About Pizza

I love pizza. No other baked good satisfies and nourishes me like pizza. If historians or religious scholars were able to actually look back in time, surely they would find that the “Manna Machine” (the Ancient of Days) that sustained the Semites in the desert was really just a pizza oven. What other item that spews both fire and food is so worthy of worship?

I try to eat pizza every day. At high points in my life this has been a complete and not even difficult to achieve reality. Now, I find myself trapped in a land where all the pizza is horrible. Every crust tastes the same, like preservatives, and the most popular alternate sauce is some sort of ranch-garlic-butter amalgamation that makes me feel like I'm eating a mayo Frostie. The horror.

In one of my early attempts at finding good pizza in Redding, I went on Yelp and read other people's reviews and opinions (I actually did this for all sorts of food, some with more luck). This lead me to a pizza place attached to a gas station, which had gotten the best reviews on Yelp. Don't get me wrong, you can get some really good food at a place attached to a gas station - hotdogs, sausages, pretzels, clam rolls (slightly more risky than the others), and probably some other local specialties - but you cannot get a good slice of pizza from any place that even shares a parking lot with one. Something about the combination of rising dough, 800 degree ovens, and a constant flow of auto fumes just doesn't work.

Of course I can always make pizzas. Recently I have discovered Chinese cooking secrets that have brought my pizzas to a whole new level of fluffiness and flavor. However, me making pizza also involves making a HUGE mess. Now, when one lives with a person who cleans with the speed, stealth, and precision of a highly trained ninja, said mess is almost unnoticeable. Unfortunately, I not only moved away from at least palatable pizza, but also left the aforementioned ninja far behind. My predicament is therefore quite troublesome and complex.

At this point, I'd even take a CPK. Sure it's a chain, but at least all the specials don't have ranch in them. If you can help, please leave a comment......

Signed,

Matt Lax, so hopelessly lost with his love so far away.