Americans have a continuing love affair with pizza. From frozen food aisles to artisanal brick ovens, we can’t seem to get enough. The menu has widened more than a little since the Margherita was originally topped with fresh ingredients from the shop down the street. The big question is: how do we top that? Well, we’ll see you’ll there, as we reveal the secrets behind the pizza that’s on a winner list right now.
Kenji
Kenji is the name of that pricey Italian pizza pie that’s been around for years. It’s a true test of materialism, as it was designed by one of the biggest pizza chains in the U.S., with over a thousand pizza joints and restaurants under their belts. Our Kenji review will focus on the fresh ingredients, Superior Chicago-style pizza sauce, and cheese.
Ppings: Kenji toppings areppings have evolved over time. Prior to opening a restaurant, Adamding would put in huge wads of money to acquire his favorite toppings.udecca-style sausage today comes from Italy, while the chicken has been special- order from Hong Kong. The chain also now has a Hawaiian pizza, as well.
Cheese: Kenji uses a number of cheeses in their pie, including mozzarella, provolone, and Romano. Additionally, they have dairies that produce hand-made mozzarella mozzarella in Buffalo, NY and California. Fettuccini is their specialty. It’s a hand-made New York style pasta having noodles made with patterned paper plate.
aroma: The two items Sitting next to me smelled great. Upon closer inspection, they both appeared to have fresh ingredients of Italian origin. The dish had a very pleasing aroma. Kenji’s had “fresh ingredients,” and the aroma was fresh and enjoyable. This is a quality that I have trouble finding in other places.
Kenji’s Menu: When I ordered for dinner, I noted that they do have a full bar. When you add it all up, I made my decision to go here. I would have gone to either Amici or Peri-peri had I not known about the complimentary bar. I would also have gone to another Italian restaurant, Sub Zero, which had a surprising hard-shell fish market and a nice selection of hard-shells.
When we arrived, everything looked good and smelled fresh. The only thing that looked out of place was the blackened, gray, somewhat rusted fork used to pick up the pizza. I guessed that the polish came from the many years in the can. The waiter supervising gave me a funny look and said, “That’s just the way it is here. …. It just depends on how well you pick it up.”
The next course was calamari, deep fried shrimp that was apparently sourced from Japan. I realized after a few reviews of this restaurant that it was sourced from the Amish, so it was safe to assume that the pizza was also derived from the same source. The waiter commented that they also just use tuna in the crust. I had thought that this was bad luck, but apparently not.
Another course featured three different kinds of bread: one was soft, one was crispy, and the other was fresh. The fresh variety was priced at $6.75 and was by far the best of the three. The soft variety was priced at $5.14, and the crispy variety was priced at $9.29. By the way, if you are wondering what the difference between this and proper pizza sauce is, in the United States legally it is not allowed to contain tomato paste, but may contain other sauces and meats.
After these dishes, it was time for thechini pizza, which I thought would be another hard dish. When I actually tasted it, I realized that it was all corn and vegetables, minus the tomato. A quick glance at the ingredients suggested that this pizza was also very high in fat. However, it tasted great, so I was looking forward to it. Here I was wrong. It tasted great, but it was not bad. I had a half expecting something below crust and found the whole thing to be Jalapeno sized instead of the customary pepper size. The Jalapeno had all the flavors that I expected and nothing that I didn’t. The crust was melt and soft, and the cheese was just average. There was nothing that I liked, and I’m not sure that I’ll order it again.
We’ll call this one a draw. I have decided not to return to this location because I found the quality to be sub-par. When you get to know a location you can usually tell by just the environment that this place is right up there with legends like “CP&T”.
