Today I met a few friends for lunch at a relativevly new pizza joint called "Dough" at Blanco and 410 and had a pleasant meal. More specifically, it's located in a new strip center on the southwest corner of Blanco and 410. It's facing south, so it's not readily visible from either Blanco or 410, but.....well I'm sure you can find it. If you can't, just give me a call and I'll talk you through it. I've got your back, bro.
Having never been to Italy, I can't verify the authenticity of anything about the restaurant, but while spitting olive pits and drinking a tasty combination of blackberry syrup and sparkling water, I felt inspired to wear an Armani suit with no socks and talk with my hands. The Italian cafe atmosphere is accentuated by outdoor seating allowing my mind to wander farther into the sockless mindset by imagining the gas-guzzling American trucks are replaced with tiny Mediterranean yachts. Still, once inside the strip mall ambiance is surprisingly unnoticeable.
Channelling my adventurous side (do I have one of those?), I went for the Arugala Prosciutto pizza in - you guessed it - LARGE! Man, I'm crazy. It's great to live on the edge, and order more food than you can eat. Both the large and small can be consumed by a single person, with the large being a 12" pie and the small measuring a scant 7 inches across. It turns out that they don't mess around with the arugala. 'Dough' is known for their neopolitan style of pizza in which (according to the website) they bake "on the wood-burning oven's volcanic stone floor in 90 seconds at temperatures reaching 1000 degrees." The arugula and prosciutto are added after this process, and I must admit it wasn't quite what I was expecting. It's not that I don't like surprises, but it took me a few seconds to figure out that this is really more of a salad served over flatbread than a traditional pizza. Once I came to terms with that fact, I was able to enjoy the meal much more. The truffle oil poured over the arugala added a wonderful flavor that inspired me to eat my leafy greens with enthusiasm.
Even though my pizza had a good 5 inches of extra girth, Mey's pork-loving pizza still had me drooling. At the waiter's suggestion, she added egg as an extra topping and despite the increased complexity to eat a slice without egg sliding on the floor, it was well worth it. The carnivore in me wants to go back and try this one full-sized in all of it's non-kosher glory.
The dessert trophy goes to Rich for ordering a delightful espresso-topped gelato with a side of biscotti. I didn't try any myself, but judging by the his lascivious facial expression it was quite clear that he was enjoying his dessert by a much greater margin than the rest of us.
The bill came and the adult beverages were conspicuously absent; we took it to be a kind gesture on the waiter's behalf. We went on our way after discussing the finer points of russian violinists and the cultural preference for women with bangs and left with a tab of approximately $30 per person. I would estimate that we were at the high end of the scale for this place, as I had two italian sodas, flatbread, a large pizza, and an espresso during the leisurely hour and a half lunch.
After reviewing my rating system I've decided to also include a section for value. Being the engineer that I am, I have decided to define value as:
Value = (Quality^2 * Quantity / Price) * Cuy_Constant
where the Cuy_Constant is equal to 0.2 and will be adjusted for inflation at the rate of 3% anually. Actually, since I'm indulging the liberal-arts side of my brain (anybody home in there?) by writing this blog, I will likely throw that out the window and go with an arbitrary value dependent on my mood and bank account balance following the meal.
Ambiance: 3 Cuy
Service: 4 Cuy
Food: 4 Cuy
Value: 3 Cuy
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