A couple of years back, my wife and I were watching Chef’s Table, half paying attention and half falling asleep, when the voice on the TV said that, “… the best pizza in America is in Phoenix AZ.”
Wait what?
That’s not a thing you expect to hear when people talk about the best ever pizza and so we had to watch. As we did ,we learned the story of Chris Bianco (who reminds me for some reason of Bobcat Goldthwait), a guy from the Bronx, who lives in Phoenix, and who really loves pizza.
When I imagine who might make the best pizza in America, an Italian guy from the Bronx, who has been working in a Pizzeria since he was 13 sounds about right,… but Phoenix?
Phoenix seems like the last place in the US you would find even good pizza let alone the best. So how did that happen?
It turns out that in 1985 Bianco won a couple of plane tickets to anywhere in the US. He chose Phoenix on a whim and liked it so much he decided to stay. Almost like it was his destiny.
Not long after watching the show I asked a friend who also is frequently in Phoenix, and whose opinion on pizza I trust, if he had heard of this place and he’s like, “Duuude! It’s so good.” Then he tells me it’s probably one of the most famous restaurants in all of Arizona.
In fact the more I looked into this place the more I realized I was one of the last to the party because everybody seemed to know about this guy and his pizza.
We live in Los Angeles though., and even though I believe great pizza is an adequate justification for a road trip, Phoenix is a six hour drive, and not a place we really have any other reason to go to. We thought about it though.
Then somebody tells me he’s opened a place in DTLA and we’re like… game on. And so too apparently did every other person who’d seen that same show, or already knew about him.
Pizzeria Bianco opened in June of 2022, and it took us until August of 2024 before we were finally able to get reservations there. That’s quite the expectational build up, even for pizza.
Location
Pizzeria Bianco is located in The ROW in DTLA on the edge of the Arts District and was originally a 100 year old Southern Pacific Railway distribution terminal. Renovated 2017, the space has been turned into 30 acre walkable urban space, similar to the 3rd street promenade in Santa Monica, only more urban and less mall. It reminded us of some of the cooler, similarly renovated parts of New York like the Hudson Yard’s, or the Warehouse District in New Orleans with that repurposed urban warehouse, bohemian art loft vibe.
My wife and I had been to a “White Party” there just before COVID hit when it was still being finished, and this was the first time we’d been back to see how it came out.
We loved it. Unlike a lot of the rest of the DTLA Arts District, the ROW is clean, well lit, and hasn’t been overrun with homeless encampments. And you don’t have sell your organs on the black market to park either. This place actually lots of parking. in a well-lit structure, and the first two hours were free.
The Food
While the menu at Pizzeria Bianco doesn’t have a lot of items, limited is the wrong word. It’s a pizzeria and if you’re here, you’re here for the pizza. The rest is almost extra.
There are six signature house pies, which you can, if you choose, further customize with a few select toppings.
On the night we were there, they were offering lollipop lamb chops as a starter. Our server was telling us that these were something of an anomaly and not the sort of thing usually offered, but that Pane Bianco, Chris’s new sandwich shop right next store, was doing lamb and the pizzeria wanted some too.
These sounded gorgeous, but we were there for the pizza and knew we’d be getting more than we could eat already just to be able try a little bit of everything.
We did get the focaccia and the burrata though, and they were goooood.
The focaccia came out first and I’m not exaggerating when I say it was by far the best focaccia I’ve ever had in the US, Italy, or anywhere else.
It was hot from the oven with a deep golden brown, crispy crust. There was a sheen of brushed rosemary olive oil and a little bit of salt (sea salt I think), and it had flavor.
So many Italian breads, especially those you get when you are actually in Italy, including focaccia are all but flavorless. This was anything but and I suspect it had been fermented slightly.
It was not at all soft or spongy like so many focaccias, but was still softer than a French or sourdough and with slightly less chew. Almost like a ciabatta. It exceeded all expectations and absolutely was delicious.
Pane Bianco apparently makes their sandwiches with the focaccia and it is now very much on my list.
The burrata came very quickly after the focaccia and was equally good. After doing a little research I discovered that Bianco gets it locally from So Cal diary Di Stefano. The burrata was seasoned with salt, pepper, and drizzled with olive oil with a few crispy croutons. I grabbed a piece of the focaccia and heaped a little of the burrata on top and damn, so simple, so good, It was a really good start.
About the same time our wine arrived. Bianco is a beer and wine only place, but other than water, beer or wine is what I want when I eat pizza. We’d ordered a Malbec from a boutique vintner, (whose name unfortunately I can’t remember) and our server told us that, for the most part “Chris likes to feature California wines, but for this particular Malbec he makes an exception and all but buys the vintner out of it for his restaurants.” It too was excellent.
Then came the pizza. There are four of us, my wife, my daughter (19) my son (16) and myself and we have mixed tastes in pizza, and so ordered three different ones; my wife and daughter got the Margarita to which they added prosciutto, I got the Sonny Boy, to which I added the fennel sausage, and then my son got the Wise Guy as is.
They were all exceptionally good.
The Margarita
The Sonny Boy
The Wiseguy
The foundation of any pizza is always going to be the crust. Overall, the crust had very good flavor. It too had been fermented, but we all noticed that it was a little saltier than most other pizza crusts we’ve tried. While this wasn’t bad, particularly if you like salt, it was definitely noticeable.
Of the three my favorite was actually the Wise Guy. The Wise Guy has wood roasted onion, smoked mozzarella, and the fennel sausage. It does not have a tomato or marinara sauce.
The Sonny Boy has fresh mozzarella, gaeta olives, and soppressata , and does feature a tomato sauce made from organic tomatoes grown in Northern California by Bianco’s business partner Rob DiNapoli and sold as Bianco DiNapoli tomatoes. This pie had excellent flavor with the olives featuring nicely and adding an almost Italian giardiniera flavor to the pizza. On my pie the outer crust was perfect and while it had some nice leopard spotting, it didn’t quite hold up in the middle and flopped instead of folded. I think this may have just been mine though; the Wise Guy folded perfectly without a problem.
The sausage on both pies also was sliced instead of crumbled. Personally, I prefer crumbled over sliced. While there are pros and cons to each. When you slice the sausage instead of crumble it, it cooks more evenly and doesn’t tend to fall or roll off the slice, but unless you slice it thick it tends to cook too quickly and get a little crispy in a wood fired oven. The flavor of the sausage was good, but very mild.
The Margarita pizza my wife and daughter shared was delicious. Both my daughter and wife are tomato lovers and both commented that the tomato sauce was some of the best they’ve ever tasted anywhere. Both of them also commented that the crust had a little more salt than other pies they’ve had. The margarita also had a slightly thicker crust than the Sonny Boy and was foldable, but was also very thin, and was on the softer side of crisp.
Our reservation was for 8:30 it’s possible that because we ate towards the end of service the heat in the wood fired had probably dropped a little towards the end of the night and the pies might have needed just a tad more time.
For the finale we ordered Harry’s Berry’s, a vanilla gelato and berry compote, and a chocolate sorbet with candied hazelnuts. Both were very good, but not quite on the same level as the other food we had that night.
