At our first stop we visited Barbato's Italian Restaurant located at 7472 New Perry Hwy. in Erie PA. We stopped at this location due to it's location on our route as it's located just off highway 90 to the north. It was late in the evening so only carryout was available, only one person was working and there were no other customers... this was our first red flag, and we began to brace ourselves. We asked what the most popular pizza was on the menu, and the gentleman behind the counter informed us it was the Meat Lovers pizza... Great, we'll have that! After only a couple minutes our eyes got big and worry set in. You see at this location, like many pizza places, you can watch them make and cook the pizza. All the while you're getting hungrier and hungrier as you watch the hot, steamy, yet crisp pizzas come out of the oven. Well in this case, the pizza oven in question was a small tunnel oven. We watched, stunned, as our cook took a frozen cheese pizza out of the freezer, proceeded to put a few toppings on it and set it into the tunnel oven for it's first pass. At this point we started thinking about some of the other fast food restaurants we drove past as we exited the highway. After the pizza's first pass through the oven, the cook added some more ingredients, namely various types of meat, and set it on the conveyor for another pass through the oven. This pass completed the cooking of our pizza. Hungry after many hours on the road we quickly paid the bill and proceeded to our vehicle, where dinner was to be served. As I am here writing this review, it is obvious we survived. As for the pizza... well, if you like pizza you see at the gas station, that's been sitting in that glass box under heat lamps for who knows how long... you'll be fine. Our preference at this particular exit from highway 90, should have been to hit Subway just down the street instead.
In all fairness, Barbato's has multiple locations, so the locals must like the pizza. I can't imagine the pizza is made this way at all the locations, but for this location... you've been informed...warned.
A few days later our journey brought us to a little town called Manchester in Vermont. Actually, not such a little town for Vermont, Manchester is a busy place, and a real attraction for tourists. There are many wonderful places to shop such as Northshire Bookstore, the world famous Vermont Country Store, or my favorite place, the Orvis Flagship Store. There are many places in Manchester to eat and shop, or just catch a movie like we did, (the Avengers first movie had just come out). As for food we chose a nice looking pizza shop called Christos Pizza & Pasta. With much more than pizza on the menu, the food represents the owners Greek culture, and is a nice place to come for a quick bite or a casual dinner.
Now for the pizza... We ordered a thin crust pizza with our usual favorite toppings, pepperoni, onion, black olives, and tomato. When it comes to pizza, we can be pretty picky, but pizza from Christos, OMG it's wonderful! The crust is like no other. It's very light an crisp and full flavor. What a shame it is that more pizza places don't understand how important a crust filled with flavor is to the overall enjoyment of the pizza. Christos hits the nail smack on the head with their recipe. If you visit Manchester Vermont, you simply MUST stop at Christos for some of their fabulous pizza.
The last pizzeria on our list for this trip was Altieri's Pizza in Stow Ohio. Altieri's was the winner of Beacon's Best in 2005, 2007, 2010, and 2011. It was also featured on Channel 8 Fox in Cleveland. We came into town in the early afternoon anticipating a tasty late lunch, however much to our dismay, they weren't open. We found this a bit odd for an award winning pizza, nonetheless, we were unable to try the pizza... Noting our experience at the beginning of our trip, we headed to Subway.
