The Best Pizza Joint in Town

by David Guipe

It’s Friday night. You and your girlfriend are curled up on the couch, watching the latest Jackie Chan movie. You feel confident that this is going to be a great night when all of a sudden your girlfriend informs you that she’s hungry.

“I’m hungry,” she informs you. You nervously pick up the phone book to look for a pizza place, realizing that the rest of the evening hangs on this decision. You open up to the yellow pages only to find several hundred pizza places, each guaranteeing you that they’re the best place around. You look over at your girlfriend. She gives you that “I KNOW you’ll make the right decision,” look. What do you do? What do you do?

Congratulations! You’ve just encountered that age-old problem that has plagued students for decades: just exactly which pizza place is the best in town? Right now you’re probably thinking, “Dave, this scenario is completely ridiculous. No girl would ever watch a Jackie Chan movie.” Well, okay, that part was for dramatic effect. But that doesn’t change the point of the story. I mean, how many of us haven’t ordered from a pizza place and been totally aghast at the quality of the pizza, the time it took for delivery, the fact that the store’s motto is “Tip us or we’ll spit in your pizza,” etc? I have personally been on a quest for quite some time to find Ann Arbor’s number one pizza joint. In my opinion, in order for a pizza place to classify as “the best,” it’s going to have to contain the following three factors:

1. Great-tasting pizza.
2. Efficient delivery service.
3. Dancing monkeys.

Well, I was just about to give up the search and go back to eating gruel, err... dorm food on Saturday nights when who should save the day but the trusty RAs at Couzens Hall. Not too long ago, a group of RAs decided to have a pizza-tasting contest in Couzens. It was held as one of their “programs” — hall activities that RAs are required to organize every now and then, to force their residents to spend quality time together. Anyway, the RAs were able to convince eight of Ann Arbor’s most well-known pizza places to participate in the competition. Each donated a sample of their pizza with the hopes of being deemed “The Greatest Pizza Place in the Whole Wide World.” The contestants, who all deserve some credit for their generosity, include Little Caesars, Faz, Jet’s, Cottage Inn, Domino’s, NYPD, DaVinci’s, and Pizza House.

The contest was held in the Couzens Hall library. I, being the dedicated journalist that I am, realized that if I chose to cover this event, I had no choice but to participate in it. The library was packed with poor college students, all anticipating the free food. I found a comfortable chair and began to wait. And wait, and wait, and wait. I was beginning to worry. What if the RAs who went to get the pizza had run into some trouble? What if they had encountered evil villains who plotted to steal our pizza?

Evil Villain: “Ha! I am an evil villain and I am going to do, uh, lots of villainous things unless you hand over your pizza to me!” (diabolical laughter accompanied by a very convincing clap of thunder)

RA: “You fiend! Now the residents of Couzens Hall will never get their well-deserved free meal.”

Just when I had given up all hope of mooching off the system, er, covering the story, the RAs arrived with the pizza. The song “We Are The Champions” could be heard in the background as they triumphantly entered the room, carrying the pizzas in one hand and a cattle prod in the other (just in case). Finally, the contest got underway. After the Devouring of the Pizza and several seconds of deliberation, the verdict was clear. The number one pizza place in Ann Arbor is none other than (drumroll, please) Jet’s Pizza! The residents of Couzens Hall overwhelmingly picked Jet’s as the place with the best pizza in town. Taking second place was Pizza House and coming in third was Faz, who impressed us all with his excellent service. Honorable mentions go to DaVinci’s and Domino’s.

There it is, friends — all the information you need for the next time you’re in one of those awkward pizza decision-making situations. Now all you men out there know which pizza place to call the next time your girlfriend gets one of those late night cravings. That's right: whichever one she wants. MR

This article was published in the 20 January 1999 edition of The Michigan Review (Volume 17, Number 6).
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