Pizzeria Lola

Visited on Saturday, March 19th with Jake, Allison and Newman

Ben's Review

Since our friends Jake and Allison live three blocks from the new pizza place in south Minneapolis, Pizzeria Lola, we had been meaning to make it over there to try it out. Last Saturday we finally got together, and Newman was even in town for the WCHA playoffs, so he joined us in trying it out.

The server commented on our "diverse" table because of our varying state shirts

We walked to Lola from Jake and Allison’s as it was a rather nice day out, and after the winter we’ve had, it felt good to be outside. Annie enjoyed using the Ergo again after a long hiatus. [Editor's note: Not really that long of a hiatus since we used it in some stores and in Mexico, but whatever - she still enjoyed it]

Since Lola doesn’t open until 5pm, Jake had called around 4:45 to try to get us on the list, since there were five adults and one toddler. It is amazing to me how busy this place gets so early in the evening. We arrived a few minutes before five and they were already open and I would estimate that one third of the tables were full. Fifteen minutes after we arrived the place was packed and people were starting to line up behind the bar. Jake mentioned that the bar/waiting area resembles Al’s Breakfast in Dinkytown; people awkwardly have to stand directly behind someone sitting at the bar. Not the best environment for the people waiting or the people at the bar, but what can you do? It will certainly be better in the spring/summer/fall when people can wait outside instead.

They serve wood fired pizza at Lola and the oven is right in the middle of the restaurant. It’s a beautiful centerpiece as it’s lined with soft looking copper that fits in well with the wood-lined walls. The can lighting is interesting as well, they used tomato sauce cans to house the bulbs, and I thought I heard someone say that Lola got the cans from Punch Pizza.

The pizzas at Lola are on the small side, so for five adults we ordered four pizzas to share. We got a plain margherita pizza, the Lady Zaza, the Boise, and the Sweet Italian. The pizzas came out in a reasonable amount time, enough time for us to chat a bit and enjoy our beverages (they had Furious on tap, always a plus). Newman was excited about the Mexican coke, but then proceeded to order a regular fountain coke, justifying it because he was going to have several refills (he drank probably three cokes).

Lady ZaZa

Sweet Italian

I tried the Lady Zaza first which has kimchee sausage, peppers, and green onions. This was surprisingly spicier than I thought it would be, but it was delicious. The crust is excellent and reminds me of Punch Pizza, which is to be expected. Next I had the Sweet Italian, which looked like a more traditional pizza with red sauce, sausage, onions, peppers, and cheese. These two were definitely my favorite, though none of the pizzas were bad. The margherita was good, but they are too sparse for my liking, Annie seemed to enjoy it. The Boise is a potato pizza, as the name implies, and it was tasty, I actually had several of these pieces because we all ate our fill and they were still on the table. That was my cue to help out.

By the time we had finished our pizza it was even fuller than before, with a large line of people at the bar and people milling about outside. Jake, Allison, and Erin all ordered dessert while Newman and I watched them eat it. I tried a bite of Erin’s vanilla ice cream (Mexican vanilla, not that inferior Madagascar vanilla) and it was absolutely fantastic. I was amazed at how good it was, and now I’m reminded to seek some of that out at the store sometime.

We headed out the back entrance to give the photo booth a try. You can buy a ticket for $3 which gets you a photo booth session. The booth takes three pictures and then prints them on a strip for you to take home, or you can cut it down the middle and hang one of the sides on the wall, where they have a sizable collection growing. We opted to leave one of ours, we’ll have to find it next time we go back.

I enjoyed Pizzeria Lola very much and I intend to go back this summer when it’s nicer out, since we have friends that live so close anyways.

Service: Service was great, the manager stopped by to check in on us as well.
Food: Great pizza, excellent vanilla ice cream.
Drinks: The bar is just beer and wine, but they have a good selection of beers. I’m not sure how they got to have Surly, I had heard there is something like a three year waiting list or something.
Ambiance: Certainly a family place, as it’s located right in the middle of a residential area. People were friendly and welcoming.
Convenience: Lola is located right on Xerxes, so there is some bus service. Plenty of parking in the blocks right around the restaurant and easily walkable.

Erin's Review

I am a big fan of pizza, and would eat it for most meals if I could. I kept hearing about how great Pizzeria Lola was, but it being completely across town from us, we hadn't gotten over there yet. We finally set a date to go over and visit Jake and Allison and their pups Bella and Lola and then to go on to Pizzeria Lola. Jake has met the owner of Pizzeria Lola, who named the place after their dog. The owner apparently did not care at all that Jake also had a dog named Lola and lived 3 blocks away, which made Jake a wee bit sad, but not sad enough to not go there.

The walk over was pleasant on that nice spring day - now if only the temps would creep up to the 50s again so this dang snow would all melt! We got there RIGHT at 5, so thankfully got a table right away. Waiting a long time at restaurants really isn't an option for us anymore with Annie, so I'm glad we had the intel to get there so early and avoid what looked like very long waits later! We were seated in a booth, and placed our drink orders quickly. I asked if they had kids cups for milk, and the server said yes - they aren't little cups though, they are just full plastic cups with lids and straws - this worked ok but I had to watch Annie and help her hold the cup lest it go everywhere. We had a sippy cup but forgot it in Jake and Allison's fridge, of course! I am going to add a "kids welcome" label to the blog so people can click that to see the places we've been that I would consider toddler appropriate. Obviously you CAN bring them anywhere, but these are the places I think are better suited to the wee ones.

I really loved the decor at Pizzeria Lola - it was very centered around their pizza oven, which kept the place toasty warm. Hopefully they have powerful A/C for summertime! The oven had some fancy birchwood in the bottom, but we discovered their secret stash of oak in the back when we left through the back exit near the photobooth. Along with a few other places we've visited lately, Lola uses mismatched plates which lends a homey vibe but seems to be not that unique anymore.

Ben details which pizzas we ordered above - Annie ate mostly the Margherita, which she seemed to love, and some of the Sweet Italian. I also ate these 2, along with one piece of The Boise, which was actually my favorite of all of them. The pizza tasted completely different than it looked - cheesy and almost sweet from the thinly sliced potatoes and carmelized onions. I loved it! Annie had one bite of that one and liked it as well. She'll eat pretty much anything, though, so isn't too tough of a critic. I didn't even try the Lady Zaza because of reports that it was spicy - I figured I'd leave that one to people that would actually enjoy it.

The Boise

Margherita

Jake told me about the ice cream sandwich they had gotten on their last visit, so I was already planning on giving that a try. They now offer it as a "deconstructed" ice cream sandwich, so the cookies and ice cream are separate - Jake mentioned that the one he had tried before was nearly frozen solid, so this is a great move on their part so they can keep the cookies somewhat warm and the ice cream soft. They have 2-3 ice cream flavors daily, I went with the vanilla and I believe Allison went with hazelnut. Ben mentions above that they were very specific that this was MEXICAN vanilla. I previously haven't been picky about my vanilla ice cream, but perhaps I should be??

The ice cream was great, but I was disappointed in the cookies. I don't know why I bother to ever order cookies at a restaurant, when the ones I make at home are absolute perfection in every way, AND I can get them fresh from the oven since we keep the dough balls in the freezer. The cookies weren't warm or chewy, which is a cookie fail in my book. The ice cream sandwich was fine, but with crunchy cookies, you're basically just getting ice cream everywhere since you can't successfully bite through both cookies AND ice cream without squeezing the sandwich completely together, thus you don't get much ice cream in a bite. It wasn't all bad, just not what I prefer.

On the way out, we had to try the photobooth, since Ben worked on the software for it. At $3 a pop, it's a bit pricey, but was a fun souvenir for us to have, and we are now forever immortalized on Pizzeria Lola's wall o' photos.

Despite the disappointing ice cream sandwich, I really liked Pizzeria Lola. The pizza combinations were unique and tasty, and the atmosphere was fun. Because there are a number of similar pizza places much closer to our house, I don't know that we'll be back too often, but it is a welcome addition to the skimpy SW Minneapolis restaurant scene!

Deets

Pizzeria Lola

5557 Xerxes Ave

Minneapolis

Black Sheep Coal Fired Pizza

Visited on Friday, November 20th with Rebekah, Rett and Adelaide

Erin's Review
Our good friend Rebekah just finished her MBA, so Ben and I wanted to take the family out to celebrate - I know how awesome it feels to FINALLY be done with a masters program!! I still find myself happy just thinking about NOT having to do homework anymore :) I told Rebekah to pick the place, and she chose Black Sheep - I was super excited since I've suggested we go there to Ben several times before, but for some reason he kept shooting me down - he couldn't this time though!

I had just seen that Black Sheep was nominated for the best new establishment by Heavy Table, so I was a little nervous that it would be packed on a Friday night - Becky called earlier in the day and they did say 6pm got really busy but that 4 + a baby wouldn't be a problem. I was definitely glad we had gotten there a bit early though, as it gets a little harder to wait too long for a table with a 10 month old that likes to be entertained!

The atmosphere at Black Sheep reminded me a little of Punch in Highland Park - bustling and family friendly. There were quite a few kids there when we were there, and there were always several people waiting for a table. I liked the decor and the open kitchen so you could see the coal pizza oven. I also LOVE their logo - that little sheep is just so cute :)

Ben, Rett and Becky all ordered drinks and they came out quickly. It took us a bit to decide on pizzas, but we didn't feel rushed at all. We ended up choosing one with meat - the #5, sausage, salami, onion and green olive, and then created our own veggie with artichokes and tomatoes. I really enjoyed both pizzas, but especially loved the #5 - the combination of flavors was perfect! I don't even like olives, but I liked them on this pizza. I loved the crust as well - it was thin but not mushy at all. I think I even liked it better than Punch, but that's just a matter of personal preference.

By the time we left, we had quite the audience observing us sitting at the table. We did sit there chatting for awhile after we were done eating, and I felt a LITTLE bad, but not bad enough to rush out of there or anything. Adelaide definitely enjoyed herself - she had fun staring at the people waiting for awhile :) I got the impression that she loved the tiny piece of crust that she was given as well! Thumbs up all around.

I really love pizza, and would definitely return to Black Sheep - it is very affordable and I like that they have table service as well as take out. It is also near quite a few bars if you are into that type of thing.

Ben's Review
After having not done a review for several weeks we went out twice in two days last week, go figure :) After going out with Becca and Joe on Thursday we met Rebekah, Rett, and Adelaide for dinner on Friday at Black Sheep Pizza in the warehouse district.

We arranged to meet after work around 6pm and knowing that it gets busy there, Erin and I planned on going over a little early to get in line for a table before the others arrived. We ended up having to wait about twenty minutes for a table, which was a reasonable amount of time. We didn't do this, but you can order beers while you wait which would certainly make the time pass quicker. Waiting for a table is a little awkward because you are so close to the people who are eating. We were literally about two feet away from a table of eight people. I didn't mind it from my perspective, but being at the table gets a little weird. By the time we left there were a good ten to twelve people standing around right near our table just watching us, it definitely makes you conscious of not hanging around too long after you've finished eating.

We made a couple quick decisions on two pizzas: a sausage, onion, salami, and olive (I believe it's the one on their home page) and an artichoke and tomato pizza. They have a good selection of tap beers and I went with the Furthermore Fallen Apple, a "Fresh-pressed cider blended with cream ale." The beer was okay, I'm not much of a fan of ciders, but it sounded interesting. I got a second beer a little later and got a Rush River porter which was much better (this is another beer I had wanted to try but never wanted to commit to a 6 pack).

The pizzas came out quickly, maybe within ten to fifteen minutes. They have clever racks that allows them to raise one pizza off the table and put the second one underneath. Our table had plenty of space but some of the tables are small so this would come in handy. Rett and I dug into the meaty pizza first and it was delicious. The crust is soft and thin making it easy to fold in half and eat as a "pizza sandwich", I started off with a fork and knife but quickly devolved to the folding style. When you're eating pizza with others it always turns into a race for the most slices and folding the pizza in half is just the smart play :)

The tomato and artichoke pizza was just as good as the other, though I am partial to meat on my pizza. I was surprised that we ate two large pizzas, I thought we would have plenty of leftovers to split up, and Adelaide didn't even eat her share!

After we finished we chatted for a bit before giving in to the glares of the beer drinking people waiting for a table, silently staring us down. A great meal to start the weekend, I wouldn't hesitate to go back.

• Service: Hard to go wrong at a pizza place and this was no exception.
  
• Food: Wonderful pizza, and it came out fresh and hot.
  
• Drinks: They have a good variety of taps and they rotate out seasonal/specialty brews.
  
• Ambiance: This is another "cozy" restaurant, but it doesn't feel cramped. They do a good job of maximizing the space for eating and I think people would rather have that than to have them use space for people waiting for tables.
  
• Price: The pizzas range from $13-$22 for large pizzas and you can add extra toppings for a nominal fee. Pizza is one of those things that you can make as cheap or expensive as you want. I think these prices are good for the quality of pizza.
• Convenience: There are plenty of meters along this stretch of Washington Ave, but they always seem to be full from the restaurants and lofts in the area. I found one about four blocks down and miraculously had a single quarter that I need to get me past 6pm when the meters weren't enforced.

Deets
Black Sheep Coal Fired Pizza
600 Washington Ave
Minneapolis

HomeMade Pizza

Update: The contest is now closed, we'll announce the winners tomorrow night!

A few weeks ago we were contacted by HomeMade Pizza, a "take 'n bake" style pizza restaurant on Grand Ave. in Saint Paul (they also have locations in Eden Prairie, Minnetonka, and Wayzata). They wanted to give us some gift cards to give away to our readers, as part of a contest of sorts. This seemed like a pretty good deal, and I have no problem giving away free stuff to people, so we agreed :)

We had never had HomeMade pizza, and they offered to give us a couple pizzas to try out before we had the contest. We wanted to make sure we weren't giving away gift certificates for crappy pizza! While this isn't like our typical review of a sit-down restaurant, it is still in the spirit of trying new places, so we think it passes muster.

HomeMade Pizza is a great combo of the quality of take 'n bake pizza with the convenience of delivery. Other take 'n bake places we frequent don't offer delivery, so this is definitely a selling point. The delivery guy showed up at our door at the arranged time with two pizzas: one meat with pepperoni, onion, and basil and a veggie pizza with tomatoes and basil. They also threw in a salad, which was a nice starter for the meal.

Two pizzas is clearly way too much food for Erin and I, so we enlisted the help of our neighbors, Nate and Molly, to help us out, since we were told that the pizzas are better if you eat them the day you get them. Nate and Molly were eager helpers for some homebrew and grilled pizza :)

The pizzas come with grilling instructions and it's really easy. You do need to have either a regular pizza stone for your oven, or a special pizza stone specifically for the grill. We have a pizza stone for our oven, which worked out just fine. We preheated the grill for 10 minutes or so and slipped the meat pizza on the stone. I was a little concerned about the parchment paper that hung over the edge of the stone at first, but the paper just turns a little brown from the heat, no big deal.

The pizza cooks in about 10-12 minutes at 400 degrees, having a thermometer on the grill helped out here. It was just as easy as any frozen pizza I've ever made, and much prettier!

Both of these pizzas were excellent. The ingredients are fresh and the presentation is wonderful. The crust is thin and has good structure when you pick it up, it can hold the weight of the toppings well. We had the salad while the first pizza was cooking, Nate particularly liked the garlic dressing that came with the salad, I think he may have dipped his pizza in it as well. I'm not even a fan of tomatoes, but the veggie pizza was great, the tomatoes were nice and meaty.

The contest

I mentioned the gift cards earlier, and this is where you come in. We have ten gift cards: five $25 cards and five $10 cards. To win a gift card you need to comment with your favorite grilled pizza toppings. If you haven't ever had a grilled pizza, just comment with your favorite frozen pizza toppings :)

We will choose ten winners at random from the comments, the first five get a $25 gift card, the second five get a $10 gift card. The comments will close on Sunday night, June 28th, at 10pm central time.

Make sure to give us a way to contact you from your comment! Leave us your blog address or email address, or something, otherwise we can't give you your prize!!! NOTE: Many people have blogger profiles that are private - make sure yours is public, or you'll have to include your blog address or email address in your comment.

Good luck!

Psycho Suzi's

Visited on Thursday, August 21st with Becca and Joe

Ben's Review
On the same day that we had breakfast at Sunny Side Up Cafe, we had also made plans to meet my sister and brother-in-law, Becca and Joe, for happy hour at Psycho Suzi's. We had given them a gift card to Psycho Suzi's awhile ago and they wanted to have some food and use the gift card.

I checked out the happy hour specials online during the day. I was disappointed to find that the happy hour at Psycho Suzi's runs from 3-5pm. This seems like a "happy hour cop-out" if you ask me; they still get to advertise a happy hour, even though very few people are going to make it out for happy hour before 5pm. Of course, Becca and Joe got there around 4:30 and got in a couple drinks while the gettin' was good.

We sat out on the patio which was pretty full, we might not have gotten a spot if Becca and Joe hadn't arrived earlier. The patio is really nice at Psycho Suzi's because it's behind the restaurant, so you're shielded from the noise of Lowry and Marshall. It was a great night out too, not too hot and clear skies. I ordered a Summit in spite of the decent beer selection - I was tempted to go for an Oberon after tasting Erin's at Brasa, but I couldn't pull the trigger. I was also tempted by the relatively cheap price of the PBR tall boy, ($3.50).

We quickly decided on splitting a large pizza and an appetizer. It's cheaper to order the Suzi Supreme and take some items off (black olives, mushrooms) than it is to order a custom pizza, by several dollars actually. The large pizza was plenty to fill up all four of us, and it was delicious. It's amazing how you never get sick of greasy cheese and meat.

Becca convinced us to split a "Volcanic Eruption" drink, which is kind of like a fishbowl at Sgt. Preston's but in a much fancier dish than a plastic bowl. This was one of the "tiki drinks" they have that comes in a wide ceramic bowl with a volcano shape in the middle. At the middle peak there is a smaller bowl (about 1oz.) that contained flaming Bacardi 151, which Becca promptly took down. The drink itself was pretty tasty I thought, and it got Erin tipsy in no time. It says it's for 2-4 people, but I would hesitate to get this with only two, that's a lot of booze to suck down.

In the end Becca and Joe had forgotten to bring the gift card, so they will be back at some point. At least the food and drink is good so coming back isn't much of a chore.

• Service: Our server was great, she had clearly been doing this for awhile, she knew what she was doing.
  
• Food: Excellent pizza, and the artichoke dip appetizer was good as well.
  
• Drinks: Full bar and decent beer selection here. There are good specials if you come to the early happy hour or the later specials at 10pm.
  
• Ambiance: I love sitting outside on a nice summer day and this patio didn't disappoint. People were friendly and it wasn't loud so I could actually hear people talking.
  
• Price: Prices are what you'd expect, $4-5 for a beer, and our pizza was $20. Pretty standard I think.
  
• Convenience: There's a bit of parking available in the parking lot, otherwise you'll be on a side street or Marshall. When the Lowry bridge opens back up it'll be a little easier to get to.

Erin's Review
While Psycho Suzi's wasn't really on our list because we have been there once or twice before, this was the first time I have had a meal there, so it kind of counts as a new place. The other times I have been there it was winter, so I didn't get to enjoy their patio. This is one of the best parts about Psycho Suzi's, so I would recommend checking it out while it is still warm if you haven't been there. Current TV just did a special on places to go while at the Republican National Convention and they picked Psycho Suzi's as the #1 bar in the Twin Cities. Kind of an odd choice but I won't disagree.

I will share Ben's disappointment at the happy hour times. I know they do have some great late night specials, but it seems weird to me to have a happy hour from just 3-5 - kind of saying a big screw you to all of us with office jobs that have to work until 5. The normal prices aren't that expensive though, so it isn't so bad.

Anyway, we got the Volcanic Eruption to all split, which was a fun novelty drink, but I'm not sure I'd order it again... it actually was a pretty good deal for the size of the drink, and for how strong it was.

I chose the Backfire Dip for an appetizer, which is an artichoke and jalapeno dip. I almost forgot to take a photo because I was so hungry, so this is when it was almost all eaten. This was very good and went quick! It does have a little bit of a kick, but isn't super spicy. I thought they could have given a bit more of the dip with the amount of bread that came with, but it is quite difficult to get the dip to dippers ratio perfect.

I also thought the pizza was good, but honestly by the time that came out the Volcanic Eruption had clouded my judgment so I can't really remember much about it :)

Deets

Psycho Suzi's
2519 Marshall St. NE
Minneapolis

Highly recommended for drinks, food, and fun atmosphere

Red's Savoy Inn

Visited on Wednesday, March 26th with Dad K. and Liz

Ben's Review
We made a quick impulse decision to go to Red's Savoy Inn last Wednesday. Erin and I came home from work and saw the roofers who were putting a new roof on our house still hard at work, and the yard was a disaster. I looked at Erin as we pulled up and said "I don't want to go in there or deal with this in any way, lets go out to dinner." We sat in the car, thinking of a place on our list, and came up with Red's Savoy Inn.

We arrived around 6pm, I was amazed that the parking lot out back was completely full. I dropped Erin off at the door so we could get a table, while I drove a couple blocks away to find a parking spot on the street.

Walking into Red's on a sunny day is a little disorienting. There are zero windows in the entire restaurant, and the lighting is low. It took me a good thirty seconds before I could actually see anything. Like the parking lot, the restaurant itself was full, but Erin had gotten a table for us, her sister, and her dad. Again, it was weird to see a full restaurant on a Wednesday night, but apparently Red's is a popular place to go after work, there are lots of offices nearby.

The waitstaff at Red's reminds me of Nye's; all the servers appear to be lifers and nobody looked younger than 55. I get the impression they've been there awhile. If you look at the ceiling you can see the artifacts from when smoking was allowed in restaurants - there's a nasty yellow color over everything.

We had a couple pitchers of beer while we waited for our pizzas, the only relatively interesting beer they have is Amber Bock, other than that its the standard dive bar lineup: Bud, Bud Light,MGD , etc. (but no Miller Lite??). We ordered a regular pepperoni pizza and a large special pizza (pepperoni, sausage, onions, green peppers, we took off the mushrooms and olives). I think the pizza took about 30 minutes to arrive, no big deal when you've got beer.

The pizza is incredible. The crust isn't thin, but has just the right amount of crispiness. It's loaded with cheese. The sausage pieces are practically golf ball sized. My mouth is watering now just thinking about it. My co-worker Scott doesn't even like pizza, but he likes Red's. When we go next time, I'm going to try the pizza with pickles, I'm a huge fan of the pickle pizza at Dulonos, so I bet this one is good as well.

(Large special pizza)

We had about half a pizza left over when we were done, which I had for dinner on Friday. It's good the second time around, but nothing like the first. I will most definitely be going back to Red's.

Red's Ratings:

• Service: The service was satisfactory, the elder waitress seemed to warm up to us after Erin's dad arrived, it must have been his gray hair.
  
• Food: I wish I could think of a better adjective to describe how good the pizza is, but I can't. It's just really f-ing good pizza.
  
• Drinks: Standard taps, no Summit though which was disappointing. They do have a full bar though, if that's your thing.
  
• Ambiance: It was pretty active on a Wednesday night, I bet its even more so on the weekends. It feels like a VFW inside, a real casual atmosphere.
  
• Price: The total was $44 I think. The "special" was $19, the pepperoni was $11, which means the pitchers of beer were $7. NOT BAD :)
  
• Convenience: They have a parking lot, but the damn thing was full on a Wednesday. I had to find a spot a couple blocks away.

Erin's Review
For some reason, I thought Savoy was a fancy place. I have no idea why, Savoy to me has a fancy connotation. Boy, was I wrong! This place is definitely NOT fancy, for those who had the same idea I did. It wasn't really dirty or anything, except for the previously mentioned yellow ceilings. The booths were all in one piece, and there were some cool murals on the wall too.

The service was a little snide - for example, we asked how many people a large pizza fed, and the server rolled her eyes and seemed annoyed at the question. I'm sure that is a pretty common question, I mean, come on. All it says on the menu is "large" and "regular" - I didn't see any mention of how many inches the sizes represented on the menu. For everyone else out there - a regular is plenty for 2, a large would probably serve 3-4. Now you won't have to ask anyone if you go, heaven forbid.

Again, disappointment at the lack of Miller Lite - but my Dad prefers Bud anyway, so it was probably best that we had that since he paid :) And let's be honest - I can't tell the difference anyway.

The pizza was amazing. Just amazing. I actually didn't really like the huge hunks of sausage, I preferred the pepperoni pizza to the special - but I'm a simpleton when it comes to pizza (and apparently, most everything) I like just pepperoni and nothing else.

(regular pepperoni pizza)

I'd definitely go back to Red's Savoy Inn - it's really cheap and has a fun atmosphere.

Deets
Red's Savoy Inn (no website that I could find)
421 Seventh St E
St Paul, MN

Highly Recommended