Who has the best pizza in Texas? The U.S.? The world? For all these answers you can consult a group of insepectors who’ve been ranking these things for a while now. The online guide 50 Top Pizza has unveiled its global top 50 pizzerias (it’s actually a top 100), and drum roll please …
Texas has been shut out of the list.
The global top 50 … 100 … does include American pizzerias including Una Pizza Napoletana in New York (No. 2), Pizzeria Sei in Los Angeles (No. 5), Tony’s Pizza Napoletana in San Francisco (also No. 5) and Razza in Jersey City, N.J. (No. 10), along with a bunch of other restaurants mostly in New York, California or like Miami or whatever. Each ranked pizzeria comes with a photo of its chef-owner usually staring hard at the camera like their pizza is the difference between life and death.
But again, no Texas. If you want to know what 50 Top Pizza thinks of the Lone Star State, you have to dig into its U.S. top 50 list it released back in May. Two Texas pizzerias made that list: Partenope Ristorante in Dallas (No. 18) and Il Forno in San Antonio (No. 23). Going deeper, its “Excellent Pizzerias” list, which sounds like honorable mention, included Bollo Woodfired Pizza in Houston. The excellence category is where a lot of long-revered U.S. pizzerias live, including John’s of Bleecker Street in New York; Modern Apizza in New Haven, Conn.; Pequod’s Pizza in Chicago; and Pizzeria Bianco in Phoenix.
The Gladiator pizza at Ristorante Partenope in Richardson, Texas. Partenope has two locations in North Texas. (Jason Janik/Dallas Morning News)
“The pizza sector in the United States of America is constantly evolving, with many different offerings and an overall quality that continues to grow steadily in terms of variety and excellence,” said 50 Top Pizza curators Barbara Guerra, Luciano Pignataro and Albert Sapere in a statement upon the U.S. list’s release. It’s unclear whether one of Guerra, Pignataro and Sapere actually said that quote or they all said it in unison with beautiful harmony.
50 Top Pizza is an Italian-based venture that has been ranking pizzerias since 2018. Under its guidelines, 50 Top Pizza recognizes service, wine and beer and décor, but most of all, the pizza.
On that note it seems to heavily prioritize Napoletana (or Neapolitan) pizza, so you won’t usually find thin-sliced New York-style, Chicago’s tavern or deep dish style, Detroit style or whatever the heck they do in Iowa on these lists. It is curious that arguably Houston’s top Neapolitan pizzeria Gypsy Poet didn’t sniff any of these lists, but hey, everyone has an opinion.
More Food & Drink
Damaged | Popular Austin restaurant closes indefinitely after fire
Flips | Houston’s Hooters-to-Rivian transformation is already underway
Television | Houston restaurant cut from old ‘Parts Unknown’ episode
Theft | Houston businesses allegedly hit by air-conditioner vandal
For more food news and features from Chron, sign up for The Feed newsletter here.
This article originally published at Texas apparently can’t yet compete with New York in pizza fray.