Pizza Throwdown

Restaurant critic takes on new crop of Chipotle-style pizzerias in Dallas

Editor's note: Since the publishing of this article, Project Pie has closed.

After decades as a pizza wasteland, Dallas-Fort Worth has become Pizza Central. We're the place to be for a wave of fast-casual chains that model themselves after Chipotle's, where you walk down a buffet line and point out your toppings. The pizzas are quickly assembled and baked in minutes in high-tech roaring ovens, crisp and hot by the time you've paid your bill.

Restaurant concept consultant Mark Brezinski says this wave reflects not just our pizza tastes, but also a societal trend.

"The whole thing is customization right now," he says, "from the apps you get on your phone to the toppings you get on your pizza. It's about expanding personal decision-making. Everyone is following the Chipotle model."

DFW more than any other area provides opportunity for pizza expansion. We lack the longtime traditions of the Northeast, making us prime turf for new pizzerias to colonize. Here's our list of the new fast pies in town, in order of how they toss up.

Modmarket

This Colorado-based chain, in its nascent days, chose North Texas for its first foray outside of its home state. Pizza is merely a small part of what is a broader menu of upscale, healthy-centric food, with salads, sandwiches, wine on tap, and vegan and gluten-free options. It's also amazingly cheap.

Vibe: Bright and busy, but with an elegant, casual coolness that feels very Colorado chill. Glassware and flatware are the real thing, there are recycle bins, and there's even sparkling water on tap.

Pizza: The pizza at Modmarket stands out in a number of ways, starting with the crust. They let the dough ferment for 24 hours, giving the crust a Neapolitan-esque puffiness and sour-salty flavor. There is also a whole wheat crust that is as buoyant and flavorful as the regular crust.

They use a Woodstone brand oven, which has two heat sources: gas and wood. You can order pizza in half sizes, which is practical if you don't want to take it home. And the toppings are gourmet level: One pizza has mushrooms, kale, and red onion; another has prosciutto, mushrooms, arugula, pear, and Gorgonzola cheese.

Spin

The Kansas City-based chain was founded in 2005 and is opening at least four locations in the Dallas area. Pizza is the centerpiece, but the menu also includes soups, sandwiches, pastas, and house-made gelato.

Vibe: Spin is more upscale than other places on this list, more Pei Wei than Chipotle. The pizzaiolo presides behind an exhibition glass display over what looks like a relabeled Woodstone oven. (The company can be rather secretive and claims the oven is custom-made.) The dining room has multiple tiers of seating and nice china. A wall-sized mural celebrates Italian bicycling.

Pizza: Spin's pizzas are 12 inches and Neapolitan-style, with a crust that's thick and puffy around the edges and flat in the center. Compared to a true Neapolitan pizza, it comes up short, with a bready texture, and not much of the Neapolitan's trademark flavor or appealing char.

But it's still better than the average pizza to be found around Dallas. Notable gourmet toppings include arugula, fig onion marmalade, apples, and pine nuts.

Pizza Snob

Fort Worth-based outfit does a local, indie rendition of the Chipotle model, with a unique oven that rotates the pizza around a gas flame, producing a hot pie in two minutes. Menu is limited to pizzas and the obligatory kale salad served in a generous stainless steel bowl.

Vibe: Cozy space feels small-town and a little rough around the edges, with nothing-fancy wooden tables, high school kids behind the counter, and a strong focus on pizza to-go. Signs on the wall warn customers to limit the number of toppings.

Pizza: Pizzas are 11 inches and cost $8. You can choose sauce from a list that includes tomato, honey barbecue, or buttermilk Alfredo, and cheese such as mozzarella or cheddar. Toppings, lined up in silver bowls, are above-average, with options such as potato, chopped olives, beer-glazed onions, and the star: candied jalapeños. The crust is thin and lightly browned, a little chewy and buttery, almost like pie crust.

Blaze

San Diego chain from a co-founder of Wetzel's Pretzels is noted for celebrity investors LeBron James and Maria Shriver. It's the most Chipotle-like, and it is growing at a rapid clip. The menu has pizza and salads, including some worthy veggie ones such as beet with almonds, arugula, and goat cheese.

Vibe: Brassy and a little cheap, with house music and an orange color scheme. Cups and flatware are plastic disposables. Wall-size murals offer slogans about staying on your horse.

Pizza: Pizzas are 11 inches and run about $8.50. They're baked in a Woodstone brand oven and come out in three minutes, on a paper-lined tray. Toppings are above-average, including artichokes, Gorgonzola cheese, roasted garlic cloves, and arugula. The crust is thin and crisp, but it has a reassuring pliability and some flavor; it's not just a cracker.

Project Pie

California-based chain has big ambitions, with 20-plus branches extending from California to Texas to international shores. It observes the Chipotle approach, with staffers who dole out your topping choices from steel bins. There are pizzas and a salad or two, including a kale salad chopped so roughly as to be inedible.

Vibe: Bright and busy, with rock music set at too high a volume for comfort. Staffers are chatty. Pizzas are served on a sheet of paper over a stainless-steel rack. Salads come in a cardboard box. Cups and flatware are plastic.

Pizza: An 11-inch pizza is about $8. The process begins when a staffer places a ball of dough into a flattening machine, producing a crust that bakes up quickly and is almost cracker-thin. This automatically restricts the amount of toppings and keeps it a "light" dining experience. Some toppings, like the artichokes, are gourmet, but the overall quality seems average.

A new wave of pizzerias hitting Dallas-Fort Worth, such as Blaze, are modeled after Chipotle.

Photo by Marc Lee

A new wave of pizzerias hitting Dallas-Fort Worth, such as Blaze, are modeled after Chipotle.

pizza

Eco Warrior News

Dallas restaurants doing amazing little things for the environment

Southwest Airlines

Cute bamboo cup from Southwest Airlines

One unfortunate legacy left by the pandemic has been a huge increase in the use of plastics — setting back progress that was being made pre-pandemic.

Plastics are bad. They harm everything they touch: the environment, health, food security, and economies. But they're convenient, subsidized, and in some cases necessary.

Before the pandemic, a growing awareness had started to snowball regarding the negative impact of plastics, particularly plastic straws and single-use plastic containers — and it was significant enough to make the plastics industry very nervous.

"In the two years leading up to the pandemic, the public backlash against plastic was a major concern for industry leaders," says a story about plastics and the pandemic in The Guardian. "As a corporate executive remarked during an industry event early in 2019: 'We need to get the image of plastic in oceans out of the public’s mind. Otherwise, we could lose our social license to operate.'"

But then the pandemic came along, igniting mass hysteria about contagion, and suddenly, bans on single-use plastics that had been in the works were reversed in countries around the world: North America, Europe, Africa, and Asia.

“Overnight, plastics went from public enemy No. 1 to consumers asking for everything to have as much packaging as possible and to be single use," said one gleeful analyst for Shell Oil, who are a major plastics player.

The urgency of the plastics situation remains invisible to most people, lined up at the drive-thru for their coffee or Chick-Fil-A, piling up nearly 250 pounds of plastic waste every year. (That's what the average American amasses — more than any other country.)

But there are brave, pro-environment efforts being made by Dallas companies and organizations, big and small.

La Casita Bakeshop cup Revolutionary compostable cup at La Casita Bakeshop.Facebook

Dallas efforts
The Dallas restaurants and organizations listed below have taken steps to fight waste, even though it costs them money.

Plastic Free Lunch Day is November 22
Dallas ISD’s Food and Child Nutrition Services will participate in Plastic Free Lunch Day on November 22, to help reduce the amount of single-use plastic in school cafeterias.

Plastic Free Lunch Day was started by middle school students in Brooklyn. The initiative was such a success that it was adopted by all New York City public schools in 2022. The concept has since spread to public schools across the country — including Dallas ISD, which was the first in Texas to participate, when it joined up in 2022.

It creates an opportunity to educate students and the community on ways to positively impact the environment, including skipping plastic. Dallas school cafeterias will replace the plastic items they regularly use during lunch with biodegradable alternatives. (Plastic cutlery, cups, and straws will be available upon request for the crybabies.)

Southwest Airlines bamboo cup
Southwest Airlines Co., the Dallas-based airline, has introduced a new bamboo cup for inflight cold beverages, and a wood stir stick in place of a plastic stick. The airline expects the new items to reduce its inflight single-use plastics by more than 1.5 million pounds annually.

In July 2024, Southwest transitioned to a paper overwrap for its napkins made from 100 percent post-consumer recycled materials — fully eliminating plastic from this service item. The airline is making an effort to eliminate single-use plastics from inflight service by 2030.

La Casita Bakeshop compostable cups
La Casita Bakeshop, the award-winning bakery and cafe operation, recently debuted fabulous new cups that are 100 percent compostable, soil- and marine-biodegradable, breaking down naturally after 90 days. and are made from natural materials.

"We are always trying to find ways to be more environmentally friendly and this is a big way we can," they said in their post announcing the new cups. "We just want to be proud of our paper trail and being a restaurant it's hard to do that."

Smoothie King biodegrable cups
Smoothie King, the Dallas-based smoothie chain, previously used styrofoam cups, but began testing a biodegradable cup in 2019. They now offer it as the default choice. They're using Vio Foam, specially made cups that biodegrade 92 percent in four years. They'll still accommodate whiny selfish customers who insist on getting a plastic cup instead, but their Vio foam cup not only helps the environment, it also keeps their smoothies cold a little longer.

Kate Weiser Recycle Box Program
Kate Weiser, the Dallas chocolatier, sells its gorgeous eye-catching bon-bons in a variety of boxes, from 4 pieces all the way up to 35 pieces. (OK, they'll sell them individually, too, but who goes to a chocolate shop and buys a single chocolate?) They have a program where you can bring your empty box to the store and get a refill and get 5 percent off. (Weiser amusingly calls it a "secret hack.")

Dude Sweet Chocolate freezer packaging
Dude Sweet Chocolate, the Oak Cliff chocolatier, has a next-level campaign in which they will accept cold-ship packaging you've received in the mail and re-use it. Say, for example, that you ordered an 8-pack of ice cream pints from Double Rainbow in San Francisco, and it arrived in a box with freezer packs and a foil liner. You can drop that packaging off at Dude Sweet's factory location at 1340 Inwood Rd., and they'll re-use it in one way or another when they're doing shipments of their chocolate.

Note: Whether you're putting it in the blue bin or the gray bin, your plastic is not being recycled. The best course when it comes to plastic, especially single-use plastic, is to not use it at all.

sustainability