Right up there with my blue, eight-eyelet Doc Martens and threadbare flannel shirts that I used to knot around my waist, sun-dried tomatoes enjoy a unique immediacy in my 1990s nostalgia bank.
They used to be everywhere, those shriveled, chewy, intensely concentrated and tangy little strings of orangey oddness. You couldn’t order a sandwich, salad, bowl of soup, omelet, pasta, savoury baked item or plate of risotto without encountering sun-dried tomatoes. Eventually, following a seemingly interminable ubiquity on menus across the Western world, we had all had enough of them and, by the time the equally over-hyped horror of Y2K arrived, the preserved fruit had thankfully retreated back into relative obscurity.
Sun-dried tomatoes were nothing new even back then, of course. Their lineage can be traced to the Aztecs and their use was fairly common throughout Mediterranean cuisine for centuries before the global marketing machine got a hold of them and championed their indispensability alongside grunge music and the World Wide Web.
Raisinated tomatoes are legitimately lauded for their nutritional value; what is lost in the sun-drying process is principally water, so what the dried fruit lacks in volume it offsets with vitamins. Sun drying tomatoes is simply a form of preservation, making a seasonal ingredient available in the long, barren months that bookend growing season.
As recently as last week, in my mind, the ingredient was still played out. A visit to Pizza Garden, however, and a bold meal choice by my wife DJ, affected a shift in my thinking and I am now a touch more inclined to entertain the idea of ordering a dish that contains the fragrant fruit.
The Dagenais family descended on Pizza Garden’s Lonsdale Avenue operation, the newest location in a growing empire of Napoli-inspired pizza restaurants, with a view to sitting in and enjoying a few different pies together.
The plan was thwarted, however, by high traffic in the restaurant and the fact that the place is actually mainly a take-out business, with a handful of seats inside and a couple of tables on the narrow sidewalk patio. We chose three pizzas from a large and well-considered menu, as well as an order of cheese bread, selected because I saw it being packed up for another diner and was stirred by its thin, bubbly and slightly singed appearance, a classic forno esthetic.
Pizza Garden is one of a growing number of pizzerias that employs the ages-old approach to flatbread developed in Napoli, the world capital of the dish. Pizza Napoletana (a.k.a. Neapolitan pizza) is a very specific thing, protected by stringently defined standards upheld by a regulatory body not unlike others that protect the reputation of certain cheeses, meats and wines elsewhere.
The restaurant uses Caputo flour, for instance, the widely accepted gold standard for pizza dough. Thin-crust pies are then baked at intense heat for a short period of time in a wood-burning oven, resulting in the distinctive appearance described above and an equally unique texture, combining crispy seared bits with soft and chewy bits.
Over the last couple of years I have reviewed a number of Neapolitan pizza restaurants, each committed to upholding the high standards associated with this regional style.
What is distinctive about Pizza Garden, in my opinion, is that they seem to have their sights set on the take-out market, offering a quick and good-value alternative to some of the big franchise players that I feel increasingly rely on oil as a primary ingredient in their flatbreads.
Each of our three pizzas was well crafted and tasty in its own right, though I would suggest that I prefer their pies that feature their lush pomodoro sauce. My wife DJ chose one of these, the Pizza Magic, a creative and enjoyable pie featuring both fior di latte and traditional mozzarella, grana padano parmesan, spinach, artichokes, fresh basil, garlic and a healthy handful of sun-dried tomatoes. The richness of the cheeses was counterbalanced by the fresh veggies and tanginess of the sundried tomatoes; it was our favourite of the three.
Closely rivalling the Magic was the Pepperoni, piled high with spicy sausage and the same mix of cheeses. Pepperoni is rarely offered in traditional Neapolitan pizza restaurants, so this combination, what many consider to be the quintessential pizza, was a welcome treat, a proven blend of salty, creamy, and tangy flavours.
Decent, but weakest of the three pies, in my opinion, was the Patate Gorgonzola, a dish that was more inspired on paper than it was on the palate, with its small cubes of hashbrown-style potatoes, fresh thyme, caramelized onions, gorgonzola, olive oil (rather than tomato sauce), mozzarella and parmesan.
I have tremendous affection for all of the ingredients I just listed, and, while the Patate was still a cut above conventional take-out, the olive oil alone did not supply adequate moisture for the pizza base and the whole affair was a touch drier than I would have liked.
The cheese bread delivered against my expectations and was a great showcase for Pizza Garden’s exceptional dough. Little sprigs of fresh herbs on each of the dishes were greatly appreciated and certainly contributed to the handcrafted appeal of this new addition to the North Shore’s pizza scene.
Our three pizzas and cheese bread were $54. Pizza Garden is located at 1596 Lonsdale Ave. 604-770-2202. pizzagarden.ca
Chris Dagenais served as a manager for several restaurants downtown and on the North Shore. A self-described wine fanatic, he earned his sommelier diploma in 2001. [email protected]
Restaurant reviews for The Dish are conducted anonymously.
