Papa Foti's -- Heath

It's Friday night, and we are in Heath to try Papa Foti's Pizza on 30th.  This is our first review of a Heath pie.  I have to admit, I was a bit skeptical at first of pizza in Heath.  I'm not aware of a long list of Italian immigrants settling on Hebron Road (and Fazoli's doesn't count here.).  But Papa Foti's passed the test tonight.  Mrs. Zaaaa and I ordered the obligatory pepperoni pizza that we get each week.  Mrs.  Zaaaa will provide her commentary on that pie.  I asked man who answered the phone what their specialty was.  There was a long silence on the other end of the phone. I rephrased my question to "What are you known for?"  Another long pause....c'mon Heath, come through for me here....Finally, I heard a "We sell a lot of "all the way's" here.  Sold a bunch of them today."  I said, "Do you mean the Papa Foti Pizza?".  Yep.   So we ordered a Papa Foti pizza. 

First the Foti.  This pie was a good pie.  Lots of toppings and plenty of girth here.  Toppings included pepperoni, sausage, bacon, mushrooms, black olives, green peppers, onions, mild banana peppers, ground beef, and provolone cheese.  The cheese was the star of this pie.  There was cheese-o-plenty here.  It covered the other toppings and was a wee bit reminiscentt of Godfather's Pizza's technique of burying the other toppings in a pound of queso.  I'm a cheese guy, so this was really impressive for me.  The other topping that stood out was the sausage.  And it stood out for both good and less than good reasons.  The chunks of sausage were sizable, and the sausage itself was really full of flavor.  That's the good. 

The less than good piece here was the flavor of the sausage itself.  It packed a sage wallop unlike any pizza sausage I can ever remember.  Now there is nothing wrong with sage.  It's a perfectly good spice.  It adds a great deal of zest to my breakfast sausage, but I'm struggling to understand how sage smacks of pizza Italiano.  I wanted to grab the maple syrup every time I got a taste of the sage-y pork product.  If I am eating a pie, I expect my sausage to be a bit garlic-y, maybe have some oregano or fennel seed in it, and it least bear some resemblance to Italian sausage.  Didn't get that here. 

Foti's crust was neither the star of the show, nor did it reduce my perception of this pie.  That is what you expect from a crust.  Don't make me not like the pizza because of the crust.  And Foti's accomplished that.  Overall, I liked this pie.  I'd get it again, and that is saying something for me.  I added pepper and hot sauce to my slices, and I thoroughly enjoyed my dinner.  Heath stepped up to the plate tonight and hit a solid double.  Thanks Papa Foti. 

Here are Mrs. Zaaaa's comments on the pepperoni.  She fell asleep last week and was unable to share her normally accurate assessment of the pie of choice.  She's wide awake tonight and just itching to share:

It seems that the pepperoni za has a gift that keeps giving, I've had nothing but gas since I finished it. The crust was a bit thicker than other LC pizzas we've tried, which was a welcome change. It was also cut in the traditional triangular pieces, which seem to be almost non-existent lately. The crust was doughy, soft and filling. (great for us dieters trying not to over eat) The pepperoni was small and plenty with a bit of spice and crispy around the edges. The sauce didn't seem to have any spice or flavor that really tickled my taste buds. The cheese had good coverage with a hint of parmesean. All in all it was just an ok pizza. Not bad but not great. The size of the pizza was a bit larger than a regular large so if you're feeding teenagers, you'll get  your money's worth. Not sure how the transition to cold pizza will be in the morning but it's got to be  easier than making breakfast.  Papa, I think you might be worth another try from this mama. I hear you have a great happy hour!

Our wine for the evening was from Chile.  We drank Veo Grande Cab Sav 2008.  It was fine, and it came straight from our cupboard.  Gifted to us at some point in time.  I did a google search on this vintage and learned a couple of things.  First, one review mentioned a smell of cedar and a burst of cherries...huh?  Tasted like wine to me.  Also found a comment on a wine blog that said this wine can be found at Sam's Club for under $7.  It's always great to know that friends to not need to alter their standard of living to give the Zaaaa's a gift.