Austin Pizza Run

It’s that time of year again… National Pizza Month!

Much like last year, David and I will celebrate with you by going through the ATX’s favorite pizzerias.

When we first moved back to Austin at the start of summer, we spent a lot of time catching up with old friends, which meant a lot of eating out.  One weekend we had plans to meet up with our friends from Bratislava (who had also moved back to Austin), Joey and Jenn.  (You may remember them from our trip to Russia back in 2011.)

Joey and Jenn are big foodies and always providing us with great new restaurants to add to my ever-growing list.  So when Joey asked where we wanted to eat on that Friday night, I sent him my list.  After browsing through it, he suggested that instead of trying just one place, we do a pizza run (without doing any actual running) through Austin.

Nice move, Joey.

Of course David and I loved the idea!  We also loved the idea of only using public transportation for our pizza run.  Although having a car is so convenient and absolutely necessary in Texas, we’ve missed taking public transportation and walking everywhere. 

So Friday evening, we hopped on the metro rail from north Austin to downtown.  It was a quick, comfortable journey.

We met Joey on the rail and Jenn downtown.  First stop on our pizza tour was The Backspace.

Nestled between 5^th and 6^th street on San Jacinto, The Backspace is a small trattoria that only seats about 30 people.  Because it was nearly 7:00 and the place was already full, we grabbed a few seats at the bar and ordered.

The Neapolitan-style pizza is cooked in a large, Italian brick oven.  We tried the Bianca, a white pizza made with a trio of cheeses – mozzarella, ricotta, pecorino, and topped with spicy arugula.  

After one delicious slice, it was all we could do not to order more and more and more.  I also wanted to try all of the antipasti.  From the roasted pears to house-made mozzarella to focaccia, it all sounded so good. 

Joey and Jenn were our voices of reason, though, and reminded us that we had a lot of pizza to conquer that night and we needed to pace ourselves.  So David and I finished off our second slices and then reluctantly headed to stop number two – Homeslice.

Continuing on our public transportation tour of Austin, we took a bus to South Congress. Metro Rail passes are good on all public transport throughout Austin, but it did take us a few minutes to figure out how to buy Jenn a ticket.  Once we did, the bus could finally get on its way.

Homeslice is an Austin favorite that has been around for years.  It’s a New York-style pizzeria serving patrons by the slice or entire pie.  We obviously could not finish an entire pie and continue our epic journey, so we ordered a slice each. 

Joey and I were a bit adventurous and went for the New York staple – eggplant.  The menu tells customers to imagine an eggplant parmigiana pizza.  Sounds delicious, right?  Well… not so much.

Sorry Austinites, but Homeslice did not live up to the hype.  I get that it’s probably the most delicious pizza ever for college students stumbling home drunk and hungry at 2AM.  But for four adults coming straight from a nice restaurant serving authentic Neapolitan pizza, Homeslice did not deliver.

In my opinion, it had the distinct cardboard taste of airport or mall pizza that is chosen by the slice and then reheated.  I’ve read recently that one of the best subs in Austin can be found at Homeslice.  So when a pizza joint is now being lauded for a sandwich, and the pizza is no longer the star, it’s not a good sign.

Maybe if we had sat inside at the actual restaurant instead of trying the Homeslice to-go building next door, we would’ve had a different experience.  But aint nobody got time for that during a pizza run!

Next on our list was Bufalina in East Austin.  When we arrived, it was getting close to 9:00 and the wait for Bufalina (they don’t take reservations) was still more than half an hour, which is saying something.  So instead of heading to the bar and drinking our calories, we walked to East Sixth to try out Via 313.

Via 313 (Detroit’s area code) is a food truck owned by two brothers from the Motor City that started serving Detroit-style pizza in Austin a couple of years ago.  I’d never heard of Detroit-style pizza before, but found it to be a mix of Chicago-style with the sauce on top and Sicilian, as the pizza is square instead of round.

I’m not the biggest fan of square pizza, so I didn’t have high expectations.  I also wasn’t so sure about a pizza with the sauce in one row over the top instead of evenly spread over the crust.  But I must admit, I was so, so wrong and Via 313 was hella good. 

Even though it was getting late and we’d made a horrible mistake at Homeslice by each ordering one enormous slice instead of spitting two between the four of us, we ate all of our pizza from Via 313.  It was that good.  We ordered a simple cheese to avoid getting even more filled up by unnecessary toppings.  The pizza came to us hot out of the oven, and the best part was actually the tangy red sauce.  Even on top, it was in perfect proportion to the dough and cheese.

We were full.  We were tired.  But we pushed on to our fourth and final dinner.

We walked back to Bufalina on East Cesar Chavez and found our table ready for us. Bufalina is famous for its house-made mozzarella.  We wanted so badly to try it, but we knew it would put us over the edge and we were already pretty uncomfortable.  We were on a mission to try pizza, so we saved the mozzarella for next time. 

We ordered the Napoletano pizza with tomato, sausage, garlic, black olive, chile, and basil.  Our pizza arrived and it was everything we’d imagined it would be.  The garlic was zesty, the sausage was meaty and flavorful, the basil was fresh, and the chile added just the right amount of heat.  The best part was the perfectly-cooked Neapolitan-style crust.

Somehow, we managed to finish the entire pizza.  

David loved it so much that he created a double-decker 

pizza for his last few bites.  

The funny thing is that the most miserable person out of the four 

of us was Joey, and it was his idea to do the pizza run! 

I must admit, though, the rest of us weren't feeling that great, either.  To really enjoy the pizza, it’s probably best not to try too many places in one night.  But we had a lot of fun checking restaurants and food trucks off of my list, and the run was perfect for this year’s National Pizza Month blog.

Downton Abbey

Last week in the UK, Downton Abbey began its fifth season.  To celebrate the return of the dramatic Crawley family and their band of loyal servants, David and I are finally posting a blog about our springtime trip to Highclere Castle, best known as the setting for Downton Abbey.

Highclere is a beautiful castle located in Hampshire, just a short drive out to the country from London.  Every year during the offseason, while the Downton cast and crew is on holiday and not filming on-location, the castle opens its doors to the public.  As the grounds are only open about 60 days each year, tickets are very difficult to come by.  We searched the first week they went on sale to find all weekends completely sold out.  Luckily for us, one of my girlfriends from the Junior League of London was able to get tickets for her and her family.  When her relatives from the states had to unexpectedly postpone their trip, she sold them to me!

David and I know how much Karen loves Downton, so we offered the other ticket to her, and one overcast morning, we all took the short drive from Karen’s house to Hampshire.

As we toured the home, we realized that so much of the show draws on Highclere Castle’s own remarkable history and the lives of its current owners, the Earl and Countess of Carnarvon.

The countess has written a couple of books detailing the lives of Highclere’s former inhabitants, one of whom happened to be a wealthy American woman like Lady Crawley.  Another book describes the life and times of Almina, who ran a hospital out of the castle during WWI, just as the family did in the show during one its earlier seasons.

Many of the rooms and much of the furniture is used during filming, but the Carnarvons do manage to live in the castle, too, with their family and playful yellow labs (like Isis, the beloved Crawley family dog).

After we finished our tour upstairs, we made our way to the basement, where we found a treasure trove of Egyptian artifacts!

In 1901, the 5th Earl of Carnarvon was badly injured in a car accident.  To improve his poor health, his doctor suggested a drier climate.  Obsessed with Egyptology, he began frequently travelling to Egypt and obtaining licenses to excavate.  Before long, he had teamed up with Howard Carter.  For 16 years, they worked side-by-side, and their hard work eventually paid off.  In November 1922, they found King Tut’s tomb!  Unfortunately the Earl cut himself shaving and died of an infection before the tomb was opened, but his castle back in England already held one of the best Egyptian antiquities collections in the world. 

After the Earl’s death, his wife found her money dwindling quickly, and was forced to sell his Egyptian collection to the Met in New York City.  In 1987, the family discovered that the Earl’s collection had not been lost after all… he had hidden his most prized possessions within the basement walls! 

To end our stay at Downton Abbey, we strolled across the expansive grounds to the immaculate gardens.  Then we drove through the village to have a traditional lunch at a local pub.

A few weeks following this day-trip, David and I decided to rent a Zipcar for the last time and drive out to another historic building – Blenheim Palace in Oxfordshire.  

Blenheim Palace was built in the early 1700s as a gift to the 1st Duke of Marlborough, John Churchill, to celebrate his victory against the French at the Battle of Blenheim during the War of Spanish Succession.  In 1874, Sir Winston Churchill was born in the palace to his father, Lord Churchill, and his mother, Jennie, an American socialite.

The palace is absolutely enormous and the park surrounding it is grand and beautiful as well.  There are more than 2,000 acres of manicured lawns, a Roman column, a Greek temple, ponds full of fish and geese, and formal gardens.

We could have spent all day touring the palace and walking through the park, but since I had never been to Oxford before, I wanted to spend that Saturday afternoon exploring the famous college down the street. 

Little did I know that that Saturday happened to be the same day that Chelsea Clinton received her doctorate from Oxford University.  With President Clinton and Hillary Clinton in town, traffic was horrendous.   It took us about an hour to get into the city centre, and by then there was absolutely no parking and crowds everywhere.  We decided to head towards home instead. 

It wasn’t until the next day, back in London (reading an article on People.com), that I realized the Clintons had been in Oxford with us the day before!  Poor planning on my part… but Oxford isn’t going anywhere, and I’m confident we’ll have the opportunity to visit during a less-busy time in the future.

So on Saturday afternoon, on the way home to London, David and I decided to stop at St. Albans instead.  St. Albans is a quaint town just 20 miles outside London, famous for being home to the country’s oldest pub, Ye Olde Fighting Cocks.

We had lunch in the pub, which was built 1,000 years ago.  However, it didn’t get its name until the 1800s, when cock-fighting became extremely popular.  The pub is also known for hosting Oliver Cromwell, the leader of the country during the English Civil War.

St. Albans is also home to St Albans Abbey, where the saint by the same name became Britain’s first Christian martyr when he was beheaded by the Romans in AD 324.

From the pub, we walked downhill to Roman ruins.  St Albans, or Verulamium as it was called 2,000 years ago, was one of the largest Roman settlements in England.  In AD 61, it was sacked by Boudicca (the Celtic woman who led a rebellion against the Romans and also burnt London to the ground), but rebuilt to become an important centre of culture – containing a forum, basilica, and theatre.  The Romans deserted the town in AD 400.  As Verulamium is now designated a city park, much of it remains unexcavated, but portions of the city wall are visible.

David and I loved our last couple of road trips out of London to the country to explore these castles and palaces and ancient towns.  We are looking forward to visiting Highclere Castle again soon - this time on the small screen, when Downton Abbey returns for US viewers early next year!