RESTAURANTS

Two National Experts Declare Portland the Best Pizza City in America

This comes three years after a Brooklyn-based restaurateur and “international pizza consultant” betrayed his hometown and also called Portland the best pizza city in the U.S.

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Portland might be over but, hey, at least the pizza’s still good.

In fact, for the second time in two years, national experts have declared Portland the best city for pizza in America. That’s the conclusion reached by Nathan Myhrvold and Francisco Migoya, co-authors of the upcoming book Modernist Pizza, according to an article published today by Bloomberg.

Myhrvold and Migoya—former chief technology officer at Microsoft and head chef at Modernist Cuisine in Seattle, respectively—ate their way across the country, from the Northwest to New Haven to, yes, New York, consuming something in the range of 400 pies, and determined that Portland is home to the best collection of pizzerias in the nation.

“We had an inkling it would be good,” Myhrvold told Bloomberg, “but we were shocked at how good it was.”

This comes three years after Anthony Falco, a Brooklyn-based restaurateur and “international pizza consultant,” betrayed his hometown and also called Portland the best pizza city in the U.S.

For Myhrvold and Migoya, it’s not just the quality of the pizza but the diversity of options. The two specifically praise Apizza Scholls and Ken’s Artisan Pizza—the restaurants credited with sparking Portland’s pizza renaissance in the mid-2000s—but note you can find everything from “New York-style pies at Scottie’s Pizza Parlor to Neapolitan-style at Nostrana and creative, ingredient-driven pizzas at Lovely’s Fifty Fifty,” which they deem the country’s second-best individual pizzeria, behind Razza in Jersey City, N.J.

For any New Yorkers planning a book burning, the three-volume Modernist Pizza is out Oct. 5.

Related: What the Hell Was Going on With This Portland Pizzeria From the 1950s?

Matthew Singer

A native Southern Californian, former Arts & Culture Editor Matthew Singer ruined Portland by coming here in 2008. He is an advocate for the canonization of the Fishbone and Oingo Boingo discographies, believes pro-wrestling is a serious art form and roots for the Lakers. Fortunately, he left Portland for Tucson, Arizona, in 2021.

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