Latest / Day Drinking With Dog / Crystal and Nick join me on location!

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Crystal and Nick join me on location! · Day Drinking With Dog

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Drinking Day, Drinking, Drink Dog Day, drinking Welcome back today, drink
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good Dog. We are here at Nautilus Milford down in the Devon area.
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Crystalline Nick have been lifelong passion to get this operation up and running. It's
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beautiful in here. They completely redid it. If you remember the old Alphas,
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it was like a pizza on one side and kind of a don't want
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to say Dingi bar on the right, but a little Dingi bar on the
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right. Now it's all real done. They flipped it so the bar is
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on the left now when you walk in and the dining room is on the
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right. They're serving pizza, salad, sandwiches, full menu. They ease
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their way into it. Everything looks good. I'm down here for about an
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hour. It's the ribbon cutting today Wednesday, the twenty fifth, or twenty
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six, whatever day it is. Had so many twenty six Wednesday twenty six
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this week. So um, I'm gonna have Nick on Crystalline and and maybe
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a surprise guest or two. The Pizza guck Bones are down here to do
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a pizza review. So we're up and running, ready to go. Uh
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gonna go grab a quick shot at Jamison and then we'll get on our way.
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Did you want me to take these all? Right? No, you're
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on ron kids. Oh it knicks back here finally right around. Just had
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the ribbon cutting. Good job, you had the mayor here. Yeah,
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well the mayor, uh what do you call that? Uh out fill in
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mayor? The lame duck oh duck mayor. Yeah he's here. Is that
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what it's called? Yeah, yeah, yeah, I didn't know that.
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It's like a lame duck president, like you can't run anymore, got it?
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You know he's out right, right, so yeah, so like he's
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still mayor, but not long. That's right. In ten years, nobody
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will know the difference. Um, hey, congrats, buddy, this place
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is gorgeous. I was here for kind of your non grand opening grand opening.
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Uh. The pizza was fantastic, the salads were great, But I
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was here before you really got everything going food wise. Yep. So what's
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on the what's new when the menu? You've got a full menu? Know,
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yeah, so we got a full menu. Now, we got uh
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appetizers, we got soups, salads, handhelds wraps, uh, pizza,
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and we have entres too. Um. Eventually we're gonna get brunch and do
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desserts too Sunday. Yeah, we're gonna do Sunday brunches eventually. And uh,
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we gotta get desserts on the menu too. Yeah, yeah, because
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I love desserts. But um yeah, I mean the burger, the naughty
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burger we have is a mate. I'm telling you got to try it.
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It's really good. Yeah. We got a really good chicken sandwich. We
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got some chicken kebabs. We've got a nice lobster roll. I know you're
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stone Bridge, but you know, hey, listen, I'm not saying it
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tops that, but it's good. It's good. When I don't work,
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I don't eat there. You know, I try other places. I've been
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there twenty three years. You say I want to eat there. I'm the
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same Listen. That's happening with me now here already. Right, Like we've
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been open two months and I was like, so what else we got?
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What are the specials? Yeah, that's only I look at the stobs,
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O, what are the specials tonight? Everything else? So when we did
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the soft opening, we were like kind of introducing like different parts of the
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menu, like one at a time, and like for a whole week,
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it would be like just handhelds, right, you know, and like at
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the end of the week, I was like, please, can we just
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can we start the next thing something? You know, like if I have
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any more burgers, I'm gonna just explode, you know, I gotta have
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something different, right. I love the garage door. You guys just opened
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that up. Now are you gonna be able to have table side or tables
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going to do a little bit nothing crazy because we wanted it all that,
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Yeah? Yeah, or the mayor doesn't have to know kind of thing.
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Yeah yeah, yeah, you know that's why you're taken. Now. You
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know we're gonna we're gonna cancel the Chamber of Commerce. No, I'm only
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I saw. So I went out for the ribber cutting, was kind of
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setting up in the back, and I realized everyone was no one in here.
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So I ran outside and I saw people like up in the windows and
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the neighbors all looking down and clapping telling me after like we had a front
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row spot. I was, yeah, that's pretty cool, know what.
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So you guys, so this podcast probably won't help you for today like this
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event, because it won't get out for a little bit, but sure,
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uh do you guys have an entertainment you guys, yes, are you doing
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the bands in the weekends. We're really excited you were able to come do
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a live podcast with out that's super cool. Um, we're gonna be doing
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a live pizza uh stream tasting stream with Frank Sibiski, the the Pizza ga
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Vone. Yes, I watched their review. I watched one of the reviews.
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Yeah, he's really good, dude, really cool guy. Awesome.
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Um. He also does pizza classes. That's pretty cool. So he teaches
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how to make New Haven soal pizza. Um. But we also have um
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live music, we have a DJ coming. Um, we have a wine
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tasting set up, free raffles and giveaways. And now the lady doing the
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wine is cool. Uh she's yeah, yes, Sammy yeah yeah yeah.
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Nice guys would telling me about that before you Yeah, now I'd have to
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go back. But when did you guys come on the show November? No,
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it was longer than that. So it was for the football yeah giveaway
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that you were doing, Yes, and I lost in the finals terribly,
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so we were hoping back then you guys would be believed it with Marcel Ross's
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monkey's name from friends that I knew that was one of the questions, but
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can you answer my contest this one? I just did I which would it's
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you just picked the NBA and NHL winner. I did not know. No,
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you're too did not. I don't even have a prize pool for you.
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I just figured it takes it takes two months to right. By the
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time I get there, I'll have figure it out. And already some teams
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are dropping out. So it's it's funny how sports us so everyone did they
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know it all and it's so hard to predict. But you have a great
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turnout right now. I know you're busy. Just want to snag you and
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I'll snack Crystal for ten minutes. Awesome. Uh, one of those pizza
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guys get in here. I'd love to have one of those guys. The
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is he here now? Is going to be? I asked if he could
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come at between three and three thirty. All right, I'll be around for
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a little bit. Awesome. Um, he's really It's a great turn out
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everyone. I'm actually gonna post the video now of the ribbon cutting, okay,
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and try to get some people to ask you too before I go.
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What do you think of Aaron Rodgers going to the Jets. Man, it's
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funny. He just he just just as you were. I was waiting for
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you to come on. He made a quote it's hold on. Oh boy,
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I can't wait to hear it. Uh he said, I'm an old
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guy, so I want to be a part of a team that can win
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it all. That's it. That's the typical Jets. They should win ten
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eleven. They should win ten or eleven games. I agree, I think.
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I mean, you know, they got a good Jets, got a
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really good defense to get a good team. I'm not an Aaron Rodgers fan.
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Yeah, uh there. I mean, I don't mind him. I
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used to root for the lines for a long time, so I hated Aaron
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n. Yeah. You know, here's the guy I think the night.
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I think that the first six seven games, yeah, are gonna be so
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important. Like if they don't start five and two, if they're like three
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and four, yeah, Like I could just see him checking out and like
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collecting his fifty five. Yeah. Yeah. So I haven't really seen the
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schedule yet. I don't think they've released it yet. So I'd like to
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see who they play there. You know, they're gonna get primetime games.
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Now that the Jets on price, it's gonna be all I think they have
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six of them now because the Aaron Rodgers makes it makes sense. Yeah,
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makes they got a hell of a team. I mean, I can't knock
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them. But if as much as I love the Lions, you know,
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yeah, which, by the way, they may be a dark horse this
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year. We'll see. I mean, if they stop gambling, I got
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I do they off like four guys on their team, like you gotta go,
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you gotta go, You're out. Like they couldn't cut Williams. Yeah
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they could. All these Alabama wide receivers love they gamble on football on team
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property. Uh but yeah, I actually like Detroit. I think I think
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they should. I should be pretty good, I think, or at least
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a playoff contender at the very least. Yeah. Um, so you know,
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are they gonna go anywhere? It's Detroit? R know they always fizzle
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out, But we'll see. Yeah, I mean, we could come on
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and do a whole football show at the beginning of the year. That'd be
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awesome. Absolutely football. I guess so many people that want to do it,
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And I joke, I'm like, you should get a fantasy league going
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make it a whole part of your thing, you know, just kind of
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talks crap each other, talk shit. Yeah right, I just do like
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a Monday or like a Tuesday night show. Yeah yeah, if you were
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to stream that. I just suck at fantasy. Actually this year I had
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a good year, dude. That's the best part. It's honestly thirteen and
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one. But I lost in the final. It doesn't even matter, though
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you could. You could have all the knowledge in the world. People get
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hurt. People get hurt, you know. You know, you guys come
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up that nobody ever heard of against somebody that they're they're shitty players. That's
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right. Yeah, you can't. You can't control that. It's not like
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it's not like GMing a real team exactly that you're gonna put out there every
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year. But uh, Nick again, congratulations, what if the turnouts only
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two thirty? Now, I don't think anyone works in Milford anymore? Uh
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both turn out? You got wine, you got a DJ comming. Yeah,
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we got tribe here too. Yeah. Yeah. Those guys are always
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uh always in live locally, so that's great. Yeah, and the bar
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looks beautiful. Yeah, So congratulations, buddy. We're gonna get Crystalline here.
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Awesome, Thank you guys, Jeremy, thank you so much. Manlid
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you're being on the show. Absolutely yep, all right, so we just
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had Nikka on, but now we got Crystalline. She's the real Uh,
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you're the You're the real person behind the scenes here, the one that really
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makes it happen. We all know that Nick's a great guy. Now I'm
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just kidding. It's just my OCD and he works well with it, believe
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Yeah. No, I was just telling him, awesome turnout it's not even
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three o'clock yet. Uh. Ribbon cutting went great. I was I was
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looking around and people were in their windows, yeah, clapping and looking down.
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Yeah yeah, yeah, I didn't even notice that. Yeah, it
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was pretty neat, pretty neat, which I know. One of your biggest
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things was was really you didn't want to be the alpha's of the community.
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You didn't want the noise complaints. You wanted to integratiate yourself nicely, you
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know, be the local tavern for you know, the Devon area, whatever
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you want to call it. Uh. So I think you're off to a
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great start with that. Thank you so much. The community has been amazing.
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Yeah, people all the other business owners have popped in checked on us.
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Hey, can we do anything anything you need let us know, Like
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it really has been amazing. Yeah, uh, you got a lot of
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stuff going on over here. Kind of tell me what's going on. You
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got the wine, which is yep. So Deborah Capone is our somalier.
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She's she's here when she's here pretty much three days a week normally Thursday,
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Friday, Saturday. Yeah. Um, but that that's probably gonna turn into
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more if need be. She's also going to start doing, um every six
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weeks, doing a wine tasting. Oh nice. I believe she decided on
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thirty five dollars in advance and you get to try ten different organics. A
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great. Yeah, she's so knowledgeable and she's fun. Yeah, she's from
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Brooklyn. She just bought a house here about five lucks up from here.
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She remodeled the whole thing. So now she's slowly becoming a part of us.
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That's awesome. Yeah, I love her. She's great. I remember
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when I came down to Visia before you open and you told me about that.
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I said, uh, you just missed this high five. I said,
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you're getting a solved and you're like, yeah, I'm like, I
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don't even know where there is one in the hundred mile radius outside of New
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York City. It's fantastic. So I'm not gonna lie. It's a little
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skeptical how that might work, but it's fucking working. And that's yeah,
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you know what, every I don't know about you, but like I've been
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to to hiring fine dining restaurants and it's definitely they're very like to the point
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right, Yeah, they're very knowledgeable, but they're not I mean, they
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come to the table, they tell you X, Y and Z and that's
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it. DEVI will interact with you. Yeah, she wants to get to
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know you. She wants to really teach you about the wine. So I
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think that that, along with her personality, really does make a big difference.
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And he's offering great wines. My first experience was when ever was I
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worked at the Marriott in Pontovitra Beach and it was this old man, you
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know, eighty two years old, and he just had a cart he pushed
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around table to the table, and not even the fancy restaurant. He did
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it in the you know, kind of the family style restaurant at the hotel
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and he was awesome, but he was old, you know, so like
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he kind of wanted to just make a sale and move on. So every
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once in a while i'd catch him before his shift and just pick his brain
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about stuff. And he would organize all the big wine seminars for management,
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Like all the Marriotts in Florida would come to our hotel for these wine classes.
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I just never could, Like, it's a lot, it's a lot.
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She'll just be talking about something and mentioned the kind of great the location,
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the temperature. I'm like, I don't know how you do that,
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but people I feel if if they order cabernet and you pour him a fucking
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pinot, they're just gonna drink it, not even know the different now.
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And that's true, that is very true. But here so she'll educate the
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table, she'll try to upsell a little bit, which is great. Great,
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that's awesome between her and like we have Jenny our bar manager, Brody
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r chef QR chef. Like it's really developed into much more than we ever
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thought. Yeah, but in such a good way, right, Like we
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all work so well together. It's crazy. Yeah, I love it.
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I was at uh, I was at stone Rig yesterday meeting Gabby and she
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needed some gift cards for a fund raiser. And she's like, oh my
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god, I'm so sorry. I'm gonna miss you tomorrow. And I'm like
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where and she's like, no, down in Nautilus. I'm like, oh,
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yeah, I'm gonna be there, and she goes, yeah, well
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I gotta work at you know, Paradise Pieces, the other place she works
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at. I go, oh, were you just gonna come down? She
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goes, no, I work there. And I'm like, oh see,
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I don't know the staff yet. I mean, I know Audra obviously,
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you know, and I know all those you know, I know a lot
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of the people that work here, but I didn't know she worked here.
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And I'm like, that's awesome. Yeah she's here. I know that girl
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for a long time. Yeah. Yeah. She said three nights a week.
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I think three, yeah, I think it's days are days? Yeah?
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Yeah? But um yeah she's great too. I'm so thankful for this
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staff. The entire staff is amazing. Yeah, they're such hard workers.
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They love this place, I feel like as much as we do. And
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it really shows. Yeah. I mean, and some of them waited eight
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months for us to open, right, And that's the I found that out
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opening. It's like you find somebody you really want. Now, if it's
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their side gig, it's a little easier. But if they're looking for a
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permanent job, how do you hold them off? How do you hold them
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off? How do you hold them off? You know for that long?
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I know, you know that happens at stone Bridge. You know, we'll
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hire somebody in March and look at the weather. Now we're almost in May
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and it's crowd now. You know, we had two good days. That
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was it, you know, So so what are your your are your obviously
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seven days a week right for six six year off? Monday Mondays? Yeah,
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Mondays are closed? Are you Italian? I am Italian? I figured
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as much Italian grey that built in day off, I think I I think
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it's a good reset day though, because we're still all here, yeah,
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like we do our inventory, still working. Yeah, but it gives us
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that day to kind of like brainstorm about the week. Yeah, maybe talk
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about how the week went. You could press a little bit while you're working,
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yeah, and really have like round tables. We all talk so much,
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but we don't talk about like we don't have the time during the week
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to really sit down and be like, okay, so this this and this,
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you know, like what happened? What could we do to fix it?
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What was good? So Mondays we take that time too, and then
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we kick out by like seven and we all get a night off. You
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know. It's funny, is we close? You know? Stonemer's closes for
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that week in January? Yeah, and it's like the best week ever,
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Like you just don't have to think about anything, like restaurants that are twenty
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four seven not twenty four seven, you know what I mean? Seven days
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a week. It's like it's just you can't have you feel like you can
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never catch up. Yep. Not saying the Stonemach should be closed on Mondays
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because they do enough business, but it would you know, I understand why
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restaurants do it. Yeah, you know, and you guys are lunched six
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days a week though, and uh time closed during the week ten pm,
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nine pm for food, ten pm for bar. The weekends is ten pm
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for food, Uh, midnight for the bar. Okay, yep, that's
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good. So you're not you're not going to that two thirty. We didn't
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want that, Yeah, like we we we want to be more definitely more
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of a restaurant. We have an awesome bar, yeah, and we have
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great cocktails. But like everyone wants to take good body or hide you.
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Um, but that's why we stuck me back by the bathrooms. That's fine,
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it's right. We put you back here in the by the way where
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we're sitting right now when it was Alpha's does not look anything. I know.
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We just finished, Like all this little stuff I finished. I started
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the honor wall this week. I hope to get it full. Anybody who's
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out there that is military veteran, come give me your picture for our honor
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Wall. And you also get thirty percent off food every day for military,
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police, firefighters, healthcare. Wow, every day. I mean companies like
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Texas Roadhouse I don't do that, but it's ten percent. You guys are
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doing thirty percent off food. Yep. Wow, they deserve it. That
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is uh, that's amazing. That's something I didn't know, and that's something
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I'll promote for you that we have to get back. You know, I
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served a very very long time ago. I'm fucking old now, but I
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lived in an error when I enlisted in two thousand and one where it was
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like it's way different than it is now, and I feel like we should
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give back. Yeah, living through it especially, I almost feel like the
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ten percent is like, oh gee, thanks, I know, I got
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a fifty dollars burger. I'm saving a buck fifty. Yeah, you know,
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me and Nick were like thirty all day good and you know that clientele
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likes to drink. Oh yeah, so I mean I love it. Come
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in, get a good burger, pizza and yeah. And so that's why
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I didn't. I don't think I said to Nick. But that's all I've
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really had here was the pizza. And I had a salad too. Uh.
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The pizza, it was phenomenal. We got that steak and cheese one.
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Oh that's my favorite. Oh my god, that is literally my favorite.
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And then we got another one with like vegetables on it. And I'm
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not a veggie guy. Yeah, I don't know you'd tell by looking at
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me, but that Philly steak and cheese one was was to die for.
18:21
And bye Honey by Aim and that naughty sauce. Yes, I put that
18:26
shit on everything. And when Brody came up, like we were talking about
18:33
a special sauce, right, and I gave him some ideas. He he
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came out with it, and I was like, that is the best fucking
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sauce I've ever had in my life. I love it. And it was
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his first go ye, and we loved it so much that we rolled with
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it. I know I was, I was, you know, I know,
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I know why you guys did it. You know you rolled out the
18:48
menu the way you did. Yeah, Honestly, I wish more restaurants would
18:51
do it that way because I feel the first three weeks aren't fair to judge
18:56
a restaurant. So the way you guys did it, I thought was perfectly.
18:59
You know, you know your pizza is gonna be good. Let's start
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with that and salads, and I think it soups too, and then let's
19:04
do the handhelds and then the apps and all that and the rest. And
19:10
was it pretty seamless for you guys? Yeah? And you know what what
19:12
I loved about it and why like the recommendation was made, is that I've
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worked in a kitchen too. I'm I'm a chef, I'm trained chef.
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That's where I started opening up a restaurant. And you start the whole menu
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right, it's you don't have the time to learn that exact plating that that
19:27
meal everything. So doing it this way it made it more soon and how
19:30
much you prepay one You're like, you don't know what people are gonna worn,
19:34
Like pizza easy, you make dough and you make you have you have
19:37
your shit on the side, yep. But when you're talking about sandwiches and
19:41
appetizers and salads, like how much shit? And then you could get stuck
19:45
with stuff that no one yep, especially having pizza. Everyone wants pizza,
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yep. You know. So I think it was smart to start with that.
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Like first five days, we sold six hundred pizzas. Did you really
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in five days? Wow? I couldn't believe it. I was like,
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holy shit, right, they were making like fresh to I mean every it
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was just insane. Yeah. They were like, is this how pizza's gonna
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be? And I was like, oh maybe, and it has not changed
20:08
that much. Yeah, it's crazy. So I asked Nick, you guys
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are gonna be doing some bands, like so definitely. The acoustic is well,
20:17
we have a guy coming today yep, mister Moral from West Shore.
20:22
He's actually coming to play some acoustic music for us from four to six and
20:26
then that's probably like on a Sunday afternoon a Saturday afternoon. That'll probably be
20:32
like what we'll try to get in here right when we do charities, because
20:36
we want to do charities as much as we can. We'll probably get full
20:37
bands in here for charities. Well yeah, it's not like drums or anything.
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But yeah, we want us try to do once we're rocking and rolling.
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When we get through the summer. We want to try to do once
20:48
a month a local charity, you know, either something with the community or
20:52
a veteran one or something. But once a month, we'd like to do
20:55
that. Yeah, you got a great neighborhood down here, Yeah, get
20:57
involved. Yep. I used to live down here. I used to live
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down this way. I don't know. We lived in the same house.
21:03
I know all about the same time. We lived in the apartment we high
21:07
five. Yeah, as we were leaving in Common that's right, nine Ocean,
21:11
nine Ocean. Yeah. Now, you told me a story. That
21:15
place almost fucking blew up, right gas somebody had a gas leaker. Yeah
21:21
it was it was next door. Oh my god, it was so bad.
21:23
Now they knocked that house down, and well I lived I lived next
21:26
to those hoarders with their thirty cats. Now I don't want to like bring
21:30
this whole day down. I know, you gotta go. You're looking around.
21:33
I get it that lady put dogs in a bag. I know.
21:37
I article upstairs. Yeah, I found the article in the apartment upstairs,
21:42
did you. Yeah? And I was like, that's ridiculous. People were
21:45
just like walking up the street and they heard they saw a bag moving and
21:48
heard a little rustling. There was like two dead dogs and two live dog.
21:51
Oh my god, how we get that for them? They got arrested
21:56
for that, and then they got evicted, and then it was a place
21:59
still there, well she was still there, but I remember they were.
22:03
They did so they did and not be beautiful. I think it was the
22:11
Fields brothers built a beautiful house. It was yeah, yeah, it's beautiful.
22:15
I always like the house next to us. I love that was an
22:19
house. Yeah, that was a nice road. I'd like to living over
22:22
there down a Devon Crystal. Thanks so much. I know you're like Jones
22:30
going to get back behind that ball. Absolutely, I'll stick around for a
22:34
little bit. If the Gavones guys show up coming, Yeah, Frank is
22:38
coming. He's awesome. Yeah, I'll get them on and uh, we'll
22:41
wrap it up and I'll got some videos up hermote and all that good stuff.
22:45
Thank you. I feel like I've grown up with you, so I
22:47
appreciate. I wanted you here so bad for the opening day. I'm glad
22:51
you came, absolutely, thank you. You're welcome, all right. I
22:56
got him the pizza gavone. Frank Zabski's here. Hey, i gotta pretend.
23:02
Oh, let me pretend my I'm a little tallion here. Hey.
23:03
Oh, we're down. Obviously everyone knows. We're down at Nautilus and Milford
23:07
and one of their biggest menu items is New Haven style pizza, which I'm
23:12
sure they invited you just for you. But you are a pizza reviewer,
23:17
Yes, sir, I am pizza review I've been doing that for about two
23:19
years with pizza gav owns, and I recently started a New Haven pizza school
23:26
about ten months ago. And it's been crazy, just like this place is
23:30
right now. Yeah, No, it's crazy. Yeah, it's just getting
23:32
busier. I got here like right before the ribbon cutting, and now it's
23:34
like I'm trying to make my way to the bar. It's awesome, yeah,
23:37
but that's why they put me back by the bathroom. I'm stuck back
23:40
here. Sometimes it's probably the best. Yeah, yeah, I know,
23:44
right. So all right, so you're here obviously to review their pizza.
23:48
You do New Haven style pizza strict to New Haven Style strict and New Haven
23:52
Style. I mean, I like a bunch of other different styles. Yeah,
23:56
like Detroit in New York, but my heart is deaf clean New Haven.
24:00
I grew up in West Haven, so I went to mikes and new
24:03
parties most of my life, and then in my mid twenties, I discovered
24:07
Wooster Street and it was love at first bite and it kind of went from
24:11
there. You know. I had my own pizza truck for about four years.
24:14
So so you and I can go and grab a pizza and no,
24:18
it's New Haven style. But how would you describe New Haven style to someone
24:22
that you know might be in New York thinking it's that or you know.
24:26
So one of the trademarks in New Haven Style is obviously a thin crust,
24:32
but basically no crust meaning no rise on the edge of the pizza. So
24:37
that's number one. Number two is to give you an example, New York
24:42
pizza bakes in about five minutes, so it's kind of like that. The
24:48
cheese is just starting to melt. The edge of the pizza. The rim
24:52
that we see, it's kind of like a yellowish brownish. Well New Haven
24:56
takes it from that five minutes up to eight to ten minutes. Yeah,
25:00
so super brown, charred, crust and charred for people that don't know that,
25:07
for those little black spots or the burnt parts on the edge which people
25:11
of Little Lover hate. Uh like a caramelized brown mozzarell top crunchy, no
25:19
flop, fresh milled Italian tomatoes. That's really the essence of New Haven Pizza.
25:26
Now before you try, there's here what is your number one spot?
25:34
So that's really hard to promote. So yeah yeah, um so so here's
25:40
my answer, and I'm gonna give you a political answer, because what I
25:45
know, here's the deal. Sally's Peppies a modern if you're not from around
25:49
here, it's called the Trinity, and they're always gonna be top of the
25:56
top of the food chain. Um for a lot of reasons, mostly because
26:00
they've been around pretty much since they started, you know, one hundred years
26:04
ago. But what I found, which is what really prompted me to start
26:08
doing the pizza reviews, is um ten fifteen years ago, Salle's Peppi's Modern
26:15
major League. Yeah, a lot of the other places we're not in the
26:19
same ballpark, but over the last ten or fifteen years that scale has changed,
26:26
so everyone again, everyone knows Salle' Peppi's Modern, Mike's and west Avens
26:32
who parties in west Haven have just the same lineage Ben the three guys Ernie's,
26:40
I'm Waley Avenue, Fantastic Fuco and Cheshire Coal Fired oven Sasso's Coal Fire
26:48
and Torrington One Coal Fired Oven. I could go The list can go on
26:52
and on. One of my favorite places is Um Tipsy Tomato on thirty four.
26:57
I have yet to eat there. All as I hear is fantastic things.
27:02
They have a stuff shrimp pie. Yeah, that's to die for,
27:04
stuffed shrimp, stuff shrimp. If you like shrimp and you like stuff shrimp,
27:08
this place is phenomenal. Yeah. I just did a review at Retro
27:12
which is in Derby. Another place. Ye, fantastic. It's kind of
27:18
like a bar pie. New Haven Flavors. They have a phenomenal uh bit
27:26
stuff big stuff shrimp pizza frants never even heard of that. That sounds fantastic.
27:33
It's I hesitate to say it's better than sex. It's to me,
27:40
it's that good. I'm not gonna be political. I said this yesterday.
27:42
Actually, I actually did a podcast yesterday. We were talking about New Haven
27:45
pizza because you know, Colin Kaplan wrote the Pizza book. So he was
27:49
on my show like a year ago talking about the Pedal Cruise and he came
27:55
when showed me the book and I read most of it and it's it's pretty
27:57
cool the history of how everything came around. So the guy had on asked
28:02
me, you know what's your favorite, and it's probably a recency bias,
28:07
but I said Modern because I was at Modern maybe right before Christmas. I
28:12
don't go to New Haven too often. Yeah, right before Christmas. And
28:18
it was the best pizza I think I've ever had in my life. But
28:22
I've been everywhere. And I also said I've been to Modern before where I
28:27
wasn't thoroughly excited like I thought they maybe even overcooked it, which is kind
28:32
of hard to do, but they did that. But I said it was
28:36
just I was just blown away. I'm like, it was just a sausage
28:37
pep pie, fucking perfect. I mean, I didn't want to take any
28:41
home. I wanted to eat it all that, you know, and then
28:45
we started talking about how, like, you know, Sally's should be number
28:48
one. I think Peppi's. I mean, you can't even It's like it's
28:53
like one A and one A people, you know. You know, yeah,
29:00
like Peppi's at the casino. It's to the point where I won't even
29:03
go there anymore. I get the corporate side of it. You want to
29:06
expand. It's capitalism, it's America. But there's just no way you can
29:08
transfer what you do in New Haven to a casino or some of the other
29:14
places they might be at, but especially a casino, like kind of done
29:18
with it. But you're right, it's the Holy Trinity. It's those three.
29:22
Uh. Sometimes I think people are deterred from Worcester Street because it's kind
29:26
of hard to you know, park and get there. It's not easy,
29:29
you know. And today's society people want to, like, uber eat a
29:32
fucking pizza, you know, you know what I mean. So it's like,
29:36
so I've eaten here, I was here the day they open. I
29:40
don't know what pizzas you're trying today, but I'm just gonna say, you
29:42
gotta try the Philly cheese steak. One they have like this spicy sauce they
29:47
dribble over the top. I think it's called Naughty Sauce. It was fantastic.
29:52
It's I can't wait to watch the review because I think it's traditional New
29:56
New Haven style, nice, thin, crispy every thinking that you just described.
30:00
Yeh, So I'm looking forward to your review. Yeah, man,
30:04
I appreciate it. I actually was here prior to them, well right after
30:08
they opened, and I had the potato bacon pizza and one of my favorite
30:15
pizzas is a traditional New Haven And what a lot of people don't know is
30:18
that, Uh, anywhere in the world, you go and ask for a
30:23
plain pizza, you're gonna get cheese on it, right, But New Haven
30:27
it's no cheese, right, no cheese. It's the dough, the sauce,
30:30
peccorino olive oil and that's it and sauce. Yeah. So that's that's
30:37
my favorite pizza with no cheese, no cheese. Yeah. So when you
30:41
do your reviews, are you like throwing a compared in Portnore. But obviously
30:45
he kind of started this whole trend. He only eats cheese pizza. I've
30:52
seen some guys that only do pepperoni pizza. Are you kind of just give
30:56
me your your signature pie or you like, just give me what you like
31:00
to eat. What is So I'll answer that question, and I'll explain to
31:07
you the premise of what I do is so that I could show people the
31:11
hidden gems of Connecticut pizza rum. When I first started out, I started
31:17
doing the scores, you know, eight point two, but I actually did
31:22
Greade School scores, so I did like eighty six. I mean, I
31:25
went instead of taking You know, I have a ton of respect for Dave
31:30
Portnoy as a businessperson. I don't particularly care for him on his pizza reviews,
31:34
but I realized he's got a following and Dave Portney. I know it's
31:38
a David and Goliath thing. But I want when I do something, I
31:41
like to do something different. So my reviews are I review the pizza,
31:47
the place, and the personality. So one of the big things is that
31:51
you can't properly review a pizza in a box, right, It's a different
31:55
pizza, So you gotta review it when it comes out of the oven,
31:59
which is what I deal um. But to answer your question, sorry,
32:04
I feel a bust a little bit. Um. I generally will always at
32:09
least get a new Haven plane or a Moots, so either a cheese or
32:15
a Haven plane. And then do you find a lot of people don't do
32:19
the New Haven plane though a lot of specifically ask for it. If you
32:22
didn't grow up with it, you don't even know what exists exactly. That's
32:24
what I mean, yeah, correct, yeah, yeah, but I tell
32:29
people give it a shot because it's there's I call it the no hide pie.
32:35
You can't hide anything, right, it's the dough and the sauce and
32:38
I like garlic on it. Yeah, but you can't hide with the cheese
32:42
or topping. You know, you can have a shitty pizza and have really
32:45
good toppings and it brings the pizza up. But a plane pie, you
32:50
got what you got. There's nowhere to hide on that, right, So
32:52
I always get that. And then what I do again, because what I
32:55
the reviews I do or for the business owners to drive business of course to
33:00
their pizzas, right, so I never say anything bad. Um. I
33:04
traditionally asked them the pizzas they want to mean a review or something that they
33:08
want to promote, and that's kind of how I do it. So I
33:12
usually do three to four pizzas, Okay, try to try all four.
33:15
Yeah, Like I feel like, uh, like you were saying you like
33:22
to do the New Haven style. Like I look at pizza three three categories,
33:29
and in a pizza it's you know, it's dough, cheese, and
33:30
sauce. Right now, we do pizza Stonebridge Restaurant. It's very limited.
33:35
It's the late nights. We've had good pizza guys in We've had whatever in.
33:39
Uh. Back in the day we first started, we had this old
33:42
Italian dude that lived upstairs and he'd make all the dough and he'd make all
33:45
the sauce, and it was, oh my god, it was so good.
33:47
Yeah, and now it's you know, I don't even know what we
33:50
use now, it's still you know what it is, what it cares.
33:52
It's the drunk college kids that are ordering sizes the pizza. But I've me
33:59
personally, I feel this is my rankings. Sauce one do too, cheese
34:06
three. It's kind of how I rank it. Yeah, because I've tasted
34:09
bad cheese or like low quality cheese, let's say so, like really good,
34:14
high quality one hundred percent moots white, whole milk, whatever, whole
34:17
milk, a little moisture, yeah right right, and the sauce can make
34:23
or break the pie to me? Do you can get around? You know
34:27
that the crust might suck, but you're eating the pizza, you're enjoying it.
34:30
Or the crusted mean New Haven style and it's like you don't even realize
34:32
it's there. Um, But you know when you have a bad one too,
34:36
like you know you have you know you have a bad one. So
34:38
I'm like, all right, let's uh. I think the sauce makes it
34:43
breaks it from me. So I've never had a New Haven original style,
34:45
though I gotta try that it's called new Um. But I'm also a sauce
34:51
guy. Yeah, so um, what I tell people in my classes and
34:58
most of them get it. Everyone's looking for like this secret formula or the
35:01
secret recipe or whatever the case might be. And really what it comes down
35:07
to, honestly, is it's it's water flower, salt, yeast, bread
35:12
flowers the key. But where we're going with this is that, um,
35:15
yeah, I'm a souce guy. I like, I don't like a lot
35:20
of cheese, if anything. When I go to a pizzeria, I tell
35:22
them, light on the cheese. Um. The cool thing that people don't
35:25
realize is that h on Wooster Street, Sally's and Peppies. Peppies actually uses
35:32
Deli sliced mozzarell. Really, they don't use shredded those slabs around the pie
35:38
correct yea. And so the good thing about the slabs is that you can
35:43
make them really thin, really thick. So if you like a lot of
35:45
cheese, you put through rosa the um, you know, the slices on
35:50
um. But yeah, I mean, you know, I always say I've
35:52
met very few pizzas. I didn't like this water. I've and hearing about
36:00
water since the day I moved into the New Haven area because I've traveled the
36:05
world. I've been to you know, Florida, and they always say new
36:07
Haven style, especially with the populator new Haven peeking up now. They said,
36:12
oh, you can't get the same water down here. You can't get
36:14
the same water. Cow. I was at a New Haven pizza place to
36:15
do what's from New Haven? We're out in like La Joya, just north
36:19
of San Diego. He had Fox and Park SODA's there. Uh, that's
36:22
the real deal. Yeah, And he knew his ship and I'm like,
36:24
do you get your water imported? He's like yes, And I'm like,
36:30
it's a thing, right, sos with it? Yeah, go ahead.
36:35
Okay. So the whole water thing is absolutely bullshit. Okay, I'll tell
36:38
you why. Okay. So without giving you my whole life story, I
36:45
can't. Most of my career has been in it computer stuff. Yeah.
36:49
So it doesn't mean I'm a rocket scientist, but I'm kind of a detail
36:52
yeah, kind of guy. So I was hearing about the water, the
36:58
water, the water, and about three years ago I made it my mission
37:00
to research this topic to the point that I actually contacted, went down and
37:07
emailed several times. I don't know what they call them. I'll call them
37:12
engineers at Regional Water Authority. Okay, so they run the whole water system
37:17
pretty much for New Haven County and higher. So bottom line is, without
37:22
getting too technical or put too much chemistry into this, there's hard water and
37:28
soft water. Hard water has magnesium and calcium in it, soft water doesn't.
37:34
We are blessed to live in Connecticut and have a lot of not only
37:37
natural spring water, but also reservoirs that are guarded. So there's not a
37:44
lot of contamination. But the bottom line is I actually have a map of
37:51
the United States that shows these swaths of hard and soft water throughout the whole
37:57
country. But the bottom line is all you need to do wherever you go.
38:02
If you want to make newhaving pizza and you know you have hard water
38:06
or shitty water, is you use bottled water? I mean spring water,
38:09
right, That's it. Um. So A lot of people don't know this,
38:15
and this will be the last thing I tell you, is that at
38:17
any time in any town, in any block, underneath the roads, there's
38:23
this elaborate piping system and it has valves on it, so it's called an
38:30
on demand system. So the point being is the water that you get on
38:34
Wooster Street could come from Lake Saltonstall, Lake Whitney, and there's one on
38:40
multiple and it could come from all three. So the bottom line is,
38:49
do we have good water in Connecticut with pizza? Yes? Is there anything
38:52
special specifically about the water on Wooster Street. No. You could go to
38:58
Maine and you the same kind of pizza or any other place that has known
39:02
good water soft water, and you're fine, awesome, all right, Frank,
39:08
I'm gonna let you go. You're gonna go through your pizza review,
39:10
but tell my audience. So it's Pizzaga Vones, Yeah, Pizzaga Voness like
39:15
YouTube channel yeah. Um. And then new Haven Pizza School is where you
39:20
find me if you ever want to learn how to make names, Instagram or
39:23
any of that. Yeah, I'm on all that, and it's real simple.
39:25
Everything's Newhaven Pizza School. My Instagram's Nehaven Pizza School. Facebook's Nehaven Pizza
39:30
School, and I have my uh Facebook group at sixteen thousand people. All
39:36
we do is talk about Nehaven style pizza, all about Nehaven style beats.
39:39
I'm good, hungry, Hey, Frank, nice meeting you, Thank you.
39:43
I'll bring in the studio one time, more in depth in this.
39:45
Thanks so much for coming on. Enjoy your pizza, enjoy the day,
39:50
take care of all. Right there you have. We're gonna wrap it up
39:53
here at Nautilus and Milford right down to Devon. This thing is going on
39:57
all day, all night, wine taste things. They got a DJ right
40:00
now, They're gonna have a little two piece band later. They got some
40:05
raffle prizes. They got Walnut Beach Creamery outside doing free samples of her.
40:10
I'm sure she has the Twicks ice cream, which was all our favorites,
40:13
and I'm gonna go up to the bar and grab a viva they got vivas
40:16
here, and maybe a shot of something called Jonathan Jamison whiskey before I wrap
40:22
it up. So thanks everyone listening all week. I know it's a busy
40:25
week. I don't even have a guest lined up for next week. I've
40:29
been so crazy lately, but I'm sure i'll have something good for you on
40:32
Tuesday or Wednesday next week. So everyone enjoy your weekend and we'll talk to
40:37
you soon.