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While the legacy pizzerias find their second wind, a couple of new spots deserve a look, both with playful homages to childhood.
Prettyboy Pizza, opened in April, is the new shop inside Little Beast Brewing (3412 SE Division St.), formerly Lawless BBQ. Owner Justin Moore grew up consuming almost as much pizza as the ’90s pop culture that fills his Instagram page.
“I love pizza, I don’t know any kid who didn’t,” Moore says. “I especially love the end of a really crummy sports season where you get your participation trophy but more importantly you get that dope pizza party.”
The pizzeria name comes from Moore’s early days making pizza for his future wife. “It came out so ugly she called them my ‘pretty boys’ for years,” he says.
But then he got serious with stints at Boxcar Pizza, Red Sauce, and Scottie’s Pizza Parlor, before hearing that Little Beast Brewing was looking for a kitchen partner.
Prettyboy’s pizza has the Detroit-style signature “frico” frieze of crunchy cheese but is only half as thick, with sauce applied over the cheese.“With a pizza like this, you can be a little silly with it. Just an unholy amount of stuff on top,” Moore says as he paints it like a Jackson Pollock.
In Northeast Portland, Sleepover Pizza (opened in the winter) occupies a tiny 165-square-foot space next to Gigantic Brewing’s Robot Room (6935 NE Glisan St.) and is open just four days a week and five hours a day.
Owner Aaron Manter was inspired by childhood sleepover parties.
“Maybe you’ve got a VHS of Predator and all night to stay up,” Manter says wistfully. “It always just ended up being Pizza Hut or something similar on the table, so I’m trying to do my absolute best to elevate pan pizza.”
Sleepover is Detroit-ish with dough mixed and kneaded by hand that makes for an airy bottom crust. The chunky, tangy red sauce is cooked in the oven instead of added at the end. The pies come out oblong but uneven with frico forming in bits at the edges.
Each Titanic-sized slice has the airy buoyancy of the Hindenburg with fire toppings. One look and your eyes will bug out of your skull like Jim Carrey in The Mask. Not coincidentally, these are movies you can get in Sleepover’s slice, soda and eBay DVD specials.
“Appealing to a simpler time when you were a kid just feels good,” Manter says. “I remember all my childhood antics being fueled by pizza, and I just want to keep that spirit alive.”
