The Best Pizza In San Francisco

Pizzetta 211, SF, CA - Pizza

Great (pizza) date place in a quite little strip in The Richmond. It shouldn’t be too hard to find parking in the neighborhood, but it’s a small place and they don’t take reservations so you might have to wait a bit for a table. There’s a weekly menu with a set of regular pizzas. The general style is Neapolitan, but it’s not going to satisfy the purist. Pizetta 211 was one of a handful of Bay Area pizza stops mentioned in American Pie: My Search for the Perfect Pizza with a similar review as my own. A very warm/cozy little neighborhood restaurant with good, but not great pizza.

The crust is this, crispy, browned but not charred. The dough itself doesn’t have much flavor, but there’s a bit there. As for toppings it varies (a lot) based on the pie you order. We ordered a margherita and another (weekly) that I don’t remember the specific name of (it involved pesto rather than red-sauce, pancetta, heirloom tomatoes, and parmesan cheese.) The margherita was pretty flat, I didn’t really care for the drizzled pesto and the flavors just didn’t pack enough in to the simple pizza to make it memorable enough for me to order it again. The other pie was much more interested and tasty. The thinly sliced tomatoes were fresh and fruity, the parmesan was nicely salty, the pesto when cooked tasted great – everything just worked well together. I have no real complaints about 211, it’s on on my list of best places or somewhere I have to take a friend who’s in to pizza when they visit, but I like it a lot and will happily accompany my girlfriend there any time I can convince her to go.

★★★★★ (site) (map) (yelp)

Tony's Coal-Fired Pizza and Slice House, SF, CA - New York & Sicilian Slices

This place pretty well nails NY Style pizza, the Sicilian not so much. It’s a shame it’s in an out of the way location (for me anyway) or else I’d go here often. Regardless I now have two (pizza related) reasons to head to North Beach.

The place is pretty new so I’ll mostly forgive the overly complex and slowish process, but they should simplify. You place your order as the cashier punches it in to a computer, at some later point a slip gets printed out and later still the guy taking stuff out of the display and putting it in the oven makes his way up to actually get the stuff and stick it back in the oven to reheat. The place wasn’t particulate busy when i stopped in, probably half full, but it still took ~10m from the time I ordered to when I walked away with the pizza.

The NY slice was worth the wait though. Good tasting, bread-y crust with a crispy well browned bottom. No char, just browned. The cheese is definitely full-fat mozzarella and slightly oily with the taste and texture you’d want/expect. The pepperoni was decent; however the sauce was a contender. You could pick out the (fresh) tomato taste and it was applied in the appropriate proportion to everything else. It had the appropriate flop without being completely limp. This place is probably your best bet for NY style slices in SF.

On the other hand the Sicilian was forgettable, you’d be much better off walking a block or so to Golden Boy. The dough that was great in the NY slice was too much here. A bit tough and chewy. The bottom was over cooked past the good brown and on its way to burnt. It was too lightly sauced and cheesed (given the amount of crust.) The only redeeming quality was the meatball topping. It had a true, herb-y, honest-to-goodness, meatball taste that got me through the otherwise ho-hum piece of pizza.

This place is worth checking out.

★★★★★ (map) (yelp)

Big Slice, SF, CA - Pepperoni Slice

Super thick and doughy slice. The bottom crust was super crisp and oily so my only guess is they oil the pan they cook them on/in heavily. The cheese was greasy as was the pepperoni. A watery/herby sauce that was barely passable. This was not good pizza and I won’t be going anywhere near this place anytime soon.

★★★★★ (map) (yelp)

Pizza Di Mano, SF, CA - Pepperoni Slice

This newly opened place seems to have been dealt pretty harsh reviews on Yelp, but I can’t really see why. The pizza is pretty solid and with a few minor improvements (or on a better/busier day) would probably be damned good. It’s no frills, couple tables, counter and a pizza oven. There’s art on the walls, but that’s about it. I found my way in mid-day on a warm Saturday and ordered a slice of pepperoni. What I got was a decently crisped crust (that wasn’t quite to the point of charred) dusted with super-fine cornmeal. The pepperoni was very tasty and the cheese was gooey, stringy, and some of the best I’ve had recently. I think some of the early reviews were complaining about the prices (which seems to have been since lowered,) but otherwise there’s nothing to complain about. The pizza is pretty good, worth a try, and if cooked right could get another star or two.

★★★★★ (site) (map) (yelp)