Roberta's Pizza Review: Remembering the Bee Sting pizza and Pumpernickel Everything bagel
Some days I try to think of posts where food relates to sports, and the sports relates to life. Such comparisons are always stretched too thinly. Loving sports and food is tough. Food just doesn’t seem to relate to life. How do you analyze spaghetti to a cook’s personality or to an eater’s? Dining descriptions have a life their own, and seem to know its boundaries. When food stories evoke emotions it’s often about quality time with family and friends. Perhaps it’s learning to cook from a grandmother or spending one-on-one time with a parent at a ballpark. I’m generally critical of memoirs because if you live your current state in such vivid details that can be recalled later, then either your diaries could be worth fortunes, or the embellishments and adjectives are monetarily placed. When I look at authors of memoirs, it fills me with rage. My anger is placed both on their ability to live a moment so fully and also with their ability to artfully articulate memories with vivid details. “It’s all about quality ingredients!” That’s the mantra de rigueur, although recollections are often panko crusted, infused with oils, and drizzled with lemon juice. Words, like food or sports, in the hands of a crafty veteran usually results in something of beauty. I, on the other hand, barely qualify to be a rookie, especially when it comes to food. Once, I got bored in a tiny Brooklyn kitchen, and tried to reduce tequila in a cheap pan from Chinatown. Man, shitty times. As for describing the food, I’m still not getting much better. That’s not going to stop me though! And maybe I’ll find a sports analogy in there somewhere.
Getting to Roberta’s on a weekend can be a bit of a pain when the MTA decides to do maintenance on the L-line. When there are transportation issues on the MTA, it worries Steph, because I turn into, “I can’t fucking wait until robots replace these useless union conductors” kind of ranting madman. After checking in with the hostess, we realized perhaps sitting outdoors would be beneficial to pictures. For some reason the hostess cautioned us against it because it was sweltering out there. There’s not much air flow in the outdoor area we were in (although it appears they have multiple areas), and it was only reasonable in the shaded portions of the patio or whatever you want to call it.
I added the biscuit to our order because it’s always difficult to pass up the idea of a biscuit. What is the idea of a biscuit? Well usually the idea is something that’s flaky/fluffy, and not too big therefore an easy addition to any meal. Also the idea includes the possibility of being a willing sponge in case your meal has some sort of wet/saucy component to it. The version at Roberta’s was slathered with maple butter, and quite honestly it was too much food. It’s like when I go to fancy restaurants and repeatedly have a Pretty Woman experience where I just don’t know what the fuck to do. But I always eat a shit ton of bread if it’s available. If a fancy place ever has x-number of types of bread, my goal usually is to try x-1. It’s a great formula to be a fatass. There’s really no reason for me to ever order too much food, because if I’m still hungry at the end of the meal, it’s always possible to order more. But no. I eat like it’s my first time seeing menu.
Steph got a P & H Cream soda. Cream sodas have become an item that we usually don’t pass up if it’s on the menu, especially if it’s one we’ve never tried. P&H is located in Brooklyn, but I live under a rock when it comes to artisanal foods. I like the Transformers 3 of foods. P&H is like the indie flick of sodas. It was great though. It was a bit herbal with a strong vanilla finish. You could see the little specks from the vanilla. 
Right now I live in Harlem, and it’s a neighborhood where I can’t walk down the street and get a slice of pizza or bagel. Unless that street involves a 12 minute walk. Usually I don’t consider that ‘down the street’ as much as “Motherfucking hassle that it takes 30 minutes round trip to get a fucking bagel.” I do it because Absolute Bagels is kinda awesome. So at Roberta’s, they had this pumpernickle everything bagel. It’s quite unlike anything at Absolute. They toast the thing super aggressively until the crunch from every bite is unmistakeable. It came with some smoked fish that had me burping up the smoke fish taste long after the meal. Also for $11, it’s pretty affordable.
And then there was the Bee Sting pizza ($13). It was blogged about on Serious Eats and Eat to Blog. The pizza has tomatoes, mozzarella, sopressata picante, basil, and honey. The heat is quite mild and the honey drizzled on top definitely was a nice touch. Not too sweet. I particularly liked the crust compared to my first pizza at Roberta’s, which was underwhelming. Maybe eating outdoors affects your mood.
This brunch at Roberta’s was good. The idea of brunch is still weird to me though. I can’t remember when I first ate brunch. The whole idea is kind of wacky. You combine breakfast and lunch together, right? Why would I reduce the number of times I consume food in a single day? Now it seems like brunch is simply just eating breakfast for lunch, at lunch hour. It doesn’t make any sense. But in New York they serve brunch til like 3 PM at most places. As strange as this tradition is, it now feels really normal. That doesn’t mean I can write about these experiences any better though. I should just try to be a chef or print journalist who hates bloggers. Those people seem to remember everything, they never need to take pictures to document a damn thing. They live fuller lives and memories richer than Sarah Palin’s take on history. If only I could be so smart.
Roberta’s Pizza261 Moore St.Brooklyn, NY 11206718-417-1118
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