Gioia Pizzeria

It has been a while since I've reviewed a pizza place!  For some reason, I just haven't really been into pizza that much in recent years.  But recently pizza has hit my radar again, with a slew of new places opening around my house, and I think it just got me in the mood for pizza again.  However, I didn't visit any of them for this review.  This review was for delivery, from classic NY style pizzera Gioia.

"Gioia is a New York Style Pizzeria with seasonal ingredients. We are an honest to goodness neighborhood restaurant."

Gioia has two locations, one in Berkeley, and one in San Francisco, in Hayes Valley.  It is named after the founders, a husband and wife pair who met in culinary school.  The Berkeley location is the original, opened in 2004, the SF offshoot in 2019.

The menu is mostly pizza, but they do have a few different salads (and use Acme bread as their croutons!), wings, garlic knots, and meatballs for appetizers, and chicken or meatball parm sandwiches for those not in the mood for pizza.  They also make homemade cannoli.

The menu has 8 pizzas: simple formaggio, margherita, and pepperoni for the very simple traditionalists, and salsiccia (with pickled jalapenos and housemade sausage), acciughe (anchovie and calabrian chile!), julian (another style of sausage, kale, red onion, garlic), or funghi (with lots of herbs and garlic oil) for curated pies.  A seasonal offering rounds out the menu, in the spring it was asparagus with almond pesto, spring onions, mint, and ricotta.  Pizzas come in two sizes, 14" or 18", and slices are available if you visit in person.  You can customize your pie to have light (or even no) cheese, be half baked (to finish at home), be uncut, cut, or double cut (smaller slices?), and add additional toppings, or sides of marinara, ranch, or hot chili oil. 

Fold and hold slice.

"We don't eat pizzas with a fork & knife. New Yorkers consider that uncivilized."

The box gives an indication of what you'll find inside.  HUGE NY style slices. It instructs you how to properly eat them, folding, "supporting", and "guiding" the slice to your mouth.  NOT using a fork and knife.

Formaggio.

"Mozzarella, Grana Padano, Tomato Sauce."

I started with the most simple, the formaggio, to really get a sense of this pizza.  I tried this one cold, as it was leftover from someone else's pizza party.

I took one bite, and was impressed.  Even cold, I could tell this was excellent pizza.  The crust had a nice chew, was lightly charred.  Tomato sauce was slightly sweet, plenty of it, enough to taste, but not too sloppy.  Well melted cheese.  

This was a classic NY slice, with great pedigree.  I really enjoyed it.  ****.

The 14" is $18, 18" $26.

Pepperoni.

"Ezzo pepperoni, Mozzarella, Grana Padano, Tomato Sauce."

Next it was time to add toppings, just pepperoni.  The rest of this pizza was exactly the same as the formaggio.  Which is to say, an excellent pizza base.

The pepperoni was the cute curved cup style, quality pepperoni, salty and greasy in the right ways.  I'll dock a slight partial star for being so haphazardly applied, particularly when everything else seemed applied with such care and balance, but, it still still a fantastic pizza.  Another ****.

With the pepperoni, the price jumps up by $6 for the small to $24,  and by $8 for the large for $34, which did seem a bit much.

Funghi.

"Roasted Cremini Mushrooms, Thyme, Parsley, Garlic Oil, Mozzarella, Grana Padano, Tomato Sauce."

And finally, one of the fancier options, the funghi.  In addition to the obvious pile of mushrooms (roasted creminis), this pizza also added herbs (thyme, parsley), and garlic oil.

It was another excellent pizza.  Again, crust with good chew, slight char, nicely sweet tomato sauce, well melted cheese, and I liked the generous amount of mushrooms on it.  The mushrooms were quite flavorful, cooked down and combined with the fresh herbs and garlic oil, it made the pizza taste "fancy", and refined.  A touch of truffle oil on this and it would have been *really* fancy-pants.  

Since I love mushrooms, and this one was the most unique, I think it was my slight favorite, ****.  Pricing the same as the pepperoni.