Went to Prato Pizzeria tonight to meet a friend who highly recommended it. Barry reviewed it a while ago, and I’ve heard about it many times, so I was curious to sample the product.
It’s a bit eccentric in a couple of ways--you can only get the pizza in one size (around medium) and I get the strong feeling there are no substitutions (no pizza for you!)
Another eccentricity is the lack of servers (the night we were there, although it all fits with Barry’s review.) Basically, there is only one, to deal with what I estimated to be 60 + diners. Like Barry, it took about twenty minutes to get in our order, let alone get some wine. Then it was another half hour till we saw the pizza. But what a pizza it was! Happily rhombozoidly irregular, thin as a Premium cracker and bursting with flavorful ingredients (ours was a Salsiccia--sausage--and our friend’s was the Neapolitan). Very reminiscent of the good thin-crust pizzas from the Bay Area of California, which is where I am from.
There were quibbles, though: the pizzas are served on a type of wax paper and your only implement to cut them is something resembling a cheap steak knife. By the time you cut the slice the paper has become soggy, yet resilient, so when you start sawing away, wads of the paper mix in invisibly with the pizza slice. God forbid if you bite down on a wad, and you’ll know it immediately by the unpleasant resistance between your molars. It's about as pleasant as chowing down on a piece of ground glass. Note to kitchen: you won’t be doing yourselves an injustice by pre-slicing these things. Or at least supply a pizza wheel.
As a side note, I was delighted to notice someone at a table of four nearby and swear I recognised him, even though we’d never met before; just through a photograph online. His name is Ed Hawco and he runs one of the founding blogs of Montreal. I wasn’t sure it was he, however, because I had never met him in the flesh, but there was a gumball machine next to their table and my 4.5 year-old son wanted one, so while I pretended to be fumbling with the quarter, I was hissing just under my breath, then gradually louder and louder until it became a half-bark: “Ed! Hawco! Blork!” (his blog nickname.) Now either I whisper too quietly or someone’s deaf, because he never noticed me, until he came ambling over in our direction on some errand and I practically yelled his name in his ear. Of course, he was very puzzled as to why a complete stranger was yelling his name in his ear. That’s what it must be like to be famous.
Anyway, I highly recommend Prato for the pizza, but ask for a separate plate that you can cut it on and be prepared to wait a looong time to get served.
And say hi to Blork when you’re there.
Ha ha! Yeah, I think I'm going deaf.
ReplyDeleteRegarding the pizza, was yours not cut? Or did you just have trouble cutting bite-size pieces? I ask because they usually come pre-cut into six slices. Personally, I abandonned the knife and fork at Prato long ago. The crust is thin and crisp and holds up well to hand-eating (which is to say, picking up the whole slice and eating it frat-boy style).
I recommend Prato too. Not your standard suburban pizza by any means, but thin crusts and fresh ingredients add up to pizza goodness!
Aha! Proof you're becoming a Francophone: you "abandonned" the knife. Do you also live in an appartment?
ReplyDeleteI didn't see any slices, but there may have been. I like my slices not to start curling over because they're too big--then the ingredients start sliding off and a large mess is created that requires a fork. I like them at that point where the ratio of the surface squared is proportionate to the mass + gravity, so just the tip of the point is bending slightly earthward but the toppings stay firmly put.
But Prato is defininitely on my repeat-visit list!