Jean Paul's Paradiso

I love me some Jean Paul's Paradiso. So it was a no brainer for me to pick when I was up for pizza tonight. Jean Paul's is a bakery/pizza place. I've only had things from the pizza side, so I can't comment on the bakery side except that I know of folks that love buying their goods at the Hyde Park Farmer's Market.

Let's start by taking a look at the pizzas, because as Dan commented, these are "beautiful pizzas". Dan's the blog photographer, so I'll defer to his judgement.

Sausage and Cheese Pizza

Sicilian, don't let the picture mislead you, there is a LOT of meat on this pizza!

Blackened Chicken & Alfredo Pizza, it's hard to see, but
there is a large slice of chicken breast on every slice.

Grecian Pizza (sans red union)

The pizza's to me tasted as good or better than they looked. The helpings of cheese on each pizza is VERY generous. I'm personally a big fan of lots of cheese on my pizzas. So this was ideal for me. You can also see that each pizza comes with a generous edge of crust, but do note that these are thin crust pizzas otherwise. It makes for a very nice combination and good crust was the second most commented item on everyone's survey forms.

That brings us to the most commented item about the pizza.  It is VERY VERY GREASY! I think this is a result of the very generous helpings of cheese. No one complained that it was a 'gross' greasy, but it definitely caused us all to use more than one napkin. As the pizza aged, the grease soaked into the crust making it even floppier. This made it difficult to eat some of the later slices. That being said, please don't let this stop you from trying the pizza. It's worth the grease!

The last thing I want to mention about the Jean Paul's is that Jani, who was making the pizzas, said that she had a surprise for me when I walked in. At first I was worried. I thought that perhaps one of the pizzas was done wrong. I couldn't have been any further from the truth. It turns out that Jani made us a free dessert pizza! See the picture below, which does not do it justice.

What's this??? A free dessert pizza??? Mmmmm...

What was on this pizza? Well, why don't I let Jani tell you. Just read the top of the pizza box it came in:

The free dessert pizza even came with a nice note!

The dessert pizza was served warm and was delectable. There was some debate about the crust though. It was the same crust as on the pizza. A few folks said they wished that it was more of a traditional pie crust rather than a pizza crust. To me though, that would have changed this from being a dessert pizza to a fruit pie of some sort. I'm in the camp that it was great the way it was. I should note that even the folks that wanted a different crust said that they still really liked the dessert pizza. If I were you, I'd put an order in for it when you visit Jean Paul's.

We'll wrap this up with the numeric rankings.

Average	3.866
Appearance	3.833
Aroma	3.410
Taste (Overall)	4.130
Crust	4.083
Cheese	4.142
Toppings	3.925
Sauce	3.683
Sausage Pizza (Overall)	3.483
Specialty Pizza	4.108
X-Factor	4.620
Menu	4.013

Now go enjoy yourself a Jean Paul Paradiso's pizza! You won't be disappointed!

Average of Averages Update

Since we've reconstituted with eight of us (November 2012), we've hit up 12 different pizza joints. Without Melissa around, we have not been nearly as diligent about getting up posts (but Dan is spearheading the cause!). Hopefully you'll see something a bit more regular (famous last words...).

I picked up Jean Paul Paradiso's tonight and will get a post up soon. However, before we get to that, I wanted to at least put up a post showing the Average of Averages as a way to give folks an idea of what we like.  So check out the plot below (bonus points to you if you can pick out the color scheme). Note that the y-axis crossing is at 3 to help show the differences between the top and bottom pizza joints. As a reminder, this is an unweighted average of the following categories: Appearance, Aroma, Overall Taste, Crust, Cheese, Toppings, Sauce, Pepperoni/Sausage Pizza (Overall), Specialty Pizza (Overall), X-Factor, and Menu. Ratings are on a 1 to 5 scale with 5 being the best.

M, Strong's Brick Oven, and Palomino are all what I'd term artisanal pizzas. So you can see that we clearly like that style. Jean Paul's Paradiso comes in tops right after the artisanal pizzas. It is also interesting to note that there does not seem to be any trend (i.e. we aren't getting easier or harder on the pizza joints).  For comparison, we'll follow the Average of Average's plot with the average across everyone's Overall Taste rating. Unsurprisingly, it tracks the Average of Averages well. Interestingly, the overall numbers are just a touch higher.

As a final set of data, below is the average X-Factor rating for each location. You can see that Jean Paul's did very well, mostly because of the free dessert pizza they gave us (without knowing we were rating the pizzas). What interests me the most about the plot below is the large spread in scores relative to the earlier plots.  There also does seem to be a trend toward higher x-factors. I wonder if that will continue...

Review of Palomino Pizza

Palomino's is a chain Italian restaurant. It's mainly known for its pasta and other Italian dishes. They also have pizza that I've never tried, so this week I ordered pizza from there.

Bacon and Artichoke

Sausage, Peppers, and Olives

Roasted Chicken with Veggies

Calamari (yep, they forgot to add the calamari)

Sausage and Onions

First impression was that the pizzas were really really thin - maybe a little thicker than a tortilla. But, these pizzas might have the best toppings that I've had in a while. The roasted chicken was juicy. The veggies and the sausage was good too. If it were up to me, I'd give it a solid 5 for toppings. There wasn't a huge selection (I basically bought one of each one on the menu), but the limited selections were thoughtful and tasty. Keep in mind, this isn't a pizza joint. It's mainly a pasta restaurant that happens to have pizza.

I'm mixed about the crust. On one hand, the crust was crispy and thin enough that even after the pizza cooled for a little bit, the crust didn't get tough or soggy. On the other, I've probably got to eat a whole pizza (maybe more) to feel full. I'm saying like, a Chipotle burrito probably weighs more than a pizza from here. If you can get past the thinness of Palomino's crust, you'll enjoy some really nice toppings. Not everyone was as bothered by the crust as I was, which you can see in the ratings below. I'm not sure I'll be back there again for pizza, but it was nice to have some premium toppings, which some places seem to skimp on.

Average	3.959
Appearance	4.03
Aroma	3.538
Taste (Overall)	4.138
Crust	4.06
Cheese	3.52
Toppings	4.54
Sauce	3.79
Pepperoni Pizza (Overall)	3.7
Specialty Pizza	4.32
X-Factor	4.32
Menu	4.188