Pizza Slice Sarugakucho, Shibuya, Tokyo

You can’t have a conversation about New York-style pizza in Tokyo without talking about Pizza Slice.  And while there are several Pizza Slice shops in Tokyo, the Pizza Slice Sarugakucho location stands out as an ideal hangout for pizza, beer, and friends.

The Sarugakucho location is in a cozy corner of a neighborhood on the south side of Shibuya Station, nearly under the tracks of the JR Yamanote Line (as it runs toward Ebisu).  From the station, take the New South Gate exit, and walk a few minutes (you can follow the tracks, stay on the west side), and you’ll roll up on a quiet intersection with a stylish slice place.

Take a look at the pizza:

Tokyo’s Pizza Slice brand delivers on a promise of New York-style, America pizza slices.

Pizza Slice takes a basic formula for the American slices, and then – particularly at this location – they layer on a really great atmosphere.  There is the food, and then there is the destination. While I’ve eaten at Pizza Slice Cat Street and Pizza Slice Commissary, this Sarugakucho shop is the one that makes my “Tokyo short list” of best places for pizza in the city.

The exterior is all shiny, white tile, with big, black-framed windows.  Inside is high ceilings, a beautiful mosaic-tiled floor, and a huge natural wood table.  It’s old-school, it’s high-quality in a very warm, welcoming way.  Rumor has it, Pizza Slice has some connections to the Streamers Coffee Company, and a similar organic comfort flows through both brands.

On the night I was there (I’ve been to this shop many times; the Sarugakucho neighborhood is a really choice part of Tokyo), there were several classic flavors on rotation; some Italian Sausage slices, some Mushroom Cheese, and of course, some Pepperoni Pizza slices.

Pizza Slice closes at 10 PM, and they usually stop making fresh pizzas close to closing time.  I was there about 9 PM.  There was a still a decent crowd inside, but if you get there earlier, they have more choices.

I will confess that Pepperoni is not necessarily my favorite pizza, but, but… American pepperoni pizza is a kind of perfect food.  It’s good when it’s at it’s very best, and it’s good even when it’s pretty bad. That is why half-way around the world in Tokyo people are actively trying to track down such a prototypically American favorite.  Most of the time, when I want special pizza in Tokyo I think of the Pescatore Pizza at Massimotavio, the Abe Froman Chicago pizza at DevilCraft, or the barracuda pizza I had that one time at Marumo Pizza.  But sometimes, sometimes, what you want is a slice of pepperoni.  You want exactly that. And when a pepperoni slice is what you need…

There it is; Pepperoni Pizza in Tokyo, in all it’s glory.  The beer in the pictures in this review of Sarugakucho Pizza Slice is Heartland, and while it’s a Japanese beer (Kirin), that embossed bottle is a very natural fit for a good slice, all sitting on a 500 pound table made of real wood.

While I’m sure Pizza Slice customized this shop when it moved it, this building seems like it has always been cool.  The bar-counter running along the right side (as you walk in) may have a history that predates the ‘Slice.

The old, dense, polished wood on display in this shop is not a look you can easily create when you buy your wood new from DCM; all that wood, that old hardware, there is history in this shop.  It could be that the 200 Hendrix Gin bottles located above the bar are a part of the current theme of pizza slice dreams, but I can’t help but imagine these have been preserved from a previous life.

Even the smoking spot at Pizza Slice has style.  That sleek, smooth-sectioned tile wall with the stairs-to-no-where, a rusty can to catch your butt, the multi-generation wall of slapped up stickers on stickers adds street cred.  Not grimy, but just enough grit to be great.

It’s all the little things.  “Why the paper bag?” So the cops can look away from your open container.  “Aren’t we indoors?”  Yeah, but it’s “a reference.” “Aren’t open containers literally legal on the street in Tokyo?”  Yeah, yeah… but that’s not the point. It’s American “block party” vibes. It’s like the parking lot of a liquor store. If you’ve been there, you’ve been there, and you get it.

There is culture in this shop.  Brown-bagged with a stamp on the bag is all extra credit.  It’s rich, without being pricy.

The “have a slice day” shrine is one of several little commitments to curation arranged in the room.

If you have ever tried to make something feel “real,” to give a spot or to project a tactile sense of something with integrity, it takes time; you can’t set up a spot like this in a weekend. Good art (like a good painting) begins with a foundation, and the layers go on one at time, with love, and the light that reflects back at you though those layers has a richness to it.  It’s just a pizza shop, I don’t need to over-play it, but there is a reason why it calls to you when you come around the corner.

There is a (very) common interpretation of American pizza culture in Japan that includes some reference to skateboarding and, often, to hip hop.  I have a personal theory that the edgy Japanese skateboarding guy, that got all tatt’d up in his teens and twenties, starts a pizza shop as a place where it’s okay to be a little punk and get some business done at the same time.  Henry’s Pizza in Osaka has a punk background, Dookie’s pizza in Nagoya has ties to a tattoo shop, we caught a slice at Sinot Pizza in Hakodate… skateboards everywhere.

Actual New York pizza runs the gambit from terrible no-effort shops to neighborhood gems to peak best-in-the-world slices; there is nothing particularly skateboard and rap music about it, but in Japan, you’ll see “the formula” again and again. It seems partly that skate culture and hip hop are generally a kind of currency of cool to be spent when you want to create a certain vibe.  You will catch similar combinations as Shibuya’s Pizzanista (which is an LA brand) and more directly Rocco’s New York Style Pizza (in Ojihoncho, Kita City) which has red-and-white checked table clothes mixed with skate videos projected on the wall.

For me, the Shibuya Pizza Slice in Sarugakucho is a living, breathing art project.  And as thus, this review of Pizza Slice Sarugakucho is as much art-talk as crust and cheese.

Recommended.

Pizza Slices in Tokyo

— The Pizza Hiroo, in Shibuya, Tokyo
— Pizzanista Pizza Slices in the Cat Street neighborhood of Shibuya/Omotesando
— New York style pizza slices at New York Tonyz Pizza in Tokyo
— PST Pizza Slice in Azabudai, Minato City, Tokyo
— Rocco’s NYC Pizza in Kita City, Tokyo
— NY pizza slices at Nim’s Pizza in Asabujuban in Minato City, Tokyo
— Pizza Slice Cat Street in Shibuya, Tokyo

For more Tokyo Pizza see:

— Marumo Pizzeria in Ebisu, Tokyo
— Pizza Bar on 38th’s omakase pizza at the Mandarin Hotel in Chuo City, Tokyo
— Massimotavio Pizza in Suginami City
— Roppongi PST Pizza in Minato City, Tokyo
— Savoy Asabujuban Pizza in Minato City, Tokyo
— Simple, excellent pizza at Frey’s Famous Pizzeria, in Roppongi, Minato City, Tokyo
— Pinsa at Bonta Italia in Sarugakucho, Shibuya, Tokyo
— Pizza Strada in Azabujuban, Minato City, Tokyo
— Devil Craft Pizza in Kanda, in Chuo City, more Chicago pizza at DevilCraft Gotanda in Shinagawa, Tokyo
— Shibuya pizza at Kevelos, in Tokyo
— Sabasu Pizza in Akasaka, Tokyo
— Komazawa Pizzeria da Peppe Napoli Sta’ Ca” in Setagaya City, Tokyo
— Deep-dish pizza at Pizzakaya (Detroit style) in Minato City, Tokyo
— Seirinkan Pizzeria in Meguro, Tokyo
— Risto Pizza in Azabudai, Minato City, Tokyo
— Butcher Republic in Ebisu, Tokyo