Description
This first New York branch of a small but ambitious Vermont chain patriotically calls its pizza “American flatbread” and confers playful, hippie-sounding names on the pies, such as punctuated equilibrium, medicine wheel, and dancing heart bread. The space sprawls near the mouth of the Holland Tunnel on the northern frontier of Tribeca, consisting of several joined dining rooms, giant picture windows, a darkened bar, and two magnificent wood-burning ovens, which form the focus of the décor. The ingredients, on the whole, are local, organic, and homemade, and the pies project their healthfulness. Of course, it’s really just pizza. The medicine wheel, using mozzarella and various dried cheeses, attempts to duplicate something like Dom DeMarco’s pies at DiFara; dancing heart bread resembles a Middle Eastern lavash; and Mopsy’s kalua pork uses pineapple and barbecue sauce in pursuit of its nefarious ends. The crusts tend to be a bit tough. We’re on the pizza frontier here, and if you’ve tried every other pizza in town, give American Flatbread a go. --Robert Sietsema
