—————————————————— Can Domino's Pull Off "Brooklyn-Style" Pizza? | Eating Our Words | Houston | Houston Press | The Leading Independent News Source in Houston, Texas

Fast Times

Can Domino's Pull Off "Brooklyn-Style" Pizza?

No! 1000 percent, N-effing-O.

Maybe my expectations were raised too high by the promise of hand-stretched, perfectly foldable crust, and by images of the flavorful, thin, crisp crust conjured by the word "Brooklyn." Or maybe it was the fact that I just wasn't drunk. Anyway I look at it -- my experience with Domino's Brooklyn-style pizza was a major fail.

On a particularly sad night, my man and I caved and ordered Domino's off the Interwebs. The chain has got online ordering down to a T, I'll give them that. Their Build Your Own Pizza app lets you handpick the amount of cheese, sauce and toppings, which comes in handy for the thinner crust pies (and your waistline...but if you really, truly cared, would you be ordering Domino's to begin with?). We ordered a Brooklyn-style pie with "robust inspired" tomato sauce (WTF does that mean?) and went light on the pepperoni and cheese.

Could I fold the slice? Yes. This was about the only thing that was Brooklyn-style. The crust should have been crisp, but slightly soft and billowy on the inside, but Domino's generous coating of cornmeal failed to achieve this effect (and I'm still confused as to how the pie managed to be a bad kind of chewy). Where the dough should have had a natural, smoky sweetness, Domino's bland attempt tasted like cheese-topped cardboard -- with rubbery cheese to boot. Don't even get me started on the pepperoni; I had no idea cured meat and fat could taste so bad. The aftertaste still lingers...

Brooklyn-style? More like Crooklyn-style (side note: Have you ever seen that movie? It's uh-mazing).

In my opinion, the best thing about Domino's is its Pizza Tracker (that is, until you realize that you accidentally shared your order of an XL pie, boneless wings and two sides of cheesy bread for your "Friday night in" on Facebook).

What do you guys think? Have you tried Domino's Brooklyn-style pies? Are the new Artisan Pizzas worth a shot, or should I just end my misery here and now? Speak now or forever hold your peace (gah! so hard not to make a terrible pizza pun here...must.stop.self.now).



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Brooke Viggiano is a contributing writer who is always looking to share Houston's coolest and tastiest happenings with the Houston Press readers.
Contact: Brooke Viggiano