For a gourmet pizza restaurant, there was nothing that set L.A. Gourmet Pizza apart from any other pizza joint around town. We were expecting a large brick oven, a funky feel and some really good pizza; however, we were surprised with upbeat classical music, plain cherry furniture and a conveyor-belt oven. The restaurant tried to mesh the gourmet with the local pizzeria and missed the mark.
When you first walk in, there is a small bar area with a few steps covered by large plants and overgrown greenery taking you to the main seating area. The inside has a very clean look, with a long cherry bench extending the entire length of the restaurant and stainless steel track lighting. Large windows allow you to look out onto McKinney Avenue, giving you a city feel as the DART trolleys pass by. Above the bench seating, a colorful film strip mural is painted of famous movie stars and their most infamous quotes with a few words changed to apply to their restaurant. For example, they had the characters of “The Wizard of Oz” painted with the words, “onions, peppers, sausage – oh my.” It felt out of place and a little cheesy but they were probably going for the “L.A.” theme like the name implies.
We were hoping the food would make up for the atmosphere, but we were not overly impressed. Because we wanted variety, we tried three different small pizzas and a salad. We had heard good things from a few of our friends, so we were excited to try the food.
There is an amazing assortment of specialty pizzas, such as vegetarian, meat lovers, and make-your-own pizzas with as many fresh toppings as you want to add. Their pizzas range from a small (8 inches), to an extra large (16 inches).
We started with the California salad and moved on to try the seven cheese, pesto chicken, and the Downtowner pizzas. The salad was very basic, with romaine lettuce and spinach topped with red bell pepper, sliced cherry tomatoes, shredded parmesan, slices of mozzarella and avocado. Nothing too exciting or something we couldn’t throw together at home.
Our seven-cheese small pizza came out with more grease than you would expect to be on a large pizza. It was the only pizza we tried with the whole-wheat crust, so we ended up pulling most of the cheese off to enjoy the crust.
The pesto chicken pizza consisted of a pesto sauce instead of marinara, grilled chicken, onions and mozzarella cheese. It was a little oily, but it was full of flavor and different than an ordinary pizza you would order at a national chain.
Our favorite pizza was the Downtowner specialty pizza. It combined the typical ingredients: tomato sauce, pepperoni, sausage, hamburger, mushrooms, onions, green peppers, black olives and mozzarella cheese together for a decent flavor, but unfortunately the marinara sauce seemed a little too sweet.
Overall, we were not too impressed with the atmosphere or the food. Nothing captured or intrigued us enough to want to go back and visit again.
Arnold Schwarzenegger was on the on the filmstrip saying, “You’ll be back,” but chances are we won’t be. I would recommend other pizza places in the area such as Fireside Pies and Two Rows, which also makes a great brick-oven pizza. The farthest they deliver is to Mockingbird, but you can order online and pick it up to go. They offer daily specials and pizza by the slice, a salad and a drink for $5.99. Pizza may just be pizza, but for a gourmet meal, I would head elsewhere.
