NYC Pizza Crawl with Kids
I may be bias, but I think I live in one of the greatest cities in the world!
And if I did a poll, would you agree?!
New York City offers people many wonderful things – architecture, music venues, theater, fashion nightlife and of course, the food! New York is a haven for foodies and one of the things we are best known for is our New York-style pizza!
My husband, my boys and myself really love pizza especially slices here in our hometown! It was only natural for us to salivate at the idea of doing a NYC Pizza Crawl with our boys. We decided to venture to well-known pizzerias in Lower Manhattan. We bought only a couple of slices at each place and then cut them in half, giving each of us a small taste to savor and rate.
Being a teacher-turned-speech therapist, I couldn’t help myself from making our adventure a little more educational. I created a simple “Pizza Rating Sheet” for the boys to use to evaluate the pizzas and ultimately help us choose a winner!
Just a few skills that a pizza rating sheet can address:
Literacy – reading the chart and writing the names of the pizzerias
Math – using a graph and counting up all the checks and X’s to figure out which one had the highest marks
Language – using descriptive words to describe how the pizza looked, smelled, tasted, etc.
Feeding – exploring various types of pizza and their unique ingredients
Self-advocacy – building awareness of one’s interests and views and being able to voice them
(Click above! Happy to share something that made the Pizza Crawl even more fun!)
Here’s how our pizza journey went…
My husband and I drove down to Lower Manhattan. We used an app called “Spot Hero” to help you find a parking garage for a specific amount of time. (Not an ad, just sharing a convenient way to secure parking for yourself).
First up, we went to Ben’s Pizzeria. It felt like a quintessential NYC slice joint. A little grimy, but suitable.
Luckily, we found a secluded table so the boys could have room to try their slices and rate them accordingly.
My husband and I, unfortunately, agreed that we were expecting something very different. We reminisced about our younger years and venturing to this place on a late night. The pizza tasted SO good back then, but tonight the pizza fell short.
We also had a good laugh at the irony of the banner outside noting it as the “The Most Famous Pizza In the World” and similarities to Will Ferrell in the movie Elf when he naively found the “World’s Best Coffee.”
Next up was Joe’s Pizza on Carmine Street.
A famous establishment with celebrity photos lining the walls. Years ago, we did see Claire Danes leaving this place. We have always considered their pizza to be a delicious favorite.
Today, their slices did not disappoint! The dense, chewy crust and delicious cheese and sauce hit the spot! My husband wanted to grab another slice before leaving, but had to remind him to slow down.
We had a couple more places to go to…
Then, we ventured to MacDougal Street to let fate take us to our next stop.
We settled on Artichoke Basille’s Pizza, mainly because they had space for us to eat and enough room for the rating clipboards. Yes, this was a must for the boys. They practically demanded that their clipboards be next to them at all times during the crawl.
My boys were really into the rating sheet, which was fun to watch. My older son was very diligent about it. He slowly went through each category (e.g., appearance, smell, sauce, cheese, crust), taking his time to decide if it deserved a check for being liked or an “X” for being disliked, and then sharing his adorable precocious comments like a true pizza critic.
When ordering our slices, I jokingly asked the employee if they had a famous slice for their unique name, and he quickly gestured to their “Artichoke Pizza.” I really do love artichokes and wanted to love this so much, but it was too heavy and creamy.
Kids were getting tired and seemed full of pizza at this point so we decided to go back to the car to give ourselves time to digest before our final spot, Prince Street Pizza.
Kids waited in the car with my husband while I waited on the line. I spoke to a very friendly person behind me and she told me that the line is usually over an hour long. Amazingly the line was only 15-minutes for us. She told me that I must get the “Spicy Spring” which is a square slice topped with fra diavolo sauce, fresh mozzarella and spicy pepperoni. Her recommendation was well-appreciated and ultimately well-received. This slice was our winning one for the night – just the right amount of crunch, chewiness and spice from the crispy pepperoni! We definitely saved the best for last!
In the end though, it really didn’t matter which pizza was liked the most or least, this was an awesome experience for our little family. Definitely something we might try again. If not a pizza crawl, there are so many amazing foods that are done right by New York City: bagels, donuts, cookies, ice cream, food trucks, etc.
I wonder what kind of crawl we will do next…
