slkinsey

Some relevant excerpts for posterity: FWIW, Bruni awarded Babbo three stars.

Very interesting that, according to my reading of the review, he thought it was the non-culinary elements that make Babbo a three-star instead of a four-star.

It's right here. Slightly different formulation reported here as:

Oh man... we'd better up your PM allocation to about a million.

! Interesting. I was there with JosephB, Donna, Eric_Malson and bergerka tonight. We enjoyed it, but thought they were a little off their game with respect to the crust (a little soft and doughy). Afterwards, we had an ice cream at the pier and watched the water taxi arrive/depart. Maybe we were there at the same time?

...don't the Zagats reportedly do many of the same things?

Well... I think we finally have a reasonable idea of what Pineau des Charentes costs. I saw a bottle of it at Union Square Wines for abour 24 bucks and couldn't resist giving the Per Se Cocktail a try. And... It's really good. Not too complicated. Slightly sweet. Subtle flavors. The vodka more or less serves to dilute the otherwise strong/sweet Pineau des Charentes, which allows its flavors to be experienced on a more "clean canvass" without overloading the senses with too many strong flavors. It's a winner, and one that we will continue to make. One note on "rinsing the glass" though... I always keep around 10 or so cocktail glasses in the door of my freezer. When rinsing a cold glass with anything sweet like Grand Marnier, the amount of liquor that adheres to the glass is significantly greater when the glass is freezer cold than it would be when the glass is at room temperature or has been briefly iced. For this drink, rather than the whole "rinse and shake" procedure, which inevitably wastes a bit of (rather expensive) Grand Marnier, I settled on around a half-teaspoon for each drink, which I think gives the right flavor. I still swirl the Grand Marnier in the glass, because I think it's a nice bit of show, but the GM never quite coats the inside of the glass due to thickening from the cold.

Tartes tatin are normally made by ewindels when they are had at our house, but when I do make them I've always done so by cooking the butter and sugar together in the pan until the caramel is appropriately dark, then putting in the fruit (I've done apple, pear and mixed tartes tatin), cooking/basting the fruit in the pan until the liquid starts getting syrupey, then slapping on the pastry crust and finishing it in the oven.

"Almond milk ice cream" See http://www.bltsteak.com/ for menus. Interesting, when I looked at the dessert menu on the site here (warning: pdf file), I saw: "chocolate tart / frozen almond milk." Perhaps this is a recent change? "Frozen almond milk" does not imply a creamy ice-cream texture to me, but perhaps that is because I know what almond milk is and understand that the "milk" part is properly in quotations. (For the record, "almond milk" is made by soaking almonds in water, it is not almond-flavored milk as in "chocolate milk.")

Dude... I'm not saying that's what I get at the churrascaria. I'm just saying that rare-only people can be served. I personally like my pieces charred on the outside and raw on the other -- especially with a pig piece of crispy fat on the outside. I usually get it at Plataforma, too.

We have never had trouble getting relatively rare meat at Plataforma. As far as I can tell, the practice is to fire the large cuts of meat until they have a nice char on the outside but are still fairly rare , take them out for service where the outside layer is shaved off, and then back to the fire for a repeat of the same. Most every time, after the outer layer has been cut off, what is revealed underneath is medium-rare.

There are several issues here: First is what I will call the romantic model: the idea that the presence of the chef somehow imbues the food with his creative essence, and that this essence is somehow missing when he is not in the kitchen. This outlook, I would suggest, reflects a misunderstanding of how this kind of creative effort works. The fact is that most of what makes a collaborative creative endeavor work is done in the rehearsal (e.g., by the chef training the kitchen staff). To return to my field... all the expressive mugging done by conductors like Bernstein is show-biz for the rubes in the audience and/or bullshit narcissistic posturing (it's not like the players are watching the conductor's face all that closely anyway). The greatest conductors, in my opinion, have often been those that trusted their orchestra, trusted their preparation and largely stayed out of the way in performances. I feel much the same about quasi-mystical chefs who claim to "connect with their food on a spiritual level" or feel that the food "just isn't the same" after a 2-3 day absence (which is totally insulting to the staff -- more on this later). Second, it is certainly true that some chefs can spread themselves so thin that their restaurants begin to lose the chef's individual imprint and/or begin to slip in overall quality of execution. Of course, the same things can happen even when the chef has only one restaurant. Third, the extent to which a restaurant will succeed in the chef's absence will largely depend on the chef's management style. Most of us have encountered situations in our working lives where a supervisor withheld useful information -- whether consciously or not. To make an example: the boss who won't take the time to explain how to get the special product your company needs from the difficult supplier and insists on making you go through him. The fact is that most managers would make themselves largely superfluous if they told their managees everything they needed to know to do their jobs. I can easily see how a chef could find himself in a situation where the sauces, etc. "just weren't his" after a 2-3 day absence: If the chef insists on personally adjusting each sauce, etc. as it is finished rather than explaining to the staff what the sauce, etc. should be like and teaching them how to make it right, that chef is unempowering his staff. He is making it impossible for the kitchen to succeed in his absence. I would consider it a great failure on the part of the chef if he was not able to leave his kitchen for at least a week without the food suffering appreciably.

Josh, do you know this based on observations in the kitchen, or information that has been communicated to you from Peter Luger, or do you infer this based on what comes to your table? I'm not saying that you're incorrect, but I will say that what people infer about how their food was cooked is often way off.

One can't really use carbon steel quite the same way as cast iron, however. The thermal properties are fairly different. Altough carbon steel and cast iron have right around the same (quite high) thermal capacity, cast iron has significantly better thermal conductivity (0.80 W/cm K compared to 0.51 for carbon steel). As a result it is pretty much impossible to have a carbon steel pan without significant hot spots. This means that carbon steel is really only good for use in high heat, fast cooking tasks like sautéing and frying where the food moves around a lot in the pan.

Some tips on Plataforma: 1. For the noise: request a table away from the musicians. 2. For the cost: order as few extras as possible. A couple of caipirinhas, a bottle of wine and dessert can really add to the cost. However, to put Owen's prices in perspective: 200 bucks for three is not that bad. It's 35 bucks a pop just to get in the door, which is around 140 with tax and tip. Add another 60 bucks for 3 soft drinks, two coffees and a dessert plus tax/tip... not that bad. 66 bucks a person for all you can eat roasted meat is pretty good for NYC. 3. Don't fill up at the (excellent) salad bar. 4. It's okay to say "no thanks" to things that don't float your boat, either taste-wise or luxury-wise (chicken thghs and sausage or whatever). Also, don't be tempted to take seconds when they bring around stuff you've already had. They probably have tons of stuff you haven't had yet. Just tell the guy "we've already had that... what else do you have tonight?" Ask for chicken hearts.

Of the various ones I have tried, Plataforma is the most consistent and consistently the best. This wasn't necessarily true several years ago, back when Master Grill was a serious contender. But the competition has really fallen off.

So, just so I understand what you're saying... You don't necessarily think that the quality of the food will suffer if the big-name executive isn't in the kitchen when the food is prepared, right? I think there is ample evidence to support that this isn't true. Do you think you could taste or somehow sense the difference between a dish of his own conception prepared by Alain Ducasse at ADNY and the same dish prepared by Christian Delouvrier at ADNY? If your answer is "no" then I sense that you suppose you would be missing something else? Something "spiritual?" Anyway, it would seem that you are saying that you like the philosophical (and, I would argue, somewhat quaintly romantic) notion of having the big-name executive chef in the kitchen, perhaps actually involved in the physical preparation of your meal? And that somehow you think there is a certain aspect of "soul" and "art" that is lost when the big-name executive chef isn't there? I'm not condescending here -- I'm trying to nail down what you think you would be missing. As much as the popular imagination likes to romanticize the creative process, art and artifice don't really work that way. People like to imagine the tortured opera (or whatever) composer bent over his piano searching his soul until, eureka!, mother invention strikes and his very being flows from the pen to the page... then, later in the performance, he conducts the orchestra with such heartrending pathos that it can never be but lessened under anyone else's baton. This is great for the movies, but it's a complete fiction (sometimes perpetuated by my colleagues and me). It's all "magic" for the people sitting out in the audience -- no one behind the curtain thinks that way. The way it really worked is that Rossini wrote an opera on contract, showed up at the theater to work on it with the original cast, maybe conducted and/or directed the first performances, and then went on his merry way with a fistfull of Florins or a sackfull of Scudi for his trouble. Although one could hold that an opera, sonata, symphony or quartet is "an expression of the person who has composed it" it does not hold that the composition "thus only exerts its true character at the hand of the creator." Guillaume Tell didn't suddenly lose its soul when Rossini left the theater, and it still hasn't despite the fact that the composer has been dead for 136 years. I don't see why food should be any different in this respect. After all, a recipe is an abstract conception which is actualized only when it is executed, just like a composition when it is performed. It is "performance artifice." Someone like Keller or Ducasse is actually more intimately involved in the execution of his concepts than any composer or playwright due to hiring and training the cooks, periodic oversight of the kitchen, etc. The fact is that Keller and Ducasse probably haven't done any substantial cooking in their restaurants in years. Doing the actual cooking in high end restaurants is a young person's game, and by the time many chef's are starting their peak creative years, those days are behind them. It's a romantic notion to think that the executive chef is saucing your plate or taking your sweetbreads out of the saute pan. To revise your earlier statement, I would suggest that (the gustatory element of) a meal at the height of its power is precisely about a group of highly trained indivduals putting together tasty and inspired dishes conceived by the chef. Now, can an executive chef spread himself too thin such that his restaurants start to suffer, either with respect to the execution of his conceptions or the conceptions themselves? Absolutely. Yes you can. You just need to make sure that the same quality is there in the mass production. Ever heard of Stickley? How about Tiffany?

Um... sometimes they are.

Oustanding. See remarks above from Artichoke and myself.

Well... a "pizzeria" is a place where pizza is made (and usually also sold). That is the definition of pizzeria. There is are no qualifying criteria of price point or level of formality. If Alain Ducasse opened a white tablecloth place selling 35 dollar pizza with sous-vide lobster on top of it, it would still be a pizzeria. Understanding that, Franny's is without a doubt a pizzeria. Really, it's silly to argue this point. Franny's is fundamentally a place that makes and sells pizza, ergo they are a pizzeria. Now, is Franny's a different kind of pizzeria compared to Grimaldi's? Absolutely. Likewise, V&T is a different kind of pizzeria compared to Grimaldi's. Interestingly, although Franny's is considered "unusual" and Ray's "standard" in NYC, in Italy it would likely be exactly the opposite. That's why I said "perhaps already the best, depending on one's priorities and preferences." According to my priorities it's definitely on its way to being a contender, although they need a few years under their belt. According to radically different priorities, it might not be worth considering. In my mind, the quality of execution and the level at which it achieves what I think are some fairly universal criteria for pizza excellence, it has to be near the top. It's really impossible to consider a "best pizza in NYC" any other way, because there are so many different styles, goals and preferences. Steven makes a good point in that it's not entirely possible or advisable to (quasi-) objectively compare and contrast disparate styles of pizza in New York. For example, there are places like Patsy's and Grimaldi's that feature a specific style of crust and topping. Is it really fair to compare Patsy's and Grimaldi's to places of the "lots of sauce and extra cheese" variety? It depends on how you do it. First you would have to have an understanding of the operable stylistic goals, then determine to what extent they achieve these goals, then compare the two pizzerie. And, I guess at some point if you're talking about "the best" you have to make some judgments as to which stylistic paradigms are more worthy than others. My own personal evaluation would put the old NYC school pizzerie above the "sauce and cheese" pizza because that is a style that is more closely aligned with my priorities and preferences. But the fact is that there might be a "sauce and cheese" place that is doing a better job at what it does than Patsy's and Grimaldi's are at what they do. For me, one may legitimately compare the crust at Franny's with the crust at Patsy's and Grimaldi's, et al. because the style and overall goals with respect to the crust are closely related. Based on my limited sampling at Franny's, I would say that the crust is clearly in the same neighborhood as Patsy's and Grimaldi's, and clearly better than Totonno's and Lombardi's. Without a doubt, this is the case. If you go there and start with the squid appetizer ($8), move on to the pancetta, fontina and egg pizza ($14) and have a beer ($7), you're talking about around 38 bucks after tax and a good tip. That's definitely expensive compared to Patsy's where you could get a similar amount of food for maybe 17 bucks (2/3 of a $14 pizza and a beer), but on the other hand you're getting a lot of things in terms of quality and interest of ingredients that you won't get at Patsy's (whose toppings are nothing special), so I don't think it really makes sense to compare them on a strict price basis. For most (but not all, of course) people who would be interested in eating at Franny's (e.g., their target market), 40 bucks for an outstanding meal doesn't represent that much of an expenditure. I can think of plenty of places where I might spend a similar (or greater) amount of money and come away less satisfied -- I call those places "practically every restaurant on the Upper West Side." Again, it depends on what your priorities and preferences are. Compared to what one might pay for a similar level of cooking at any kind of restaurant, we didn't consider it too much to pay. Based on our observations, plenty of people in the 'hood must feel the same way as they seem to be handling about as much business as they possibly can. A couple of things here. It definitely makes the most sense to compare Franny's as a whole directly against places like Serafina and La Pizza Fresca (i.e., Italian-style places serving Italian-style pizza). Otto... I'm not so sure about. Otto is, IMO, really in its own category. I would tend to agree that places like Serafina, et al. represent a kind of pizzeria that is as distinct from Patsy's and Totonno's as those pizzerie are from Ray's and V&T. That said, I do think it's possible to mitigate the impact of stylistic differences and preference somewhat when making cross-genre comparisons by considering simply how well each place does what it does. For me, Franny's ranks very high on this scale. One can also compare and contrast individual elements in isolation where appropriate. For example, as stated above, I think it's entirely legitimate to compare Franny's crust to Patsy's crust, as the pizze are stylistically similar enough, and the goals of the respective pizzerie are similar enough in this respect to make the comparison meaningful. As proud as I am to be considered the member of an "axis" along with Signori Bavuso and Sconzo, I am not so sure that I would describe myself (or my fratelli) as "heavily predisposed to favor whatever seems most accurately Neapolitan." This is a style that I like, to be sure, and I am happy to see it in New York executed to this level. But this hasn't prevented me from preferring Patsy's over Naples 45, for example. I will say that it's true that I tend to value things in a pizza that are also accorded high value in the Neapolitan style (e.g., crust = 80% of the show, sparse toppings, etc.), but I don't think I have a fondness for Neapolitan pizza that predisposes me to admire, say, Giorgione's pizza over Patsy's just because Giorgione's is closer to the Neapolitan style. In fact, the opposite is true. I think Patsy's is better. Now, if a neo-Neapolitan place (e.g., Patsy's) and a Neapolitan place (e.g., Franny's) are operating on a similarly high level, then I suppose it's true that my preferences might incline me towards the Neapolitan place. "Accuracy" has nothing to do with it, though. I am not dogmatic or doctrinaire with respect to "authenticity" when it comes to pizza. I think you have to have an understanding of what the pizzeria is going for and adjust your expectations accordingly. For example, I don't think it makes any sense to complain about the fact that Franny's doesn't slice their pizza any more than it does to complain about the fact that Patsy's does. Anyone who does make such complaints is missing the point entirely. This is amply demonstrated in Heimlich's NY Press review of Franny's where he comes to the pizzeria with an incompatible paradigm and just doesn't get it. Narrowing the field does have certain benefits, and it does enable one to make what seem like more "objective" comparisons that some may hold as more meaningful (although I would argue that one person's "criteria for excellence," even in a narrow category, may not be the same as another's). One would hope, however, to have the ability to account for stylistic differences when making comparisons. For example, one may prefer traditional menus to tasting menus in haute cuisine -- and yet, I would still expect a critic to be able to put that preference aside in comparing Per Se and AD/NY. We do, after all, feel like we have enough basis for comparison to say that Patsy's East Harlem is better than V&T (right?). Getting back to pizza, after one has done enough like-pizzeria to like-pizzeria examination, if it turns out that there are several pizzerie of different kinds which are all more-or-less operating at the same level versus their respective stylistic goals... then the person making the evaluation may bring his or her own stylistic preferences into play in assigning an overall "winner" (not that I think such an exercise is useful or worthwhile) -- hopefully noting where and how those preferences came into play. This is one reason why I always like to say "arguably the best" in these situations rather than "the best." The "arguably" part means that it is one among several that could reasonably be considered the best, and that the overall designation of "best" will depend largely on the prejudices and preferences of the person making the evaluation. One could say much the same thing about steaks or hotdogs or hamburgers. Balance is everything, and I suppose there is some small value in debating where that balance can and should lie. I do think that one must be cautious about taking the reductive analysis approach too far. At some point, you're only comparing 12-inch pizza with pepperoni and low-moisture mozzarella cooked in a coal-fired oven at 12:30 PM on a Tuesday. One coud argue that this is the best context in which to form any comparative judgments, but one could also argue that the scope is so narrow as to have very limited meaning. It is also true that, whereas two reasonably perceptive and intelligent tasters will likely have a high degree of correlation between their judgments given a sufficiently narrow range of samples, well defined criteria and an a shared understanding of how to evaluate these criteria, there can still be a large degree of difference as to what level of importance and desirability they accord those criteria. What is nice about a place like Franny's is that it really doesn't matter if you philosophically support their causes or not. I am sure that 90% of the people who eat at Franny's don't give a rat's ass about organic produce, local purveyors and sustainable agriculture. They're in there because the food is great and they think it's worth the money. Anything else is gravy. I, personally, don't give a rat's ass for patronizing places whose causes I support philosophically unless I'd go in there anyway for the good food.

Yea, I'd say it's definitely true that it's a different category of pizzeria. I was telling Joe when we left Franny's that, if they only added a rotating menu of maybe 4-5 "secondi" they would be a lot like my friend Alfrido's place "Big Ben" in Urbania, Italy (a small town in Le Marche near Urbino). Big Ben advertises itself as a "ristorante pizzeria enoteca." The pizze are more expensive there, too, than they would be in a place that sold only pizza. That said, my impression is that "trattoria/ristorante pizzeria" places are relatively comon in Italy. For sure it's not a slice shop, and the overall experience and price point cannot be compared to more traditional pizzerie on the American model. In that sense, one cannot directly compare the totality of what is Franny's to the totality of what is, say, Patsy's or Grimaldi's or Ray's. On the other hand, I do think one can compare individual common elements, such as the crust, in isolation.

Yes, it was probably me making many of those posts. This is true. I think I may have said this upthread, but I believe that Falk's prices rationalized the market for stainless lined heavy copper cookware, and they are all fairly compatible now. I should point out that it is not the case that they met in the middle. Bourgeat lowered their prices to meet Falk. Bourgeat is a good choice, for sure. I tend to prefer Falk myself, because I think it's easier to maintain the brushed exterior, I like the option to buy my heavy copper without the (expensive, difficult to mantain and functionally not better) copper lids, and it's worth a few extra bucks (if it comes to that) to give my business to the people at Falk. But, yea... Bourgeat is great stuff at the right price. You could get an All-Clad MasterChef 12 inch frypan from Cookware and More for 70 bucks. This is very similar to the Demeyere Apollo frypan. All-Clad MasterChef has an exterior layer of aluminum at around 4.0 mm and an interior layer of stainless at around 0.4 mm. Demeyere says that their Apollo fry pans have a "7 ply material" construction at 4.8 mm. Setting aside the ridiculously inflated "7 layer" claim, what they in fact use is an outer steel layer at around 0.4 mm, an inner aluminum layer at around 4.0 mm and an internal steel layer at around 0.4 mm. So the extra 50 bucks for the Demeyere gets you an outer layer of stainless steel and a pan that is an inch less in diameter. Not a good deal in my opinion. I noticed that at Broadway Panhandler the last time I was there. Sure does look a lot like Paderno Grand Gourmet.

Great picture of the oven here, and I should point out that they were doing a brisk business with a short line outside when we left.

Yea, point taken. I used the Chez Panisse reference to highlight their quasi-evangelical and somewhat politically framed dedication to sustainable agriculture, local suppliers, etc. That is, to a certain extent, part of the Italian aesthetic, but they don't tend to make a point out of it. You won't find a pizzeria menu in Italy listing the names of all their suppliers and making statements about what "Madre Natura" has to say about it all.

Franny's 295 Flatbush Avenue (between St. Marks and Prospect Pls.) 718-230-0221 frannysbrooklyn.com After reading some interesting reviews (New York Metro, Slice, New York Press) and discussion in the NYC Pizza Survey thread, JosephB, bergerka and I made our way to Franny's yesterday evening with great anticipation. We were not disappointed. I might as well cut to the chase. Franny's pizza is not classic NYC style pizza. Rather it is pizza in the Italian style filtered through the Chez Panisse philosophy that happens to be made in NYC. It is also clearly among the top 2-3 best pizzerie in the City -- and perhaps already the best, depending on one's priorities and preferences. Not bad for a place that's only been open for 8 weeks! As stated above, Franny's pizze are baked, topped and served in the Italian style rather than the classic "old school" NYC style. They are served as small, somewhat irregularly shaped, individual pizzas not cut into slices but intended to be eaten with a knife and fork (although we had no trouble cutting ours into wedges for the purposes of sharing, and using our hands). Franny's uses a dome shaped, brick covered, wood fired masonry oven custom built for them by a third generation Italian pizza oven builder. The toppings are applied with a spare hand and many of the toppings American pizza eaters have come to expect are not available while many others are that might not be so expected. All very correct from a Neapolitan perspective. Have I mentioned the crust? I've only been there the one time, but... if they are able to maintain the quality we experienced last night, I have no trouble declaring theirs the overall best crust in the City. It's a light thin crust, slightly sweet, crisp on the bottom yet pliable and capable of being folded, well browned with a touch of char, crunchy and dark at the edges, and with a beautiful wheaty flavor. It's almost like a combination of the best features of Patsy's East Harlem's and Grimaldi's crusts, plus something extra. Franny's also puts to rest any questions as to whether a wood-fired oven can make enough heat to compete with the coal-fired guys. Not only does Franny's crust have all the desirable features of the classic NYC coal-fired crust at its best, but we all felt there was an subtle smokiness not found in the other pizzerie. This is likely due to a number of reasons... First, the oven is truly massive. It looked as though the walls were a foot thick. Second, the fire was quite large in proportion to the interior of the oven. There was a large pile of coals in the back crowned by several actively burning pieces of wood whose flames licked the curve at the top of the oven with an orange curtain of flame. Third, I am beginning to think that there are certain thermal benefits to the classic dome shaped oven as opposed to the flat-ceilinged rectangular ovens used by the coal guys. I know someone who wrote a book on baking with masonry ovens, and I'll see what he tells me. Fourth, the pizzeria is small, which mitigates heat loss from high volume production. Finally, the pizze are baked in a smaller size, and with fewer toppings. In fact, some of the toppings are not applied to the crust until the pizze are out of the oven. On to the toppings... what may come as a surprise to many American pizza lovers is that not every pizza features tomato sauce and mozzarella cheese. Now that I think of it, of the three pizze we sampled, not one of them included both of these ingredients. Indeed, yesterday's menu listed eleven different pizze, and only 4 of them featured both tomato and mozzarella. Rather, they offer a somewhat eclectic and everchanging offering of seasonal ingredients that manages to be innovative and yet firmly within Italian tradition at the same time. Below is the menu from June 1, which is substantially similar to the one from yesterday. So... on to our meal. After having a drink at the small bar and chatting with the owner/FOH manager, Franny Stephens, we were shown to a table near the oven by Karen, our attractive and enthusiastic waiter. Behind the counter, we could see owner/chef/pizzaiolo Andrew Feinberg at work. We decided to share three appetizers and three pizze. For the appetizers we had squid with white beans, chilis and lemon; house cured sopressata with parmigiano-reggiano and Sicilian olives; and sugar snap peas with parmigiano-reggiano, and aged balsamico. These were all simple and perfect in their own way. The sugar snap peas were served raw (briefly blanched/refreshed, no doubt) in a pile, lightly dressed with evoo and balsamico and covered with shaved cheese. What could be better? Sugar snap peas are in season right now, and theirs were pristene. Why not just let them be what they are? The house cured sopressata was wonderful, with that slight funky undertone that says, "the good bacteria grew in this one." We chatted with Franny about this particular flavor on one of her many passes by our table and she remarked that they were very happy when they started seeing that flavor coming out of their curing room. The squid appetizer is wonderful. Tender, meaty, room-temperature rings of squid, tiny bunches of tentacles, huge white beans, soft croutons, evoo, lemon and just enough chili to make it interesting. All of these dishes are strong manifestations of what I admire most in the Italian culinary aesthetic: take a limited number of seasonal ingredients at their peak, combine them in a simple yet interesting fashion and get out of the way so they can shine on their own. For pizza, we had one with house-cured pancetta, fontina and egg; one with mushrooms, herbs and mascarpone; and one with spicy cauliflower, tomato and pecorino romano. All were outstanding and graced with just the right amount of toppings so that nothing interfered with the full potential and expression of the crust. The pancetta/egg pizza featured fat chunks of pancetta, just a little cheese and a single egg fried right on the crust by the heat from the oven floor. When we divided the pizza into thirds, the perfectly cooked egg yolk ran out onto the crust. I hope a McDonald's executive never visits Franny's, or we'll see "breakfast pizza" all across America in short order. The mushroom pizza also impressed, with a rich foundation of cheese and thin-sliced but deeply-flavored mushrooms. The last one especially interested me, because I never would have thought to top a pizza with cauliflower. Well, it was fantastic. The pizza is baked in the oven with only a thin layer of tomato sauce, and the spicy cauliflower and slivers of red onion are added after it comes out of the oven (this is fairly common in Italy depending on the topping ingredient). For us, this pizza really worked. The cauliflower had just enough spice to make it interesting, and the contrast of the room-temperature cauliflower against the hot, crackling crust was superb. So, that does it for our meal. No pictures this time, but we'll be back again and again and again. One of the sad facts of eGullet is that I am constantly discovering places I love that I wish were in my neighborhood. If I lived in Park Slope/Prospect Heights, I'd go there at least once a week. I have no doubt that they will continue to get even better. I have said before that I think the three factors that lead to great pizza are 1. the skill, continuity and dedication of the pizzaiolo (they have that one nailed in Andreg Feinberg, owner and formerly of Savoy); 2. the quality of the ingredients (yes again -- see below); and 3. the oven (yes again!). Based on this formula, they seem to have all the pieces in place. The final thing that is worthy of mention about Franny's is their philosophy. You may recall from above that I described Franny's as "Italian style filtered through the Chez Panisse philosophy." This philosophy is manifested not only in their use of fresh, seasonal, (mostly) organic ingredients, but also in their dedication to local farmers and sustainable agriculture. Read more of their thoughts on this subject here. Below is the back of the menu: