The Weekly Eater: New pizzerias elevate art of the pie on Oahu

Pizza has been lauded as a recession-proof part of the food industry. That reputation is holding up under the most challenging of circumstances, today’s COVID-19 scourge.

While other restaurants struggled to stay afloat and meet the demands of the new socially distanced, to-go-focused dining landscape, for many pizza vendors it was business as usual, as stay-at-home diners relied on the comfort of familiar pizza delivery.

The biggest pizza chains were already adept at delivery, a new hurdle for other restaurants that weren’t set up for it. By fall, Nation’s Restaurant News reported that business at popular chains such as Pizza Hut, Papa John’s and Domino’s had climbed 15% to 28% compared with the year prior. And while other businesses cut staff, Papa John’s added more than 30,000 employees nationwide.

But there has to be more to life than fast-food pizza, and for connoisseurs of all things, some familiar names are betting there’s an audience for craft pizzas.

‘ILI‘ILI CASH & CARRY

2065 S. Beretania St. Open 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. Wednesdays to Sundays. Call 367-0606.

Kind of a strange name, I thought, for the latest endeavor involving Alejandro “Aker” Briceno and Lindsey Ozawa, whose pizza cred dates to the days of V Lounge and Prima, when their Neapolitan-style brick oven-fired pizzas were new to Honolulu.

“Yeah, the name’s been a headache,” Briceno said, as people assume they must have cash to eat. But more on that later.

When Prima’s planned expansion from Kailua to Kakaako didn’t materialize, Briceno spent about five years in Malibu, Calif., working for Nobu Malibu before returning in hope of opening a casual, neighborhood pizza shop.

The former Watanabe Bakery spot next door to Mini Garden in Moiliili proved perfect. Bread ovens, mixers and a walk-in freezer were already in place, equipment Briceno said would have taken months to source in today’s COVID climate.

Lacking a brick oven, though, the owners switched to pizzas more compatible with the bread oven and the Moiliili neighborhood. The family- friendly New York-style and the bread­ier, rectanglar Sicilian-style are the kinds of pizza Briceno says he prefers eating.

Nine house pizzas are available, but diners are welcome to build their own at a base price of $22, with about 13 topping ingredients priced from $1 for onions to $5 for prosciutto.

House pizzas range from the simplicity of mozzarella, Parmesan and tomato ($23) or Margherita ($24); to the popular RIP City ($25) with Italian sausage, tomato, mozzarella and pickled peppers; to the Spicy Meatball ($25) with arugula, ricotta and mozza­­rella, the meatballs sliced thin and layered like sausage covering the entire crust.

Sandwiches became a natural addition to the menu. Briceno is able to bake hoagie rolls and focaccia to wrap around many of the same ingredients that go into the pizzas, such as salami, sopressata, housemade sausages and top-round meatballs. I actually crave the sandwiches more than the pizzas just because a great deli sandwich is so hard to find in Honolulu. My favorite is the eggplant hoagie ($16), which is essentially warm and decadent eggplant Parmesan wrapped in a toasty bun, finished with accents of fresh basil.

There will be more to come, as Briceno is just getting started offering prepared foods to cook or warm at home, such as spicy meatballs and lasagna. He also has burrata and buffalo mozzarella for sale, and once he brings on more staff, he will be available to offer cheeses and deli meat sliced to order.

He’s also working with Fitted Hawaii designer Keola Rapozo to come up with a line of branded apparel and merchandise that connects the shop to the neighborhood, with the same kind of storytelling that led to the Cash & Carry name.

Briceno explained that beginning with the Great Depression in 1929, a lot of Asian businesses in the area tacked “cash & carry” onto their names. That new way of doing business countered the “buy now, pay later” mantra of easy credit that contributed to the stockmarket’s downfall that ended the Roaring ’20s.

Well, easy credit is available again, so feel free to show up with credit card in hand.

PIZZA MAMO

16 N. Hotel St. Open noon to 8 p.m. daily. Call 369-2445 or order online at eatpizzamamo.com.

Matt Resich was in the process of opening his second Brick Oven Tavern in Kaimuki when the pandemic hit. The full-service restaurant opened in October with a menu of his certified brick-fired Neapolitan pizzas and Italian specialties, but the original Chinatown restaurant struggled to address COVID-19 realities of reduced traffic, social distancing, and the difficulty importing ingredients needed to maintain Naples certification.

So the Hotel Street space, now a collaboration among Resich and the owners of Encore Saloon and The Daley, was reimagined as Pizza Mamo, a takeout spot. The style of pizza has changed as well. Instead of the crispy-crusted Naples pizza, Pizza Mamo’s focus is on heartier Brooklyn-style (a large hybrid of New York-style and Neapolitan) and Detroit-style pizzas.

The idea was that those strapped for cash would be able to purchase pizza by the slice, but in the early stage of opening this service hasn’t materialized. Waits can be long so for it’s best to call in takeout orders.

Diners may experience sticker shock when first receiving their four-piece Detroit-style pizza, baked in a rectangular pan. For those weaned on $6 and $10 whole pizza deals, the breakdown here works out to about $6 to $8 per slice. After adding a couple of toppings and a soft drink, a single pizza order could easily add up to $40.

That said, the inch-thick bready slices are filling and delicious. Melty baked cheese forms a beautiful crispy crust on all four sides of the pizza, and the crust also soaks up all the flavors of sauces such as marinara and pesto.

The menu is short and sweet for now, with three well-curated Detroit and six Brooklyn options. On the Detroit side are cheese ($19), pepperoni ($21) and pesto with Pono Pork sausage ($24).

On the Brooklyn side are triple cheese ($21), pepperoni ($23), potato ($24), sausage and fennel ($25), mushroom ($25), and Big Island lamb ($28).

You can add toppings ranging from pickled fennel ($2), which lends a bright note to contrast with the pizza’s more savory aspects, to crimini mushrooms ($3) and fresh pulled mozzarella ($4).

Because you’re choosing your favorite ingredients, every pizza is bound to be delicious. The most unusual was the potato pizza, a double- carb phenomenon with thin slices of potato layered throughout and a buttery, cheesy richness equivalent to potatoes gratin. The potatoes do maintain some of their raw crunch, which may not appeal to everyone.

To this I tried adding some Big Island lamb sausage ($5), but the amount was negligible, maybe 10 pieces no bigger than a centimeter each. For the overall cost of a pizza, it seemed pretty skimpy, but those pieces were tasty, and these pizzas are quite addicting.

Nadine Kam’s restaurant reviews are conducted anonymously and paid for by the Star-Advertiser. Reach her at nkam@staradvertiser.com.