D'Amore's Pizza - A Slice of Home

LOS ANGELES, more than a large percentage of other cities, has something to offer just about everyone. Naturally, this is one of the reasons why so many people still to this day choose the Southern California city as their choice of permanent residence. In my particular case, this was a slightly frustrating thing at first, but ended up turning into something great. I had just visited the Beverly Hills tapas restaurant, Son of a Gun, with my girlfriend and do to the small size and high prices of the food neither of us were as full as we wanted to be upon leaving. During our time at the restaurant, I had been eyeballing this pizza place across the street called D'Amore's. I had never heard of it before, but when I saw their pizza was supposed to be "Boston Style" I was inherently inclined to give it a shot. I had tried a number of supposed "East Coast style" and "New York style" pizzas during my time here and while some had been good enough to satisfy my craving none had really impressed me and reminded me of something I could order back home. This has long time been a complaint of East Coast transplants to the region, with many claiming the water used plays a factor into the taste of the pie.

I was excited to try D'Amore's in the hopes that they would prove me wrong, and show me it is possible to get a pizza up to my standards out West. I had a good feeling going in due to the specificity of "Boston" style, and my good feeling proved itself to be true after tasting the first bite. As soon as I took my first taste, my brain recognized everything instantly and I was assured that it was indeed the real deal. Everything about it was consistent with what I would qualify as a pizza done right. The dough was stretched thin but not too thin, the crust was cooked enough so that it was slightly crispy but not burnt, the sauce was distributed evenly and had a bit of a tangy zest to it, and the layer of mozzarella covered the sauce but was not an overpowering amount of cheese. All it took for me to become a convert was two slices, I have found my favorite pizza place in LA and my search is over. After checking out their website it seems as though they import the water they use for the pizza dough from Boston - so my question of whether it actually has something to do with the water still lies unresolved. To be honest though, as long as D'Amore's is still around I don't care what the magic is.

-- Derek Dellovo
photo: LA pizza blog