Ah, Lombardi’s Pizza. . . the first stop on the most incredible tour in all of New York City – Scott’s Pizza Tour. For those of you who are not familiar with Lombardi’s, let me fill you in on a little bit of American pizza history. Lombardi’s was opened in 1905 by Gennaro Lombardi and was officially the first American pizzeria. He first opened the original location as a grocery store in 1897 after landing in America in 1895. Genarro began selling traditional Neapolitan pizzas from the grocery store and when the pizza sales out-sold the grocery sales, he decided to focus his business completely on the pizza. Over 100 years later, Lombardi’s is still going strong in it’s new location, just a few blocks from the original (they had to move because the #6 subway line ran right under the original location and the subway vibrations were loosening the bricks in the coal-fired brick oven). They moved the original brick oven to the new location, so the pizzas people are getting at Lombardi’s today are the same pizzas that Genarro Lombardi was serving in 1905. Lombardi’s pizza was spectacular. You definitely can’t get this kind of pizza here in Kansas. . . at least not that I have been able to find. If we could, I would be in big trouble. The crust was perfectly done and it had just the right amount of cows-milk mozzarella and fresh basil on top. To die for! Now, for Scott’s Pizza Tour. Scott is a self-proclaimed pizza expert and has spent the last 11 months guiding pizza lovers through America’s pizza birthplace. Scott is very knowledgeable and keeps people entertained for the entire tour. The tour that Josh and I took included a big yellow school bus dubbed "The Pizza Bus" that took us all over Manhattan and then to the Bronx for pizza tasting at 4 different pizzerias. Posts on the other pizzerias that we visited will be appearing in the next few days. Josh and I would absolutely recommend Scott’s Pizza Tour, whether you do the walking tour around Little Italy or you do the pizza bus tour all over the city. It was the best 4.5 hours that we spent in New York and who doesn’t love pizza?
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