Time for the Top 10: PW Pizza

The solar-powered PW Pizza is for the environmentally conscious, and it's not your father's pizza. Unlike pizza of yesteryear, PW Pizza sources their cheeses, vegetables, and meats locally in their quest for quality pizza. They even offer vegan, gluten free, and a honey wheat crust as options. The place is named after Paul and Wendy Hamilton of the Vin de Set and Eleven Eleven Mississippi restaurant magnate. 

Stlpizzaguy discovered PW Pizza in the Spring of 2013 while perusing Yelp reviews of downtown pizza places on Thursday afternoon in his Health Care Quality class. I remember this distinctively because the class was so darn boring. But the highlight of each week was going to a pizza place of every Thursday night with classmate David Castellucci.  Located in a sort of no-mans land on Chouteau, we finally arrive at PW and order some wings and pizza. The hot wings have a healthy twist to them. They aren't deep-fried, contain no sauce but have a strong Chipotle seasoning. 

We order our pizza--a half "Yo Pauly" and half "Big Balls" the first time. Big Balls is just how it sounds, PW's version of a meatball pizza with giant meatballs invading their somewhat thin, hand-tossed crust. Yo Pauly has volpi salami, hot capicola, sun-dried tomato, roasted garlic, pepperoncini.
On other visits, I order the Wolf pizza, my recommendation, which is topped with housemade fennel sausage, pepperoni, applewood-smoked bacon, carmelized onions, and cloves of garlic. 

"Maybe it's called the Wolf because if you put it in front of me I will WOLF it down!"

Stlpizzaguy (LEFT) with his sister Krista (RIGHT) the inspiration behind the "P" of Approval. Stlpizzaguy's choice pizza here is The Wolf, and Krista enjoyed the "healthy" hot wings to pair with the pizza.

PW is my first release of a top-10 pizza place because it introduced me to a new way of making and eating pizza. It expanded my horizons to crave pizza places that use fresh ingredients and combine meats in creative ways. Here, they slide their pies into wood-fired ovens, and cook the pizza at 800-degrees. Their crust is close to a Neapolitan-style pizza, hand kneaded and tossed. PW's cheese of choice is mozzarella.
All their pizzas are 12-inches, but PW douses on a crap ton of toppings that will leave you satisfied. Because of the wood-fired oven the crust is crispier than Dewey's. Because of the fresh ingredients, you get a sensory overload in your moth when you bite into their pizza. The toppings come alive and have greater richness. As fresh and local sourced ingredients for pizza in St. Louis was pretty rare in 2013, this place left an indelible mark on me. For a nice view of downtown, a great pizza/wings combo, and of course fresh ingredients go try out PW Pizza.

PW PIZZA IS LOCATED AT
2017 Chouteau
St. Louis Mo 63103

SHOUT OUTS:

Since the advent of this pizza blog, I've received many requests from friends for advice on where to eat pizza. A few friends have even taken me out and bought my pizza, in exchange for a trip to one of the places in my top 10. I must give a special shout out to the Saint Louis University Internal Medicine Residents, particularly Hina and Kush Mehta, who are avid followers of stlpizzaguy blog and have eaten at a couple of the St. Louis pizza places mentioned in the book Where to Eat Pizza. They  made the pledge to eat pizza at all of my forthcoming top 10 pizza places. I expect to release a pizza place into the top 10 every couple weeks. 

Another special shout out goes to Blake McGaugh and Olivia Nicholson. When I was planning this post, they asked for a great pizza place near the Soulard area and I suggested PW Pizza. Blake was kind enough to give PW Pizza his "P" of Approval. 

Blake Mcgaugh gives PW Pizza the "P" of Approval, will you?

Thank you fans for all the kind words. Feel free to make the pizza pledge to eat at all my top 10 pizza places, and you will get mentioned in my blog, along with photos you take. Other ideas coming down the pipe is a pizza poetry contest, with the winner getting a $25 gift certificate to my #1 pizza place. But that is all for a later date. Stay happy and remember, sometimes the key to a happier life is to eat more pizza.  

Refutation of Where To Eat Pizza

Daniel Young's Where to Eat Pizza is a very ambitious encyclopedia of pizza, but falls short of my expectations because of its failure to include St. Louis-style pizza and Provel cheese. Released in late March of 2016, the 526-page behemoth of a book devotes hardly a page to the best pizza places in St. Louis. Out of the abundance of great pizza places in St. Louis, the book lists only five, while also listing five pizza places in Omaha, Nebraska.

Are you kidding me? I actually got nervous when I read the Wall Street Journal over the weekend, which highlighted the release of this book. It appeared that someone else had already done stlpizzaguy's job by finding the best pizza places in the area.

"Have no fear, I am still the holder of many St. Louis pizza secrets not mentioned in Where to Eat Pizza."

Where To Eat Pizza is written by someone I could only dream to be someday: the aficionado of all aficionados when it comes to pizza: Daniel Young. He is the organizer of the London Pizza Festival, which is a yearly pizza tasting and competition featuring some of the best pizzas in Europe.

In order write this book, Mr. Young couldn't have possibly gone to every major U.S. city and ranked the pizza. I'm sure that if he did visit St. Louis, Young might have devoted a full chapter to St. Louis pizza and given Provel cheese and our local spots the credit they deserve. Instead, he employed regional food experts. Ian Froeb was chosen as the regional food expert for Missouri Pizza. Mr. Froeb is a very accomplished food critic in Missouri, and known for his 100 top St. Louis restaurants on stltoday.com. In the case of pizza, however, he misses the mark.

Out of the five St. Louis pizza places listed in the book on pages 408-409, only one of the five listed in the book are in my top 10.

According to Where To Eat Pizza, the BEST pizza places in St. Louis are:

• Pastaria
• Black Thorn Pub & Pizza
• La Pizza
• Pizzeoli
• Pizzeria Tivoli

All of these pizza places are certainly great, but then again it is rare that I meet a pizza that I don't like. My bone to pick is the lack of any St. Louis-style pizza places listed by the author. Pastaria is wood-fired Neopolitan, while Black Thorn is Chicago-style deep dish. La Pizza is a New York-style pizza, while Pizzeoli is Neapolitan, along with Pizzeria Tivoli. 

Maybe the Neapolitan Pizza mafia along with the Chicago-style Pizza mafia paid a visit to the author of the book. All jokes aside, if you want to find out my top-10 pizza places from someone born and raised in St. Louis, then stay tuned because my list coming soon.