ILLUSTRATION BY JOEL KIMMEL
For whatever reason, SLM dives into the subject of pizza every five years. (If only I ate pizza just that often as well.) As I flipped through those past issues and talked with our dining team, I was fascinated to see how pizza has evolved in St. Louis.
At one time, the popular pie evoked images of coupons, animatronic mice, and player pianos. Beyond the national chains, families flocked to our town’s pizza pioneers: Rossino’s, Frank & Helen’s, Pizza-A-Go-Go, Farotto’s, Racanelli’s, Imo’s... Over time, little has changed at these St. Louis classics—one more reason we love them. Yet for years, pizza was typically found at pizza parlors and casual Italian restaurants, many of which used deck ovens.
Then wood-fired ovens made their way to St. Louis, and pizza began showing up at such fine-dining restaurants as Cardwell’s at the Plaza. As the cuisine began to change, flatbreads became a fixture on menus at many non-pizza establishments. Eventually chef Mike Randolph brought the dish back to its Italian roots, introducing many St. Louisans to Neapolitan pies at The Good Pie. With premium ingredients served on that signature charred crust, the style quickly gained traction at Katie’s Pizza & Pasta Osteria, Basso, Louie, and Pastaria.
Following in the footsteps of breweries and burger joints, pizzerias began looking for ways to carve out new niches. Pizzeoli became St. Louis’ first vegetarian-focused pizzeria, with a variety of woods stoking the oven. Twin Oak Wood-Fired Pizza & BBQ was one of the first local pizza joints to align itself with barbecue. (Others also crossed over, including A Fine Swine BBQ & Pizza and Imo’s franchisee Jim Cook, who serves a Sugarfire brisket pizza.) In The Grove, Pie Guy Pizza earned a late-night following. And in Clayton, the fine-dining chefs behind Charred Crust have taken dough to new heights.
At the same time, the fast-casual segment has taken off. For prospective restaurant owners, the lure of pizza seemed a relatively safe bet, given its popularity, high profit margin, and low cost of entry. St. Louis has seen an explosion of national chains: Blaze, MOD, Firenza… Locally, Crushed Red and ’ZZA Pizza + Salad carved out their own territory, with oblong pies and fresh salads served in minutes. With so many players in the pizza game—and the explosion of restaurant delivery across all cuisines—restaurateurs continue to adapt, with some turning to “ghost” kitchens, which deliver food from centralized locations.
Today, the pizza proliferation continues at bakeries (Union Loafers, Red Guitar), breweries (The U.R.B., Brew Hub Taproom), and even food trucks. In fact, after falling in love with Italy and Neapolitan-style pies, Wayne Sieve and Kendele Noto Sieve rolled out a pizza trailer—then doubled down recently with a brick-and-mortar in St. Peters, Noto Italian Restaurant. Wayne Sieve now aspires to gain certification from the Associazione Verace Pizza Napoletana. “We’re trying to do things as authentically as we possibly can,” he says.
It would mark yet another first in St. Louis’ never-ending pizza progression.
