PDX Pizza Week 2022 - Day 2

Tuesday, April 19, 2022

After a day of RT leftovers and other casual eating at home, I checked in officially for Pizza Week with ordering the Me and Luigi, from Meta Pizza, for dinner takeout.

More on the Me and Luigi, from the establishment:

What's on it?: Red sauce, Calabrian chili, garlic, rapini, Italian sausage, seasoned ricotta, pecorino romano

The Inspiration: On a trip last year to New York to visit family, we scouted a bunch of pizza shops in Brooklyn. But there are so many, how do you narrow it down? Well, we asked local bar owners! After chatting with the owners of Hinterlands Bar in Kensington, they sent us to Luigi's, an old school shop in South Slope. I got a square slice with broccoli raab, mozz and pecorino. It was so damn good I had to riff on it. Our version is a bit more hearty, with Italian sausage and Calabrian chili and garlic punching up the flavors and textures.

I had driven by Meta Pizza and remembered its name catching my eye, but hadn't been there yet.  It's in the Brooklyn neighborhood on SE Milwaukie, which is a main road through that neighborhood and depending on the route I take, is en route to my storage unit.  Otherwise it's in another little PDX neighborhood that without reason to check something out there, I haven't really had occasion to go to and explore.

It was an easy online order and pickup to be ready in 30 minutes.  I left my place to drive down there (maybe 2 miles away) and found easy street parking.  (Notable that parking can be really difficult, particularly in a full size truck, for some neighborhoods here).

Pickup was decently easy with little wait in what is a tiny hole-in-wall base floor unit of a new build multi story structure, stuck into the middle of the block.  Only a standing bar height small eating area inside, and maybe 5-6 picnic table + benches outside.

Pizza got picked up and with much hunger, I ate all but one slice in a single sitting once I got home. 

I blame my gluttony on having only a TJ's breakfast bar and leftover chicken noodle soup for lunch for the day...

As for the pizza, the calabrian chilis had me in full head sweat status early on, the way crushed red peppers do when I administer too much on my pizza slices.  I am picky on Italian sausage on pizza (usually do NOT order it) but Meta's was crumbled and tasty to my liking.  I enjoyed the hits of seasoned ricotta, and the rapini was a good added element to make it not seem like such heavy eating.  The crust was good but not my favorite -- thin and light, it eats too quickly for my pizza appetite.

Overall I'd be up for trying one of their other specialty pizzas in the future, so good job Pizza Week for piquing my interest in this place.