Top-Notch Pizza in Massachusetts

And my schedule through October!

Greetings from Wisconsin! I’m writing this out of Colectivo Coffee in Madison and Open Door Cafe in Mayville, both of which are wonderful places for remote workers like me!

This email is mostly a lot of pizzas and a quick update on my schedule.

(If you’re new here, where I live is where I’m cat sitting, mostly through Trusted Housesitters.)

Schedule

• Jan 10–Apr 05: Belmont, MA (near Boston) – Yoshi and Kiku

• Apr 12–May 22: Scottsville, VA (near Charlottesville) – Phinny, Tony, Greyson, Gertrude, and Elliott

• May 29–Jul 06: College Park, MD (near D.C.) – Lucy and Oscar

• Jul 08–Aug 02: Brown Deer, WI (near Milwaukee) – Karim

• Aug 02–Aug 13: Chicago, IL – Goldie and Olive

• Aug 13–Aug 23: Minnesota (TBD)

• Aug 26–Sep 01: Fort Collins, CO – Mazie

• Sep 03–Sep 10: Tacoma, WA (near Seattle) – Molly

• Sep 11–Oct 21: Vancouver, WA (near Portland) – Cashew and Zoom

If you’re near any of these places, please reach out!

I would truly appreciate seeing you.

Thank You

To those of you who have met up with me over pizza, for coffee, for a film, at a record store, at a brewery, at a winery, to wander through a town, to see a baseball game, or to welcome me into your home… I so thankful. For me, the biggest challenge of being a digital nomad is the lack of consistent connections with people, and it means a ton that you have made time to be with me.

You all know who you are. I love you. Thank you.

Yoshi and Kiku

I spent the first quarter of the year outside of Boston with Yoshi and Kiku. Yoshi’s a dominant tuxedo cat with iris melanosis in one eye. The boss of the house.

Yoshi’s companion is Kiku, the shy and skittish one of the family who seemed scared of everything.

Kiku would prefer not be seen. I’d come downstairs, and she’d hide. But she loved chasing a laser around and tackling treats. Overall, Yoshi and Kiku were good companions to have where I was staying: a comfortable home in a bedroom community with good connections to bike trails, transit, trains, and highways.

Pizzas For Your To-Do List

The Boston area has a lot of good pizza, but with the time I had I decided to dive deeper and explore more of the state and surrounding locales. Looking back, these are my top nine.

Volturno Pizza Napoletana, Worcester, MA

Volturno Pizza Napoletana, Worcester, MA: Top-tier Neapolitan style place in a large, converted warehouse space. Was surprised the pizzas were two-for-one on the Monday I was there, so I got a second pizza for free to take home.

Avenue Kitchen + Bar, Somerville, MA

Avenue Kitchen + Bar, Somerville, MA: I would bet it’s the best Detroit-style in Massachusetts. Less greasy than Detroit’s standard-bearer Buddy’s with a crispy and thick edge, and overall proportioned well.

Bar, New Haven, CT

Bar, New Haven, CT: I’m generally not a big fan of New Haven style. I’ve done Frank Pepe, Sally’s, and Modern on another New Haven trip. I think the style is an outcome of Italian immigrants having to reinvent the wheel in the New World with sub-par ingredients. This said, Bar has been on my Connecticut to-do list, and I took the train down to meet up with friends to give it a shot. Bar does take New Haven style a notch up, and retains the droopy yet cracker-like ultra thin crust (as well as the presentation on a sheet of paper on a huge pan). It’s a mess, but one with actually good ingredients. Out of the five of us, the second youngest, age six, after downing a bunch of rectangles, declared it the best pizza she ever had. I respect her opinion a lot. Bar is now where I recommend if you’re going to New Haven.

Cape Cod Cafe, Brockton, MA

Cape Cod Cafe, Brockton, MA: South Shore Bar Pizza has a lot of variants in the region, and many point back to Cape Cod Cafe being the first with style. Made in a pan, it gives the edge of the crust a caramelized bite. It’s a bit buttery, and very satisfying.

Si Cara, Cambridge, MA

Si Cara, Cambridge, MA: Canotto style is a Neapolitan derivative that has a puffier and more airy crust. It’s the Italian word for “dinghy,” and the edges resemble something that would float at sea. More filling than a Neapolitan pie, I regretfully had to leave a quarter of it behind.

Flying Saucer Pizza Company, Salem, MA

Flying Saucer Pizza Company, Salem, MA: In a town full of witch kitsch, it was oddly refreshing to stumble into a place that instead had science fiction geekery cranked up to 11. After ordering, I spent some time admiring the signed photos from Star Trek cast members and a full-sized replica of Locutus of Borg that silently greeted visitors at the door. The pizza was dialed in with the same level of nerdom: unusual complexity but calculated balance. The “Poison Ivy” I had contained basil pesto, spinach, broccoli, green bell pepper, goat cheese, and balsamic fig glaze. Somehow it was not heavy, and it was even refreshing, in a way.

Venice Pizza, Dorchester, MA

Venice Pizza, Dorchester, MA: This neighborhood take-out joint is punching far above its weight. The pie I had was crispy, chewy, and a little sour, covered in biting pesto and sweet tomatoes, all well proportioned.

Jinny’s Pizzeria, Newton, MA

Jinny’s Pizzeria, Newton, MA: Fantastic 72-hour fermented crust that is a bit salty without being too noticeably so. Might be the best crust I’ve tasted in the state. This one had a nice mix of cheeses with a sharp blue, balanced out with saba. Top of my list to go back to when I’m in Massachusetts.

Ops, Brooklyn, NY

Ops, Brooklyn, NY: On my to-do list for a while, I arranged a day trip to meet friends in New York to have this pizza. Absolutely phenomenal crust that’s chewy with a solid crisp and hard, thick edge, with mostly sourdough notes. A little sour, a tiny bit sweet, and a little salty. The mix of cheeses were sharp and pronounced, and offset by the surprisingly juicy olives. The kind of pizza where we periodically paused, looked at each other, and contemplated the art we were consuming.

What’s Next?

I recently had a wonderful time in Scottsville, Virginia (population ~550), which I’ll recap in my next missive.

Will you be near where I’m headed? Know of a pizzeria I should check out somewhere? Need a long-term cat sitter at the end of the year or in 2024? Just want to chat about cats or pizza? Reach out! Email is great, and I use Signal and Discord constantly too.

Keep in touch!

-Aaron