Alex De Vore
A pizza covered in arugula? The best!
There were, I think, many Santa Feans who, upon hearing Pranzo Italian Grill would close in 2018 following the purchase of the Sanbusco Market Center by the New Mexico School for the Arts, just kind of didn’t care. In the pantheon of local eateries, this particular Italian restaurant seemed to occupy a place between thoughts like, “Oh, right. That place,” and, “I ate there once years ago, but I’ve got others at the top of my list.”
Still, it was a mostly beautiful location with regular music from the likes of pianist David Geist and, I’m told, a regular haunt for a certain type of diner. So, when owner/chef Steven Lemon shortened the name to simply Pranzo (pranzoitaliangrill.com) and reopened in the former Shohko Café location at the corner of Guadalupe and Johnson Streets last year (321 Johnson St., (505) 984-2645), those folks probably sighed with relief.
Others, however, have been putting it off. Don’t get me wrong—Pranzo has never strictly been what we’d call a bad restaurant, more like one starts to wonder about a place’s markup on pasta or why the dark and cave-like environs of a certain era needed to live on. Those things and others have been addressed at the new Pranzo, and it has become a must-visit culinary destination once more.
Lemon, it seems, is at the height of his powers. Perhaps a case of a shift in location causing a shift in inspiration? Originally, he’d come on board with Pranzo in the late-1980s. He’d leave by ‘96 to run a meat company called Pinnacle, but by 2014 he owned Pranzo outright. Now, in the new and decidedly brighter space, things operate a little differently. Gone are the heavy curtains and dimmed down lighting of yore, replaced with a flood of natural light and a more casual atmosphere.
On the day I visited, Lemon himself was running food (and you’ve never seen a more star struck diner than me during the brief moment he sat and conversed with fellow restauranteurs Bonnie and John Eckre of Santa Fe Bite), which was no small feat given the packed bar area that formerly housed Shohko’s sushi chefs—and the opposite dining area brimming with patrons.
Service came with a smile, both from the busser, who kindly fielded annoying questions about olive oil and warm bread (which come gratis), and the server, a lovely woman who announced the bread was by Albuquerque-based Fano, and that I could get some for my home if I simply visited Albertson’s Market Street store in the DeVargas center. Not only that, but she didn’t engage the no-wine stink eye for a non-drinker like myself, a thing that is very real, I know, because I’d deploy it strategically during my own foodservice days.
Looking over the menu was a challenge, however, mainly because everything sounded phenomenal. Lemon has edited offerings down to choice appetizers like arancini with peas, prosciutto, sun dried tomatoes and pesto ($10) and meatballs of beef, pork and padano cheese ($14) among others. I selected the frito misto, a seafood medley of calamari, shrimp and scallops, all lightly fried and served atop a bright tomato sauce with a refreshing aioli on the side ($14). Elsewhere such a dish has proven too greasy—at Pranzo, the items were fried just right: crisp and crunchy where you want those things and no flavor lost to thick breading or sauce.
Next came a pair of pizzas: The margherita ($14; because if a restaurant can’t nail the simpler things, what hope has it for a more complex dish?) and the funghi, a mushroom-forward number with a roasted garlic puree, mozzarella, shiitakes and truffle oil, all served under a bed of fresh arugula ($18). I opted to forego the truffle oil as it is a flavor which tends to dominate all others and is often, as I’ve read, not made from actual truffles. Now, I’ll never be able to say whether it would have aided or hurt the personal-sized pizza, but without it, the dish was a triumph. Mushrooms seemingly never go bad, but you can still tell whether you’re eating them fresh. At Pranzo, they’re the freshest, and they possess that satisfying chewiness we all crave when eating fungus. The arugula, which seemed a strange choice at first, added crisp textures and, in tandem with the puree, an earthy factor that just plain works. Lemon deserves kudos as well for crafting a thin crust pizza that didn’t err into that all-too-familiar cracker territory common with over-baking. As for the margherita? Well, we tend to shy away from terms like “perfect” in food writing, but as a pizzeria staple and co-star of lunch, it was utterly perfect from the fresh mozz to the light marinara. If you’re reading this, Steve, you really perfected the ratio of sauce to cheese.
Lastly, our server only got so far as the “creme brulee with piñon,” section of her desserts speech before I nearly flipped over the table in excitement. “I love both those things,” I said, probably a little too loudly. “Fire up the sugar torch!” Now, while this particular creme brulee ($9) could have gone a little heavier on the piñon—though I theorize it only contains a few so as to not throw off the texture of the custard—it was once again perfection. Pranzo torches the thing when you order and not before, making for a creamy and flavorful sweet treat that is warm at the top and pleasantly cooler toward the bottom. Is this a remnant of the ‘90s when it comes to restaurant dessert lists? Honestly, no one should care; though I’ll probably need to return for the tiramisu.
Of note is the $4 kitchen gratuity added to the check. First off, I am very pro-this. Kitchen staffs work harder than anyone, and while it’s a mere $4 to a guy who just had one of the best pizzas of his life, it’s the kind of small fee that adds up and changes lives behind stoves. Upon announcing my support of this measure, the server explained how other diners of late were perhaps still adjusting to the change. Allow me to say it out loud, since Pranzo’s staff probably won’t: This is a good thing, you shouldn’t complain to them, enjoy your pizza and pasta.
But I digress; to thoughts of the eggplant parm ($24) and the cioppino sea food melange farther down the menu ($26). Will I return for those? Oh, just as as soon as possible. And will I order pizzas to go from Lemon and crew? An inevitability. No, I never did much care about Pranzo before now, but it has since become a top new favorite. Get there soon.
