Since moving to Boynton Beach I’ve lost my cool about pizza. I’d been looking forward to pizza. Florida is not known for pizza, but after twenty years of living away from pizza, sometimes an ocean away, I am not very fussy about it. I just want a large, drippy slice with subtly fragrant marinara sauce, properly chewy cheese, a nice, solid crust which is neither crispy nor soggy but has that indefinably good feel every New Yorker knows from birth... um, yeah, sorry, you were saying?
In Florida, food is found in minimalls. In other words, you get into the car, drive to a minimall parking lot, park as close as possible to your destination, and enter. Any deviation from this routine will invite speculation, stalkers and worried questions. You may not be seen walking, or stopping on one of the few corners amenable to human habitation and contemplating where to go. Now, how is this relevant, apart from to recommend a few places (the mall, the park) where humans are allowed to gather and inspect one another for signs of life?
The minimall life is not conducive to grabbing a slice of pizza. The point of a slice is to balance it over a paper plate while walking down 6th Avenue, or if more time is available the slice is covered in red pepper flakes and cheese and eaten on a stool at a shelf. If you're really lucky you're getting this sold by weight in Rome (or Tel Aviv- just try the amazing pizza slices on Dizengoff) but you aren't getting it from a young server named Scott who keeps asking you, again and again, if there's anything else you need before he brings you the bill.
I could go on and on about minimalls, the ache of loneliness I feel looking out at the parking lot through a glass window, the melancholy that sets upon me eating a slice of pizza without the traffic of the world stamping around me. I don't hear America singing! But I don't want to wind up the implication of pizza without pizza. I want pizza. Come back, crust with cheese.
So let us go then, you and I, to a corner restaurant a few blocks from the easy resort buzz of Delray Beach's Atlantic Avenue. Anthony's. It's a restaurant, and once you're there you will see other humans. Delray Beach, the town that is, gets its fill of humans who come, park their cars next to actual sidewalks, and stroll a good half-mile up and down, past shops and restaurants. It's like a city! You stop in from of a shop window, look inside, and then on to the next one! There are park benches, cafes! And if you know where to find it, a little north on the Federal Highway, Anthony's!
The full name of Anthony's is Anthony's Coal Fired Pizza. It's a local chain- big surprise. You may notice that the name contains nothing about dripping slices, Penn Station, eggplant or even a vague allusion to a borough. So I won't say anything about the pizza, which is that type served as a pie on a raised plate. It's okay. Maybe it's good. But it's thin crust, a little burnt on the bottom, and subtly not burstingly flavored.
However, there is one special dish-the Broccoli Rabe and Sausage. Sauteed in garlic and oil, of course, the texture is finely balanced between the juice of the oil and a delicate crunch in the texture. It actually tastes like food, and I could imagine someone in back, cooking it.
Come to think of it, this is the ongoing theme in my return to the U.S.A. (after many months of training my palate near the Elephant & Castle roundabout in London): does the food on my plate seem to have been conceived, cut and cooked by humans, or did it emerge full blown from a picture of food to be half-eaten and then languish in a styrofoam box in the fridge?
Anthony's: good for balmy Florida with its outdoor terrace and retiree-friendly prices. But I won't be walking down Atlantic Avenue with a slice.
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