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I grew up outside of East Liverpool Ohio, I never realized that pizza was made any other way until I moved to college. Bruno's pizza was a friday staple growing up, so much that now when I go home to visit my parents, my mother always picks up a tray. The best part if Ohio River Valley Pizza, is that it tastes just as good the next day out of the fridge! Home pizza in St. Clairsville is VERY good as well. I live in Columbus now, and the pizza just doesn't get to that level, but there is a DiCarlo's off of 256 in Pickerington, although I have not had it.

If anybody passes through Athens Ohio, Goodfella's pizza is a must. They sell by the slice, and it is close to Ohio Valley style, but they use a much thicker sauce. It was perfect after a night uptown at the bars.

I just read comment above...(tomdobb)I didn't eat pizza when i came to Columbus but in Canton, Ohio u will get authentic Italian pizza made by the best owned italian family restaurants.

There's a mouthwatering style of white pizza which seems to be peculiar to McKees Rocks, PA, just outside Pittsburgh -- I know I've never seen it prepared this way anywhere else and I eat a lot of pie, dude. I believe it originated at Mama Lena's (now Mama Mia's) and has been cloned by former employees at another shop down the street called Doughboys (which is cheaper & maybe even better, IMHO). I've never seen one prepared from start to finish, but here's my best guess as to the general idea: a medium-thickness pizza crust is brushed with olive oil & perhaps garlic or other spices and partially baked, then removed to add a light layer of some kind of white shredded cheese (don't think it's mozz), then baked again until done. The hot pie is then topped with a room-temperature prepared mixture of diced tomatoes, minced garlic, finely chopped onion & basil and olive oil and sprinkled with more shredded cheese. The pie partially melts the additional cheese and warms the topping mixture up to the perfect temperature while preserving the flavor & freshness of the ingredients. On every other white pizza I've had the tomatoes & other ingredients are baked along with the crust which dries them out. This stuff is almost like a big round bruschetta. I'm no longer in the 'burgh, but I might have just talked myself into driving 3 hours each way to get one right now -- it's that good.

I have no idea what cloyd42 is talking about. Vince the Pizza Prince is neither long gone nor do they make Old Forge style pizza. Vince's signature pizza is round and covered with almost-burned cheese. They are still open in Scranton in the same location they've always been.

I wanted to chime in on the ongoing New England pizza discussion.

Papa Ginos is somewhat similar to the mom-and-pop stuff, but it's different in a few key ways: 'Ginos has a thinner crust than most local places, and it's less (!) greasy.

Thinking back to the local non-chain pizza of my northeast Connecticut youth, the distinguishing characteristics are a firm-but-not-crisp, doughy bottom, sometimes tending towards rubbery, and the use of cheap manufactured mozz, typically very oily. It tended to be the sort of pizza that, if you were eating a slice and folded it, you could pretty much squeeze several tablespoons of orange grease out of it. The crust tends to be crisp on the outside and soft inside, sometimes a little bready.

And the pizza places, almost always "[town name] Pizza" or [town name] House of Pizza", were uniformly owned by Greek families. (I never quite worked out why...but it was always faux-Italian food, pizza, and good Greek stuff on the menu.) I'm not sure if that's still as much the case now as it was 20 years ago, though.

Some places in New England seem to do the square-cut thing, which I think is truly blasphemous, while others pie cut. I've never been able to figure out a regional variation to this. It's just a weird individual preference of the restaurant owner, I think.

Why nobody in New England, at least north of New Haven, seems to be able to produce a decent NY-style thin-crust, I've no idea. Maybe it's the water.

My personal recommendation, if you wanted to "experience" a representative sample of New England-style pizza, would be to try Willington House of Pizza in Willington, CT. Although they have a menu that's more diverse than average, it covers pretty much everything I remember from all the local places I went as a kid.

One more vote for Buffalo style. I've yet to find anything like it in DC, Virginia, California or Washington state. I have some shipped to me every year from Imperial. Carbones on South Park was also a favorite.

i still have a soft spot for papa gino's, it's the only chain pizza i like. the only problem i've ever had with it is that they never used to peel the tomatoes so i would always end up with some in my teeth. not sure if that's changed since i haven't been there in a few years.