely not the best value for the price they are charging for the sandwiches.

Mr. Baguette
8702 Valley Blvd
Rosemead, CA 91770
(626) 288-9166

Grade:

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The Breakdown:

Best Bread: Saigon's Bakery & Sandwich
Worst Bread: Banh Mi & Che Cali (both shops)

Best Veggie Condiments: Ba Le French Bakery & Sandwiches
Worst Veggie Condiments: Banh Mi & Che Cali (both shops)

Best Meat or Use of the meat in sandwich: Banh Mi My Tho
Worst use of meat: Mr. Baguette

Best Overall Service: Saigon's Bakery & Sandwich, Banh Mi My Tho
Worst Overall Service: Bale Banh M Coffee and Sandwich Shop

Best Overall Price Value : Saigon's Bakery & Sandwich, Banh Mi & Che Chai (Alhambra)
Worst Price Value: Mr. Baguette

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Best Overall: Saigon's Bakery & Sandwich, & Banh Mi My Tho

Rankings
1. Saigon's Bakery & Sandwich
2. Banh Mi My Tho
3. Ba Le French Sandwich & Bakery
4. Banh Mi & Che Cali (Alhambra)
5. Banh Mi & Che Cali (Rosemead)
6. Bale Banh M Coffee and Sandwich Shop
7. Mr. Baguette

Pizza Worth Traveling For @ Vito's Pizza (West Hollywood)

Going all the way up to WeHo for a pizza sounds very ridiculous. In fact, I would avoid anything west of La Brea. This place was what I heard as the best pizza in all of LA. In essence, I gotta go check it out why this pizza joint is that popular.

The pizzeria is located in the plaza between Santa Monica Blvd and Melrose Place (yeah, I checked it out…there’s no love triangle or any drama in that street. So bland!). On that particular stretch of La Cienaga Blvd is full of galleries, high end antique shops, and other very posh shopping spots that seemed to cater to deep pocket players. In many ways, you would never suspected this pizza place to be located along with them.

The glass case display of pizza inside

Going inside of Vito’s, you will encounter a massive impressive display of pizza samples where you probably wagged your tongue by the look of those pizzas.

The pizza size comes only in one size which is their 18 inch pie that will be cut into 8 slices. Forget about asking for personal size or medium size as they do not exist.

Our group ordered two of their most requested pizzas. It seemed to be that the Terra Ferma (the works!) and Pizza Margherita are the two most commonly requested orders.

The Vito's Terra Ferm

The Vito’s Terra Ferm which is deluxe pizza with everything on it. It is loaded with sausage, pepperoni, olives, peppers, onions, and mushrooms. The look of the pizza can be very busy as it is over stocked with toppings. For me, I love it just because of the fact I like to create a pizza sandwich by folding in half so it doesn’t bothered me if it’s too much topping.

The Pizza Margherita

The Pizza Margherita is one of the best pizza I had taste in a long while. It’s like a simple cheese pizza with tomato, basil, and mozzarella cheese. It is very fresh and simple as they claimed on their menu.

The place is not very big with about half dozen tables on the inside with a few more tables on the outside. We have one of the coolest server that ever served us. Tony the manager was entertaining and delightful for the whole afternoon. Some others had mentioned to me about the loud east coast bantering will exist in this place. Especially with Paulie manning the kitchen where he also would obliged with a couple of his own shoutouts. They are both very accommodating and a friendly face to welcome their guests.

Needless to say, the pizza exceeded my expectations. Granted, i don’t have too many New York style pizzas nor have I ever been to New York, but I can tell you that it’s probably one of the better pizza I had ever tasted. I was impressed on the fact that the crust was not greasy and the cheese & toppings were very fresh and made to our likings.

Vito’s Pizza in fact would take on all detractors to try to prove they can make New York style pizza to their liking. I have a feeling they will not lose their many of those challenges.

The pizza is very quite good. In a bad way, I had a craving of it this morning when I woke up and wanted to go back for their Terra Ferma and Margherita. Luckily for me, I did ordered the Vito’s sandwich loaded with sausages, peppers, onions, and their special marinara sauce. That hit the spot.

Besides the takeout, they do deliver within the confines of WeHo. Lucky them, but unlucky for me.

What stopped me from going there again was the drive to WeHo. If they ever had a closer location, I would definitely be the first to get there. It’s better than settling for California Pizza Kitchen, which I hope their pizza DOES NOT represent California!

Now I can see why the fuss for this pizza place. It is very good, I’ll give them that. I just hope they can maintain their quality before they get too big. Believe it or not, they still haven’t advertised this place yet and people still coming over in a busy lunch hour. That’s how popular in recent months they had become.

Vito's Pizza
846 N. La Cienega Blvd
West Hollywood, CA 90069
(310) 652-6859

Grade: