Pizzeria Bianco: A Taste of Italy in Phoenix
The smell of yeasty bread fills the small brick building in heritage square. If you didn’t know about Pizzeria Bianco, you might just skip past this unassuming building. But inside, the restaurant churns out hundreds of delicious pizzas per day. When you walk in, you can already tell the pizza is the star of the show. A pizza oven sits in the back-left corner and takes up a quarter of the tiny space. Soon after sitting down, a small plate of crusty bread will arrive at your table with some olive oil. The bread acts as a sponge, soaking up every last drop of the creamy oil. I recommend asking for a side of parmesan cheese to mix in with the oil.
One of the best appetizers to order is the Gaeta olives. Traditionally, they come with both black and green olives, but I ask for only green olives because I prefer the salty flavor. The olives sit in a pool of the same delicious olive oil that is served with the bread and acts as a glue for the parmesan cheese.
When deciding on a pizza, it’s impossible to go wrong. For the longest time, I would order the margarita, which has tomato sauce, chunks of mozzarella cheese, and basil. While there is nothing wrong with it, I would recommend the marinara pizza. It took me years to decide to try this pizza for one reason: it has no cheese. As a pizza purist, I thought a pizza without cheese is no pizza at all. Instead of cheese, there are tiny thin slivers of garlic that roast in the oven. After just one bite of this delectable pizza, you’ll wonder why anyone puts cheese on pizza in the first place. If you still cannot handle no cheese, a sprinkle of the parmesan you asked for with your bread will go a long way.
Although the pizzas are on the more expensive side, with the cheapest pizza being $14, if you play your card right, you can get a deal. The key is to bring a friend so you can split the pizza and eat a lot of the free bread. I almost always ask for seconds because it is so tasty.
The restaurant is small, so I recommend coming for lunch when the wait is usually shorter. On the other hand, there is nothing more romantic than eating a delicious pizza under the stars with twinkling lights hanging above.
For a headliner video with more photos of the food, click here.
Food Quality: ★★★★
Atmosphere: ★★★★
Service: ★★★
Price: $$-$$$
Creativity: ★★★ ★
