New York-Style Pizza Meets Bay Area Quality at This Dynamo Pop-Up

PHOTOS AND WORDS BY ANDY SAMWICK

When I texted the owner of Buddy, after realizing that all the reservations for the pizza pop-up Jules were already taken, fortune smiled upon me. Alvaro Rojas, one of the owners of Buddy, told me because of the Eater article that came out August 8th, not only were the seats taken for that week’s pop-up, but there were only a couple spots left for the following remaining weeks. Jules, and all of owner Max Blachman-Gentile’s noteworthy pizza, was blowing up in popularity.

Rojas looked at his iPad and found some miraculous seats available so I didn’t look like I had egg on my face for the meeting I had already set up at 5 p.m. with two other friends. I arrived early to see the magic begin and to hear some of the lineup notes as the chef Blachman-Gentile went through the menu with his staff. That’s when I noticed two of the evening’s pizza selections. They looked like one was a riff on a Margherita and the other a meat variety. I ordered some bubbly orange wine and perused the menu, as I am wont to do, until my guests arrived. 

We decided to indulge in all the appetizers while we mulled over the pizza selections. The Swedish Pizza Salad was a simple way to start our meal with some shredded cabbage, red onions, carrots and radish. Then these delicious  anchovies arrived in chili oil and we began to perk up a bit; We saved that chili oil for future pizza dipping. Since we are in the midst of the great summer season, we loved the juicy Zuckerman melons, sweet starfire peaches, and pluots with touches of Calabrian chili chamoy, a dollop of fresh mozzarella. crushed pistachios, and cinnamon basil. We can’t forget about the marinated tomatoes either, which included tomatoes from Fresno’s K&G Farm with a variety of heirlooms and a few from Santa Cruz’s Dirty Girl tomatoes all mixed up in a glorious flavorful orchestra.

After several glasses of colorful wine, Buddy’s house campari soda and its bitter milk punch — with blends of bitter wines, vermouths, lemon, strawberry, and ango (thats code for angostura bitters) — we sampled two of the evening’s pizzas and, to our delight, they were both fabulous. Bay Area native Blachman-Gentile, who has quite the bi-coastal resume of bread and pizza making, extending as far east as Roberta’s, Emily, Emmy Square Pizza to LA’s La Morra Pizzeria and SF’s Tartine Bakery, looks as if he is on a game-changing mission with his fermentation process and sourdough strategy. We were overjoyed, dammit! We were more so blown away with his Marone-tomato sauce, garlic, basil, and his three cheese combo: Fresh mozzarella, pecorino toscano, and parma, fighting for every piece. That and his Fun Guy pie with mushroom cream, two cheeses: mozzarella and pecorino toscano, plus all sorts of fungi including maitake, and honshimeji mushrooms topped with a black garlic tamarind sauce. 

The Bridge and Fennel pizza, topped with fennel cream, pickled fennel, fennel sausage, fennel pollen  mozzarella, caciocavallo, and pecorino romano is the ideal third pie choice for the final Buddy pop-up on Wednesday, August 23rd. I might also dive into the Drunken Sailor, because who doesn’t love a gluttonous visual  while eating a yummy pizza with white wine tomato sauce, garlic, oregano, caper and anchovy. I’ll let you know how the evening goes. I just got asked to join a gal pal and feel blessed to try more from this great addition to the expansive pizza movement in the Bay.

Andy Samwick is a bon vivant who brings decades of food and beverage insight to the table.