Pizza Nea on East Hennepin 1/18/2018

A big shout out to Mike Sherwood, owner of Pizza Nea.   Here's a guy who knows how to run a business.

We recently had dinner at Pizza Nea...fairly late on a cold January evening.  We circled the block a few times looking for parking and lucked out when a spot opened up within a few feet of the front door.   There's lots of construction going on in the area, so parking is a bit tighter than usual.

With interesting art on the walls, one wall is exposed brick, comfortable cozy seating and overall great ambiance this is a delightful and comfortable space for a quiet intimate dinner.

Typically January evening is a quiet and tough month for restaurants.  Everyone spent their money on Christmas and have now opened their credit card bills.  Plus it's cold and icy...not the most desirable time of year to trudge out for a late dinner.  It was not surprising to see just two tables of diners on this particular evening.

Ian, our attentive host and server, seated us, and took our drink order.  John had a glass of cabernet sauvignon...a serviceable wine although we think it suffered from waiting for January customers just a little too long.

We decided to share a salad and pizza.   The Verde salad, with greens, a nice portion of proscuitto, pine nuts and two kinds of cheese had much more generous proportions of meat and cheese than a comparable Punch offering.  There were a few greens in the salad that should have been plucked out in the prep. It's common in mixed greens to have some deterioration in quality from being damp or stuck together.  Kitchen staff have to be vigilant to send out just the fresh ones.  The same quality issue applied to the bread which was was cold and stiff.   The proscuitto was excellent and abundant, and over all, the other ingredients were high quality.

Pizza selection was tough...there were many, many great sounding choices.  We settled on the malazana...an eggplant pizza with peppers, onions, and two kinds of cheese on a red sauce.  Hands down this was the best neapolitan pizza we've ever had.  The crust was perfect.  If you've eaten other neapolitans, like Punch, you know that unless you ask for a few more seconds in the oven, the middle of the pizza comes out soggy.   Not so with Pizza Nea.  This crust was absolutely perfect...crisp, chewy, tender...a million texture experiences in the crust alone.   The cheeses were superb and the eggplant, relatively thinly sliced, came out of the oven with wonderful texture and flavor.  We thoroughly enjoyed each and every bite.

So, our review of Pizza Nea:   A great neapolitan pizza restaurant with an attentive owner.   We had a food safety issue with the preparation of our dinner, so we contacted the owner.  He immediately listened to our concerns, took them seriously, and reviewed food prep steps with all of the employees...not just the shift involved.   He kept in contact with us to update us so that we could be assured that the issue was resolved.  Then he offered us the opportunity to return to give them another try. 

The potential of our meal was all there....except for some problems in execution.   But the pizza was over the top fantastic---among the best pizza we've ever eaten.   The fact that it was vegetarian was an extra....a satisfying vegetable-based dish that was flavorful and interesting.  Our server Ian had a great sense of humor and we had a great chat after dinner.  Except for some problems with tonight's execution of parts of the meal, this would have been five star.  Abundant ingredients on the salad and a superb, colorful, pizza with an exceptionally good crust.

We'll be back to try it again when we can walk on Hennepin in warmer weather so that we can stroll without freezing.  We believe our next meal there will be a memorable one.