Should you find yourself on Fourth Avenue or Congress Street this weekend, remember, one pizza does not fit all occasions. There’s a perfect pizza for those moments when you drunkenly stumble out of Opti Club, Plush or Mr. Heads and are overcome with the insatiable urge to gorge yourself on some greasy cheesy goodness. There’s also a pizza for the times when you are enjoying an evening out perusing the many shopfronts on Fourth Ave. and would like to partake in a pizza with some truly unique flavor. Here are the two best joints to grab a slice in their respective niches.
When it comes to the sober pizza near campus, it’s gotta be Magpies.
“They have some super delicious vegetarian options. My favorite pizza to get there is the White Pie,” said Julie Fagg, an anthropology junior.
Magpies truly earns this praise, as it has some of the best-tasting pizza to be found in Tucson. Magpies is a gourmet pizzeria, so you can expect to enjoy some quality ingredients, as well as their daily-made signature dough and sauce. Their specialties feature distinctive pies, like the Juan Carlos Pesto, which features a spicy pesto sauce, piñon nuts, fresh tomatoes and two kinds of cheese. There’s also the Chicken Primavera that includes lemon herb roasted chicken, garlic ranch sauce and artichoke. These specialty pizzas and others like them can be a bit costly at $16.99 for a medium pie, but a daily special menu features one or two of these gourmet pizzas at $15.99 for a large.
Magpies also features a create your own pizza menu featuring nine kinds of cheese — including a vegan soy alternative — 10 different choices of meat and a humongous selection of 21 fresh veggies.
The seating inside of Magpies on Fourth Avenue is ample, and this makes it an excellent place to take the family out to eat. The atmosphere is a little off thanks to the construction on Fourth ave. and an eclectic mix of awful songs they have playing from the outdoor speakers, but the pizza is truly delicious.
For those hazier nights, Brooklyn Pizza Company, down the street from Magpies on Fourth Avenue, is worth the drunken adventures it takes to get there.
“I don’t even remember [how we made it to Brooklyn Pizza],” said Nicole Rivera, an English sophomore, when telling the story of how she and her friends ended up taking a cab all the way to Brooklyn Pizza after a party. Brooklyn Pizza Company was in the opposite direction of her house and they had to walk all the way home, but they went anyway.
This story sums up just how good Brooklyn Pizza tastes when you are intoxicated. For only $2.29 a slice, there is no excuse not to take your drunk self by Brooklyn’s late night window, which is open Thursday, Friday and Saturday from 11 p.m. to 2:30 a.m., to grab some pizza. The line at the window is a real scene of drunken camaraderie, as friends offer to buy one another pizza and strangers loan each other lighters. Everyone stands on the sidewalk waiting for their turn to bite into the cheese-covered grandeur that is a drunken slice of Brooklyn Pizza. Go get yours this weekend.
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