The Shortlist (2023 edition)

What are some of the Montreal restaurants, bars, boucheries, boulangeries, cheese shops, and specialty stores that AEB actually frequents?  What are the places that have sustained us through a couple of difficult years?  Here’s a shortlist…

Aliments Viens, 4556B boulevard St-Laurent (Mile End), 514-379-4666—The city’s best source for artisanal charcuterie—and especially mortadella!—also happens to be a very fine butcher shop and specialty foods store.  Their selection of beef, pork, chicken, and veal is well-sourced and expertly butchered.  Their exceptional charcuterie counter (cold cuts, sausages, saucissons secs, pâtés, etc.) is always tantalizing.  And they also sell an excellent selection of conservas, pastas, eggs, cheeses, prepared dishes, and other delicacies.

Bar Henrietta, 115 avenue Laurier W. (Mile End), (514) 276-4282—Chef Eric Dupuis created this beautiful Mile End bar a number of years ago. It’s been a fixture of the neighbourhood ever since. Great wine selection. Lovely cocktails. And a short, but thoughtful, and perfectly executed menu of bar snacks and small plates.

Boulangerie Automne, 6500 avenue Christophe-Colomb (Petite Patrie)—If there’s a better bakery for bread and viennoiseries in Montreal, we don’t know of it.  Our go-to bakery for breads that I don’t bake at home, like baguettes, as well as chocolatines, pains aux raisins, danishes, buns, and other gourmandises.  Truly outstanding, and now working closely with the amazing people at Moulin de Charlevoix to source much of their flour (!).

Caffè in Gamba, 5263 ave du Parc (Mile End), 514-656-6852—For a couple of years now, my café of choice.  Features an extensive selection of third wave coffee beans from across North America, and a top-notch espresso program with some talented (and award-winning) baristas.  Plus, they renovated during the pandemic, and they’ve got a bright, light-hued new look—very L.A., actually—perfect for the New Age.

Camellia Sinensis, 351 rue Émery (Latin Quarter) & 7010 rue Casgrain (Little Italy/Jean-Talon Market)—Not only the best tea shop in Montreal, but one of the very best in North America.  Extremely knowledgeable and well-travelled staff.  Truly magnificent selection of teas from India, Japan, China, Taiwan, and beyond.

Chez Nino, 192 Place du Marché-du-Nord (Little Italy/Jean-Talon Market), 514-277-8902—One of the finest green grocers in Montreal, and an excellent source for rare and hard-to-find products like Buddha’s Hand citron and Rosa di Gorizia radicchio.

Chez Vito, 5180 rue St-Urbain (Mile End), 514-277-1981—A Mile End fixture for decades, and deservedly so.  In addition to their wide selection of meats, cold cuts, and cheeses, they also happen to be an excellent source for Italian specialty food products, including pastas, olive oils, preserves of all kinds, and seasonal delicacies (like imported panettone).

Double’s, 5171 avenue du Parc (Mile End)—Looks like a dive bar. Feels like a dive bar. Acts like a dive bar. But it also happens to be a cheerful, dive-y restaurant that’s overseen by Executive Chef Danny Smiles. The place in Mile End for a smashburger and a martini. Open LATE.

Elena, 5090 rue Notre-Dame Ouest (St-Henri), 514-379-4883—Despite its long history in our fair city, pizza was a sorry affair in Montreal until God Created Elena, and their wood-fired, perfectly blistered, slow-fermented sourdough pies put an end to this travesty once and for all.  Since then, the pizza situation across the city has improved, but it still lags behind other world-class cities. II’ve never been disappointed by Elena’s pies, however—they’re exactly the kind of pizzas I want to be eating regularly, exactly the kind of pizzas that people who live in true pizza towns are spoiled with.  Recent faves:  rossa with stracciatella; margherita; M. Funguy (with loads of mushrooms); artichoke and ham..  And although Elena is best known for its pizza, everything they do, they do well, including top-notch pasta dishes, overstuffed hoagies, a killer wine selection, coffee, and desserts.  They also have one of the very nicest dining rooms in the city, IMHO. And ever since dining rooms became meaningful again, circa 2021, that’s been a great thing.

Épices de cru, 7070 avenue Henri-Julien, C-6 (Little Italy/Jean-Talon Market), 514-273-1118—No other spice shop in the city compares, and, frankly, Épices de cru is one of the finest and most ambitious spice shops in all of North America.  Ethné & Philippe de Vienne have spent decades tracking down the most exceptional spices and herbs around the world in-person.  Their sourcing and their ability to forge contacts are legendary.  Consequently, their selection is spectacular and always of the highest quality.  A treasure.

Etna Pastaficio,, 244 rue Jarry E. (Villeray/Jarry Park), (438) 408-6030—Etna started off as a restaurant and wine bar, but during the pandemic they made a brilliant pivot: they became a pastaficio, an artisanal pasta shop specializing in top-notch, freshly produced stuffed and extruded pastas, as well as wine. Having adapted, they were now better suited to face the public health restrictions and to satisfy a public that was hungry for quality take-out options and well-curated boîte-à-vins. Even better is what’s become of Etna in recent times: from noon to 2:00 pm, five days a week, they offer lunch specials right there in their shop. Wines, many of them natural and biodynamic, are available by the bottle and by the glass. I can’t think of a place I’d rather go for lunch.

Euro-Deli Batory,, 115 rue Saint-Viateur W. (Mile End), (514) 948-2161—Hands down the restaurant we’ve frequented the most in the 25 years since we moved to Montreal (or moved back, as the case may be). Does that mean that Euro-Deli Batory is our favourite restaurant in the city? It’s quite possible. The thing is I only ever order the same handful of things (potato-cheese pierogis, cabbage-mushroom pierogis, clear borscht (winter), cold borscht (summer), kielbasa, and occasionally their multi-decker kanapka (sandwich). We recommend visiting Batory Thursday through Sunday, when their pierogis taste particularly fresh, particularly ethereal. Oh, by the way: apparently some TikTok about Batory went viral in recent months. Ever since, it’s been very busy. This makes us happy. I’m not sure what we’d do without Batory.

Fairmount Bagel, 74 rue Fairmount Ouest (Mile End), (514) 272-0667—In our honest opinion, the definitive Montreal bagel. Don’t get distracted by the silly novelty flavours. Just stick to the classics: sesame, poppy, and everything. If you have any doubts, just order sesame—they are always hot, 24/7/365. There are few pleasures as elemental as biting into a fresh, hot Fairmount sesame bagel just outside the store on a bracingly cold winter day, the steam billowing into the air, the purity and simplicity of that tender, chewy, and slightly sweet flavour—no cream cheese, no smoked salmon necessary!—reaffirming life once again.

Falafel Yoni, 54 rue St-Viateur Ouest (Mile End), 514-424-7767—Montreal used to be a pretty decent falafel town, and then it really wasn’t one for a long, long time.  Thankfully, everything changed a few years ago when Falafel Yoni came along.  Yoni’s falafel game was fantastically strong from the day they opened, but it’s actually gotten even stronger over the years.  The quality is always “top shelf,” and the combination of ingredients that goes into their falafel sandwich is ideal (sauces, salads), especially if you get yours prepared “extra-spicy” (with additional zhug).  Falafel Yoni is easily one of the Montreal restaurants I’ve frequented the most over the last few years, and I always look forward to doing so.  In addition to the falafel sandwich, I recommend the house-made hummus, lemonina, and fries, while Michelle is a big fan of the sabich sandwich (chopped egg, roasted eggplant, etc.).

Fromagerie Hamel, 220 rue Jean-Talon Est (Little Italy/Jean-Talon Market), 514-272-1161—The fromagerie with the city’s largest selection of cheeses also happens to be its best.  

Jean-Talon Market (Little Italy/Jean-Talon)—One of Montreal’s two great green markets, and the one we frequent the most.  Home to a number of places on this shortlist:  Chez Nino, Épices de cru, Fromagerie Hamel, and Camellia Sinensis.

Ma Poule Mouillée, 969 rue Rachel Est (Plateau), (514) 522-5175—Our pursuit of the ultimate Montreal grilled chicken à la portuguaise keeps pushing us east all along the same axis (rue Rachel). First it was Portugalia. Then it was Romados. And now, for the last several years, it’s been the saucily named Ma Poule Mouillée. Their grilled chicken options (quarter, half, whole, or sandwich) are all fantastic, as is their grilled chouriço and grilled squid, but the true revelation might be their Portuguese poutine: fries, sauce, grilled chicken, grilled chouriço, Sao Jorge cheese, and piri-piri sauce. They invented it. They own it. Life in Montreal has never been the same since.

Milano, 6862 boulevard St-Laurent (Little Italy), 514-273-8558—Montreal’s Italian specialty foods emporium.  Essential shopping for Italophiles like ourselves.

Mr. Patty, 5312 avenue Patricia (Montreal West), 514-483-2323—The city’s finest Jamaican bakery, specializing, as their name suggests, in patties.  The veggie and chicken varieties are both excellent, but it’s the beef patty, with its oxtail unctuousness, that is the runaway hit.  Buy them by the dozen!   Exceptional rotis, too.

Pascal le boucher, 8113 rue St-Denis (Villeray), 438-387-6030—This is the full-service, responsibly sourced, and artfully prepared butcher shop Montreal had been waiting for. Attentive, knowledgeable service, and a fantastic selection of the best meat and eggs produced in the region.

Pâtisserie Rhubarbe, 1479 avenue Laurier Est (Laurier Village), 514-316-2935—Stephanie Labelle’s boutique has been a fixture on Laurier East now for over a decade, and while her store has been one of the city’s finest pâtisseries since the day they opened, Rhubarbe keeps getting finer and finer.  Brilliant pastries, outstanding cakes, excellent prepared foods and preserves, and a truly beautiful shop.  What more could you ask for in a pâtisserie?

Piazza Salumi, 6833 boulevard St-Laurent (Little Italy), 514-276-6833—Kind of a mini-Milano, directly across the street from the mega-Milano, generally a lot quieter, and featuring Fumagalli’s exceptional line of imported Italian charcuterie.

Pumpui, 83 rue St-Zotique Est (Little Italy), 514-379-3024—Pumpui specializes in the David Thompson/Pok-Pok/Night + Market school of street/night market Thai food, and we wouldn’t have it any other way. Honest, unabashedly spicy & funky, and often adventurous, Pumpui upended the Thai food scene in Montreal. Don’t be afraid to explore the menu fully—who knows what surprises you’ll find—but don’t forget to order some of their phenomenal chicken wings.

Sabor Latino, 4387 boulevard St-Laurent (Plateau), 514-848-1078—Along with Andes, this is Montreal’s premier source for all things Latin American—Mexican, Central American, South American, and Caribbean. They also have a store up in the Plaza St-Hubert area, but this store, occupying the old Sakaris site on St-Laurent, is our local and we go there all the time. Grocery store, green grocer, butcher, bakery, and restaurant, Sabor Latino has it all. Plus, the service is always friendly and the music (cumbia, rebajada, son, etc.) is always great.

Supermarché PA, 5242 avenue du Parc (Mile End), 514-274-8782—A pillar of the Mile End food scene for decades now.  Quality, selection, and prices are always impressive.

Supermarché PA Nature, 5029 avenue de Parc (Mile End), 514-271-8788—PA’s organic and natural foods division, occupying the former location of the original Supermarché PA.  Similarly impressive.

Tinc Set, 1233 avenue Lajoie (Outremont), (514) 303-0315—Probably our favourite discovery of 2022, and one of our favourite restaurants of 2023. Exactly the kind of casual, friendly, wine-centric tapas bar we’ve always been hoping for in Montreal. Run by the people in charge of the upscale Alma next door, and sharing the same kitchen, Tinc Set occupies a former dépanneur and makes great use of its walk-in beer cooler. The menu is simple, but thoughtful: snacks and tapas (warm olives, pan con tomate, boquerones, patatas bravas, conservas, etc.), a rotating cast of accompanying dishes (a crudo preparation, a salad, a burrata plate, etc.), and two specialties of the house: a whole roast chicken à la barcelonaise and grilled octopus style pil pil. If all that wasn’t tempting enough, the bar is a showcase for Alma & Tinc Set’s wine importation business and it doubles as a bottle shop. An absolute joy of a restaurant.

Vin Mon Lapin, 150 rue St-Zotique Est (Little Italy), 514-379-4550—Talk about a power couple:    Marc-Olivier Frappier is one of the city’s most talented and creative chefs, and a long-time chef and chef de cuisine with the Joe Beef group; while Vanya Filipovic is one of the city’s most gifted sommeliers and a leading figure among its private wine importers (Les Vins Dame-Jeanne being her importation house).  Easily the most remarkable take-out meal of the pandemic that we experienced was a product of their 3rd anniversary festivities earlier this year: soupe aux huîtres à la Bocuse? Yes, please. Now, Vin Mon Lapin is back in action in their recently expanded and refurbished dining room, and the place has been bumping. It’s also back in full swing. Marc-O’s latest coup was a cheeky ode to the iconic grilled ham & cheese sandwich at Harry’s Bar in Venice, one where the ham & cheese had been replaced with scallops and mousseline that was totally hallucinant and such a joy to devour with a crisp rosato. Quite possibly our favourite Montreal restaurant at the moment.

Wilensky’s Light Lunch, 34 avenue Fairmount Ouest (Mile End), 514-271-0247—The one, the only, the original…the home of the Wilensky Special, a hot, pressed, sliced bologna number that happens to be one of Montreal’s few truly great sandwiches.  In business since 1932, Wilensky’s doubles as a museum of sorts, an artifact of Montreal’s former glory.  But don’t spend too much time admiring your surroundings, because service at Wilensky’s is brisk.  We recommend a Special with cheese (Kraft, of course), a soda fountain drink of your liking (we’re partial to their root beer and their egg creams), and a side of half-sour pickles.  Classic. And now they’re over 90 YEARS OLD! Amazing!

Wills (a.k.a. Wills.Beer), 6731 avenue de l’Esplanade (Parc Extension), (514) 708-1070—Ethan Wills and Annika Krausz, formerly part of the Lawrence team, together with Alex Wills (Ethan’s brother), have taken over both the former Alexandraplatz and the former Brasserie du Vieux Montréal complex that housed the vanguard Parc Extension bar/hang-out/festival site. They’ve put their own imprint on it and toned down the post-industrial vibe considerably—the look is simultaneously grandiose and human-scaled and approachable. Natural wines, a small but seductive selection of cocktails, and fine beers (including two at the moment from Greensboro, VT’s legendary Hill Farmstead) are issued from the updated horseshoe-shaped bar area, while the Winneburger truck from the team at Nouveau Palais is parked outside to satisfy your food cravings. One of the city’s hot spots since 2022.

What We Need Now 1: Pan Pizza

fig. a: The Joy of Pan Pizza

I’m definitely not the first person to point this out, but what we need now are simple, satisfying recipes; recipes that don’t require a bunch of obscure ingredients, but instead feature items that can be easily found at your local supermarket, green grocer, or co-op; recipes that actually turn out well (exceptionally well) and that are rewarding to make.

And if these recipes should have a touch of nostalgia to them, all the better.  

Enter pan pizza.

So much of the literature on pan pizza—and, believe me, there is a fairly extensive body of literature on the topic—is dripping with nostalgia.  Almost literally so.  There’s a real obsession with trying to recreate those buttery, decadent crusts of yore, topped with excessive amounts of gooey cheese, and lots of piping-hot, slightly sweet tomato sauce—the ones that you cherished as a child.  The ones you may still cherish today.

While my family definitely ate a considerable amount of pizza, I didn’t grow up in a pan pizza household.  I never had that powerful association with Pizza Hut and its ilk that so many others had.  I wasn’t entirely averse to the pan pizza thing—its charms were pretty obvious to me—but, for better or for worse, other types of pizza exerted a stronger influence on me.

All of which is to say, that when I got interested in making pizza at home a number of years ago, I gravitated toward other styles:  mainly Neapolitan (or rather, Neapolitan-esque), New York-style (or what might more accurately be described as New York-ish), some approximation of Bay Area pizzas we’d admired in the past, and sheet pizzas that mimicked those of Sullivan Street Bakery.  Even though I often read about pan pizza with interest, it took me years to actually get around to trying one of these new-school, homemade pan pizza recipes out.

Big mistake.

When I began to experiment with pan pizza a couple of years ago I quickly realized that these were among the very easiest, most consistently excellent, and most satisfying home pizza recipes out there.  They didn’t require ingredients that were difficult to find, and you didn’t need a pizzaiolo’s touch or a whole lot of fancy equipment.  Hell, you didn’t even need a pizza peel (or some kind of substitute for one), you just needed a 10-inch skillet, preferably cast-iron.

fig. b: Look, Ma, no peel!

My go-to pan pizza recipe is actually a mash-up of two popular recipes that have appeared online in recent years:  one from Serious Eats, and the other from The New York Times Magazine.

The dough recipe comes from J. Kenji López-Alt, it’s incredibly easy to make, and, even better, it’s foolproof—or as close to foolproof as a recipe can be. In fact, that’s what it’s called: Foolproof Pan Pizza Recipe.  The only investment needed is time.  I typically start the process late at night, before I go to bed.  This step takes mere minutes.  The next morning I form my dough balls.  Again, this step takes no more than 10-15 minutes (tops!).  And by late afternoon/early evening, my pizza dough is ready to go—the only thing is that you need to allow 2 hours for your dough to temper and come to room temperature.  Once your dough has tempered, you’ll find it incredibly easy to handle and stretch.  You’ll also find it very much alive.  Twenty to twenty-five minutes later, you’ll be pulling piping-hot pan pizza from the oven—quite likely, the lightest, tastiest pan pizza you’ve ever tasted.  Sounds do-able, right?

Kenji’s accompanying sauce recipe is perfectly excellent.  But even better, in my opinion, is a sweeter, somewhat more decadent sauce developed by Anthony Falco of Roberta’s.  It, too, is foolproof—or as close to it as imaginable—and its Bit-o-Honey finish is the ultimate flavour sensation with these crispy, chewy, buttery, and wonderfully gooey pies.

J. Kenji López-Alt’s Seriously Foolproof Pan Pizza

400g bread flour, plus more for dusting

10g kosher salt, plus more for sprinkling

4g instant yeast

275g water

8g extra-virgin olive oil, plus more to coat pans and for drizzling

1 1/2 cups pizza sauce (such as Anthony Falco’s Pan Pizza Sauce [see below])

12 ounces grated full-fat, low moisture (dry) mozzarella cheese

2 ounces grated Parmesan or Pecorino Romano cheese

1.  Make the pizza dough, keeping in mind that this is a slow-ferment dough that requires over 12 hours to be made properly, and that will benefit from even more time.  (My normal schedule has been to mix the dough late at night before I go to bed.  Form the pizza doughs the next morning.  Wrap them and place them in the fridge to hold all day.  Then remove from the fridge two hours before baking so they can temper at room temperature [see details below].)

2.  Combine flour, salt, yeast, water, and oil in a large bowl. Mix with hands or a wooden spoon until no dry flour remains. (The bowl should be at least 4 to 6 times the volume of the dough to account for rising.

3.  Cover bowl tightly with plastic wrap, making sure that the edges are well sealed, then let rest at cool room temperature (no warmer than 75°F) for at least 8 hours and up to 24. Dough should rise dramatically and fill bowl. In a hot kitchen, the dough may overproof near the end of that range.

4.  Sprinkle top of dough lightly with flour, then transfer it to a well-floured work surface. Divide dough into 2 pieces and form each into a ball by holding it with well-floured hands and tucking the dough underneath itself, rotating it until it forms a tight ball with a smooth surface.

5.  If you’re aiming to bake some pies in about 2 hours, skip the next step and move on to Step #7.

6.  If you still need some time, place the doughs on a well-floured small rimmed baking tray, cover with plastic wrap, and place in the fridge for several hours (up to 36).

7.  Pour 2 tablespoons oil in the bottom of two 10-inch cast iron skillets. Place 1 dough ball in each pan and turn to coat evenly with oil. Using a flat palm, press dough around the pan, flattening it slightly and spreading oil around the entire bottom and edges of the pan. Cover tightly with plastic wrap and let dough sit at room temperature for 2 hours (at room temperatures above 75°F, the dough may require less time to rise; at temperatures below 65°F/18°C, it may require more time). After the first hour, adjust an oven rack to the middle position and preheat oven to 550°F (290°C).

8.  After 2 hours, dough should be mostly filling the pan up to the edges. Use your fingertips to press it around until it fills in every corner, popping any large bubbles that appear. Lift up one edge of the dough to let any air bubbles underneath escape, then repeat, moving around the dough until there are no air bubbles left underneath and the dough is evenly spread around the pan.

9.  Top each round of dough with 3/4 cup sauce, spreading sauce to the very edge with the back of a spoon. Sprinkle evenly with mozzarella cheese, all the way to the edges. Season with salt. Drizzle with olive oil.

10.  Transfer pan to oven and bake until top is golden brown and bubbly and bottom is golden brown and crisp when you lift it with a thin spatula, 12 to 15 minutes. Immediately sprinkle with grated Parmesan or Pecorino Romano cheese, if using. Using a thin spatula, loosen pizza and peek underneath. If bottom is not as crisp as desired, place pan over a burner on your stove and cook on medium heat, moving the pan around to cook evenly until it is crisp, 1 to 3 minutes. Remove the pizzas and transfer to a cutting board. Cut each pizza into 6 slices and serve immediately.

Now that we’ve learned to make the dough and bake the pizza, it’s time to hit the sauce.

Anthony Falco’s Pan Pizza Sauce

2 tablespoons olive oil

1 clove garlic, peeled and minced

2 tablespoons tomato paste

Pinch of chile flakes, to taste

1 x 28-ounce can whole San Marzano tomatoes, crushed by hand

2 tablespoons honey

1 teaspoon kosher salt, or to taste

Place a saucepan over medium-low heat, and add to it 2 tablespoons olive oil. When the oil is shimmering, add the minced garlic and cook, stirring, until it is golden and aromatic, approximately 2 to 3 minutes.

Add the tomato paste and a pinch of chile flakes, and raise the heat to medium. Cook, stirring often, until the mixture is glossy and just beginning to caramelize.

Add the tomatoes, bring to a boil, then lower heat and allow to simmer for 30 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Take sauce off the heat, and stir in the honey and salt, to taste, then blend in an immersion blender or allow to cool and use a regular blender.

Use as directed.

Okay, now that we’ve covered the basics, feel free to get creative. 

Personally, I like my pan pizza pretty simple and basic:  dough + sauce + cheese, with maybe some chili flakes, or some hot sauce, or some hot honey added at the last second, just before I’m about to chomp my still-blistering-hot slice. 

Pepperoni is considered by many to be a classic variation, especially by contemporary hot honey enthusiasts, but I never make it at home. 

What I will highly recommend is a version that’s still very much possible RIGHT NOW, while you can still find choice local cherry tomatoes around. 

fig. c: How ‘bout them tomatoes?

It’s super simple.  It just involves adding cherry tomato slices to a basic tomato-cheese pie, but if you source the right tomatoes, and you’re the kind of tomato fanatic that I am, they will take your pan pizza into the stratosphere.  Plus, it’s got a cute name.

fig. d: What more do you need?

A.J.’s Tomayto-Tomahto Pan Pizza

Additional topping:

4-5 fresh, locally grown, organic cherry tomatoes (the sweetest, tastiest ones you can find) [per pie], sliced

Revised instructions:  

Follow instructions 1-9 to a T.  At that point follow these steps:

10.  Transfer pan to oven and bake until top is golden brown and bubbly and bottom is golden brown and crisp when you lift it with a thin spatula, 12 minutes. Remove from oven.  Distribute cherry tomato rounds evenly, pressing them gently into the molten cheese, while being careful not to press too hard, thereby scalding yourself.  Sprinkle with grated Parmesan or Pecorino Romano cheese. Return to oven and bake for another 2-3 minutes, until tomatoes are golden-brown and Parmesan or Pecorino is also bubbling wildly.  Using a thin spatula, loosen pizza and peek underneath. If bottom is not as crisp as desired, place pan over a burner and cook on medium heat, moving the pan around to cook evenly until it is crisp, 1 to 3 minutes. Remove the pizzas and transfer to a cutting board. Cut each pizza into 6 slices and serve immediately, keeping in mind that this pizza is a hot, molten, delicious, but dangerous mess at the moment.  Be careful.  Proceed with great anticipation, and an ounce of caution.

You’re all set.  

What more do you need?

aj

Out of the Archives: "Green Mountain Pizza: In Search of Transcendental Pizza Along Vermont's Hippie Trail" (2011)

fig. a: green, Green Mountains

This article first appeared in the Montreal Gazette in September 2011. It was syndicated by PostMedia News not long afterwards, and although you can no longer find the article on the Gazette’s website, you can still find it on the Ottawa Citizen’s site.

At the time, I considered this article to be my modest contribution to the project of determining each and every one of America’s vast number of regional pizza styles initiated by Slice NY, Serious Eats, and others in the 2000s.

All three of the pizza/flatbread restaurants featured in this article are still thriving, and I stand by all of them. Since then, however, Vermont’s Hippie Pizza scene has continued to grow at an impressive rate. Many more recent establishments could be added to this list. It’s quite possible that a follow-up article is in order. But that will have to be for another time.

In the meantime, without any further ado…

For at least a decade now, North America has been swept up in a full-blown pizza revolution, one characterized by a cult of Neapolitan pizza and an almost fanatical concern with authenticity and Verace Pizza Napoletana accreditation, not to mention a considerable amount of boasting and posturing.

Meanwhile, pizza enthusiasts in Vermont have been quietly going about their business, developing a similarly passionate and characteristically unorthodox approach to the venerable pizza pie.

This is a state that has made "Keep Vermont Weird" a mantra, after all. These are people who pride themselves on marching to the beat of a different drummer.

One might call it Vermont's very own Quiet Revolution.

In spite of a vibrant movement that dates back at least 25 years, Vermont continues to fly under the radar of most pizza authorities. The explanation for this is simple. It has to do with the relative lack of concern Vermont's pizzaiolos have shown for Neapolitan articles of faith like tipo 00 flour, D.O.C. San Marzano tomatoes, and imported Italian ovens. It has to do with the fact that pizza in Vermont is not rigidly bound by a type of oven, a type of crust, or a shape.

Instead, Vermont's pizza pioneers have put their focus on sourcing top-calibre local ingredients - from farm and chef partnerships like the impressive Vermont Fresh Network, which unites farmers, artisanal producers and chefs in a common cause, and mills like Norwich, Vermont's, highly esteemed King Arthur Flour - and on using these ingredients in an ingenious manner.

They've also placed an emphasis on community. At its best, pizza in Vermont is less a style than a way of life. One that's guided by an innate belief in the power of transcendental pizza to bring people together, even in the most rural of locations.

In fact, this is one of the signature features of Green Mountain pizza. While the history of pizza has been very closely bound to the urban experience, many of Vermont's most outstanding pizza establishments are well off the beaten path.

In other words, not only are there great pies to be found in Vermont, but many of the best are found in the most bucolic of settings. For those with a taste for pizza and the great outdoors, this is road food at its finest.

There were surely precursors, but the modern Green Mountain pizza movement began in 1985, when George Schenk built his first woodburning oven out of field stones from his property and founded American Flatbread.

fig. b: clay oven, Murray Bay, QC, 1898

Bigger ovens followed, including a domed, earthen oven built in the style of the traditional bread ovens of Quebec, which has become American Flatbread's signature model. And by 1990, Schenk & company had established their flagship location on the historic Lareau Farm in Waitsfield, near Montpelier, Stowe and Sugarbush.

It was there, at this idyllic farmhouse setting in the Mad River Valley, that my partner and I had our first extraordinary experience of pizza in Vermont. I remember it vividly, for as we turned off Route 100 and entered Lareau Farm [which doubles as a comfortable inn], we found a veritable Midsummer Night's Dream before us. Tables were set up al fresco next to the farmhouse. Kids were running freely across the meadow. A fire was burning in the fire pit. And those who were waiting for a table were spread out across the vast deck, sipping wines and drinking craft beers, and taking in a perfect summer evening. As the sun began to set, fireflies came out. It took us a while to get a table (2½ hours!), but we didn't mind - we couldn't have been happier, or more relaxed.

Then we were seated at an outdoor table and our pizzas arrived, and the experience was taken to a whole other level. We'd never had a pizza named after an obscure evolutionary theory before, but when that beautifully blistered Punctuated Equilibrium arrived fully dressed with Kalamata olives, roasted sweet peppers, handmade Vermont goat's cheese, mozzarella, fresh rosemary, red onions and garlic, we were sold. The work of Stephen Jay Gould had never tasted so good. And our New Vermont Sausage Pie was an even bigger hit. Its combination of homemade maple-fennel sausage, sun-dried tomatoes, mushrooms and caramelized onions was positively lusty, and the maple syrup notes gave the pizza a real gout du terroir.

We left Lareau Farm in a state of bliss. We'd discovered Vermont hippie pizza at its finest and its effects were mind-expanding.

Glover is a Northeast Kingdom town best known for its associations with the Bread and Puppet Theater, a radical performance ensemble that developed a reputation for sharing bread with its audience in an act of communion. Just a couple of miles away, in West Glover, stands the Lake Parker Country Store, where, at the back of the store, past the displays of local organic produce, Vermont artisanal cheeses, locally sourced maple syrup and convenience store staples, you'll find the Parker Pie Company. There, another kind of communion has brought the local community together - one based on the twin pleasures of Vermont pizza and American craft beers.

Started five years ago by partners Ben Trevits and Cavan Meese, the Parker Pie Company was an instant sensation, a back-country treasure that locals guarded jealously. And with good reason. Parker Pie's pies are the product of a conventional electric pizza oven - not the imported wood-burning ovens preferred by pizza snobs - but they feature a crispy-chewy crust that borders on the sublime and contains a secret ingredient: maple syrup. (Meese's parents are maple syrup producers.)

fig. c: half & half: NEK Garden Style (l) + Green Mountain Special (r)

No pizza captures the peculiar genius of the Parker Pie Company as powerfully as its Green Mountain Special, an inspired combination of wilted spinach, cheddar, red onion, crisp apple slices, and Vermont Smoke and Cure bacon. Here, you have it all: a perfect union of imagination and execution, an edible homage to the state that produced it, and a pizza that's so magical that it enters into your dream life.

Roughly 20 kilometres south of Burlington, in Charlotte, you'll suddenly find a painted roadside sign bearing an image of a pizza that looks suspiciously like a circular map of the world (with tomato sauce oceans and mozzarella continents) and bold lettering that reads "Pizza on Earth: Wood Oven Bakery." We slammed on the brakes and made a U-turn so that we could take a closer look.

The story of Jay Vogler, the founder of Pizza on Earth, contains so much of what makes the Vermont pizza scene so special. Trained first as a painter, then as a cook, he left New York 20 years ago and relocated his family to a farm in Charlotte, out of the conviction that farmers would be to the '90s what superstar chefs had been to the '80s. He and his wife ran their farm as a wholesale vegetable farm, then a CSA before the cooking bug and the chance purchase of a previously owned wood-burning oven got the better of him.

A decade later, you can gauge Vogler's success not only by the number of pizzas he sells on a typical Friday night (about 150), but also by the range of licence plates you find in his parking lot (Massachusetts, Connecticut, California, New York). And it's easy to understand why.

The combination of Vogler's specialty pizzas - like his Sausalito, with garlic sausage, chard, red onion, Parmesan, mozzarella and a dash of garlic oil; and his Spudnik, with bacon, sour cream and (you guessed it) thinly sliced potatoes - and the relaxed atmosphere of open-air, bring-yourown-bottle Champlain Valley dining is completely seductive.

Like Parker Pie and American Flatbread, Vogler insists on using Vermont flour (King Arthur) and locally sourced herbs and vegetables. And like the best of the Green Mountain pizzerias, Vogler creates some unusually creative and flavourful pizzas - pizzas that capture the spirit of Vermont, pizzas worth travelling for.

Coordinates:

American Flatbread

Lareau Farm, 46 Lareau Rd., Waitsfield, Vermont 1-802-496-8856 www.americanflatbread.com

Parker Pie Company

161 County Rd., West Glover, Vermont 1-802-525-3366 www.parkerpie.com

Pizza on Earth

1510 Hinesburg Rd., Charlotte, Vermont 1-802-425-2152 www.pizzaonearth.com

Where to stay:

Lareau Farm Inn, which is connected to the original American Flatbread in Waitsfield, is an absolute gem of an inn.
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