APIZZA SCHOLLS
4741 S.E. Hawthorne Blvd.
503-233-1286
apizzascholls.com
Lunch, Saturday-Sunday; dinner, daily
$$
Portland's best pizza, bar none, and has been since Brian Spangler started baking his New York-meets-Connecticut pies out in the Washington County crossroads of Scholls.
In what goes down as a particularly short-sighted footnote in Oregon food history, Spangler and his team were eventually run out of town, landing in Southeast Portland but keeping the name.
Today the restaurant stretches across two Southeast Hawthorne Boulevard storefronts: Check in on the right, where you can often grab a seat at the bar or one of the roomy wood booths, or wait for a table in the dining room next door.
Despite what you might have read, this is one of the most kid-friendly restaurants in Portland, and you're sure to find babes in arms and toddlers underfoot both in the waiting area and the '80s arcade in the back (Donkey Kong: surprisingly hard).
It's not elaborate, but Spangler is uncompromising: The Caesar salad is spot on, the right mixed olives sit in rosemary and oil, a straightforward summer Caprese gets drizzled with pitch-black balsamic.
And then there's the pizza. These are real East Coast pies, thin, wide and crispy, with both red and white sauce options and an array of toppings. Solo, I'll get a green olive and salami personal pizza at the bar and watch a game amid the gallery of San Francisco Giants memorabilia.
With friends, we'll get as many of the classics as we can, split pies of New York White and Tartufo Bianco, Apizza Amore (with capicola) and Amatriciana (with bacon), and see if I can get a slice of each before I quit.
Don't miss: An ice cream sandwich for the road.
-- Michael Russell