Food Wars: Battle of the Pizza Rusticas

Welcome to our first installment of Food Wars. We decided to use Jonny Mangia's favorite dish of the Lent/Easter season, pizza rustica, as the subject of the first Food War. We went out and bought four different version from leading vendors (hey, we wanted a homemade one but couldn't get one of the vaunted ones from Nicole's Great Aunt Tina in time for the taste test), brought them to Mom G's for Easter and set about tasting them with Mom and Dad G, Jen & Mario Giannettino and Chessy. Here are the contestants:

Faicco's Pork Store - 260 Bleeker Street, NYC 212-243-1974
The Skinny - Faicco's was handicapped as an early favorite. They specialize in stuffed breads and it's so damn clean you can eat off the floor of the place. Cleanliness = quality in the Sunday Sauce book.

Rocco's Pastry & Espresso Cafe - 243 Bleeker Street, NYC 212-242-6031 
The Skinny - Rocco's was a dark horse candidate, added at the last minute. His specialty is pies and pastries. Could he pull-off a prime-time pizza rustica?

DeCicco's Food Market - 21 Center Street Ardsley NY 914-813-2009
The Skinny - This is where Mom G bought the gorgeous lamb for Easter. They have a lofty reputation
for quality so we figured they would hold their own in this pitched battle.

A & S Pork Store - 1789 Central Park Avenue, Yonkers NY 914-337-2550
Jonny Mangia's "go-to" place when it comes to Italian food products.

Note: No contestants from Arthur Avenue? That's right folks. Due to it's rapid transformation into a
tourist mecca, the prices on Arthur Ave. are getting ridiculously inflated. $40 for a pizza rustica? Go scratch!

Here are the tasting notes:

Faicco:
Visual -Huge gorgeous chunks of soprassata show they didn't skimp on the meat. Towering piece.
Crust - A thick shell, almost bread-like
Taste - A bit salty due to the large amount of meat, but after the salt spike subsides, bliss.

Rocco's:
Visual - Shallowest one we bought, not  much meat.
Crust - Pie crust which makes sense as it came from a baker.
Taste - Tasted more like an Italian cheesecake due to the propensity of formaggio.

DeCicco:
Visual - Another large piece, alla Faicco. Decent amount of meat.
Crust - Flaky, phyllo-like crust. Very Middle Eastern.
Taste - Very nice, correct balance of meat and cheese. Only problem was the structure as it fell apart easily when cut into.

A&S Pork Store:
Visual - Somewhat underwhelming. Not much in the way of meat, especially when compared to Faicco.
Crust - Crust was a negative, had a gummy, undercooked vibe.
Taste - Certainly not bad when heated up, but most were unimpressed..with one exception (read below).

The Winner: Faicco's of Bleeker Street
Aside from the initial salt spike, there wasn't anything wrong with this beast, as it scored three 1st place votes and a 2nd place finish as well. Tasted great, held it's form and wasn't all that expensive to boot - about $24 for a whole pie.

Second place was awarded to DeCicco as they finished in the upper rung with all of the voters and avoided any last place finishes.

Next up was A&S which had a few last place finishes yet scored a 1st Place with Nikki !(?).

Rocco's took up the rear, mostly due to it's lack of meat. Hey if we were voting on cheesecake, it would have been a contender.