Best Pizza -- Thin Crust 2005 | Proto's Pizzeria Napoletana | Best of Denver® | Best Restaurants, Bars, Clubs, Music and Stores in Denver | Westword
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Best Pizza -- Thin Crust

Proto's Pizzeria Napoletana

The pizza at Proto's Pizzeria Napoletana straddles that dangerous line between honest, wood-fired thin-crust excellence and faddish, overdone, cracker-crust nonsense. So far, though, Proto's has stayed on the right side of that line, turning out wonderful, hand-tossed pies that are first-rate examples of the thin-crust form, even if they're irregularly shaped, sometimes unevenly covered, and never consistent from one 'za to the next. How does it manage this trick? By taking great care with every pie that goes through the ovens and never using anything but the best ingredients available, from the simplest cheese and pepperoni to fresh tomato and veggies. A pizzaman is only as good as his next pie -- and you can count on that next pie here being very, very good.

Best Pizza -- Thin Crust

Proto's Pizzeria Napoletana

Cassandra Kotnik
The pizza at Proto's Pizzeria Napoletana straddles that dangerous line between honest, wood-fired thin-crust excellence and faddish, overdone, cracker-crust nonsense. So far, though, Proto's has stayed on the right side of that line, turning out wonderful, hand-tossed pies that are first-rate examples of the thin-crust form, even if they're irregularly shaped, sometimes unevenly covered, and never consistent from one 'za to the next. How does it manage this trick? By taking great care with every pie that goes through the ovens and never using anything but the best ingredients available, from the simplest cheese and pepperoni to fresh tomato and veggies. A pizzaman is only as good as his next pie -- and you can count on that next pie here being very, very good.

Best Pizza -- Thick Crust

Beniamino's

Ben Guest had been talking about opening a pizza joint for fourteen years, ever since he moved to Denver from Chicago's South Side. His friends were getting kinda sick of hearing about it. But he finally took the plunge, and his pizzas were worth waiting for. The Mile High City was badly in need of a decent stuffed pie, and Beniamino's are beautiful: high-walled and golden-brown, filled with quality ingredients, sealed with a layer of soft dough, then topped with an herb-heavy sauce and cooked (for upwards of twenty minutes, so be prepared to wait) in authentic Chicago-style steel pans. Every one of these pies is a candidate for a Food Arts centerfold, and they taste just as good as they look.

Best Pizza -- Thick Crust

Beniamino's

Ben Guest had been talking about opening a pizza joint for fourteen years, ever since he moved to Denver from Chicago's South Side. His friends were getting kinda sick of hearing about it. But he finally took the plunge, and his pizzas were worth waiting for. The Mile High City was badly in need of a decent stuffed pie, and Beniamino's are beautiful: high-walled and golden-brown, filled with quality ingredients, sealed with a layer of soft dough, then topped with an herb-heavy sauce and cooked (for upwards of twenty minutes, so be prepared to wait) in authentic Chicago-style steel pans. Every one of these pies is a candidate for a Food Arts centerfold, and they taste just as good as they look.

Best New York-Style Pizza

New York Pizzeria

New Yorkers agree that there are just two ways to do a pizza: the New York thin-crust way, and the wrong way. Lucky for us, that's the way they feel at the New York Pizzeria, too, and that's the way the kitchen has been making its pies since the day this pizzeria opened. With crusts that are thin but never crunchy, good-quality toppings that include real shredded mozzarella, and plenty of that magical orange grease that separates a real New Yorker from the legions of pale imitations, this pizza is as authentic as you're going to get without changing zip codes.

Best New York-Style Pizza

New York Pizzeria

New Yorkers agree that there are just two ways to do a pizza: the New York thin-crust way, and the wrong way. Lucky for us, that's the way they feel at the New York Pizzeria, too, and that's the way the kitchen has been making its pies since the day this pizzeria opened. With crusts that are thin but never crunchy, good-quality toppings that include real shredded mozzarella, and plenty of that magical orange grease that separates a real New Yorker from the legions of pale imitations, this pizza is as authentic as you're going to get without changing zip codes.

Best French-Style Pizza

A La Tomate

Technically, what A La Tomate serves isn't even a pizza. It's a tarte à la tomate -- a golden-brown, braided, buttery, pastry-shell tart filled with pizza-like toppings that comes straight from the cafes of Provence to Denver's 17th Avenue. At first bite, the pie tastes...weird. The sauce is keyed to French tastes, kicked up with a strong dose of herbes de Provence, and the crust seems to be made from crushed-up Keebler butter crackers. But once you get past the initial shock of this being unlike any other pizza you've tasted, you quickly realize that different is not necessarily a bad thing. In fact, it's a pretty good thing, especially when the kitchen brings all the skills of a pro pastry department to the construction of each shell.

Best French-Style Pizza

A La Tomate

Technically, what A La Tomate serves isn't even a pizza. It's a tarte à la tomate -- a golden-brown, braided, buttery, pastry-shell tart filled with pizza-like toppings that comes straight from the cafes of Provence to Denver's 17th Avenue. At first bite, the pie tastes...weird. The sauce is keyed to French tastes, kicked up with a strong dose of herbes de Provence, and the crust seems to be made from crushed-up Keebler butter crackers. But once you get past the initial shock of this being unlike any other pizza you've tasted, you quickly realize that different is not necessarily a bad thing. In fact, it's a pretty good thing, especially when the kitchen brings all the skills of a pro pastry department to the construction of each shell.

Best Masterpizza

The Oven

Until you've tasted what a French-trained, James Beard Award-nominated executive chef can do once he decides to open a dream neighborhood pizza place, you really haven't tasted pizza's potential. But since the debut of the Oven, Mark Tarbell's wood-fired pie joint in Belmar, now you can. Here, every pizza is hand-tossed; topped with the best organic, locally produced and artisan ingredients Tarbell can find; draped with his signature homemade mozzarella (made fresh all day in the Oven's kitchen) and smoked ricotta cheese; and cooked in one of two massive wood-fired ovens that Tarbell himself designed. The result is a lightly sauced pie, subtly woody in the crust. These aren't just pizzas, they're works of art -- true masterpizzas.

Best Masterpizza

The Oven

Until you've tasted what a French-trained, James Beard Award-nominated executive chef can do once he decides to open a dream neighborhood pizza place, you really haven't tasted pizza's potential. But since the debut of the Oven, Mark Tarbell's wood-fired pie joint in Belmar, now you can. Here, every pizza is hand-tossed; topped with the best organic, locally produced and artisan ingredients Tarbell can find; draped with his signature homemade mozzarella (made fresh all day in the Oven's kitchen) and smoked ricotta cheese; and cooked in one of two massive wood-fired ovens that Tarbell himself designed. The result is a lightly sauced pie, subtly woody in the crust. These aren't just pizzas, they're works of art -- true masterpizzas.

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