So much more than pizza...

I was first made aware of Il Cane Rosso in Deep Ellum at the 1^st Annual Iron Fork Competition. There was something like 100 Dallas restaurants that set up stations and were handing out tastings of a representative dish from their menu. Diana (frequent guest star) and I were wandering around gathering samples and drinking wine when toward the end of the event, I stumbled upon Cane Rosso’s station and decided to try their caprese skewer. It was a cherry tomato, a large basil leaf a chunk of freshly handmade mozzarella and a drizzle of balsamic vinaigrette. I swear to you, out of all the 20 or so restaurant tastings we tried, this was my absolute favorite! I had 4 skewers. The most impressive part was the mozzarella. I’ve had freshly made mozzarella before that was bland (blasphemy!). This was the most flavorful mozzarella I have ever encountered. I asked if I could just buy some cheese from the restaurant and the guy gave me a weird look…he said maybe.

Anyway, cut to a few months later, Haley, a new guest star cleverly nicknamed “The Bonz” and I decided to trek out to Deep Ellum and enjoy a delightful lunch. I forcefully required that everyone share the caprese salad with me to start and then we decided on 2 delicious sounding pizzas. Before I forget, I should note that this restaurant is devoted to creating authentic Neapolitan pizza made according to the strict guidelines of the Associazone Verace Pizza Napoletana and actually began as a food truck (hooray!!). The salad was delightful and the mozz was just as good as I remembered. 

Our pizzas were excellent too! We ordered the Delia: fresh mozzarella, roasted grape tomatoes, spicy bacon marmalade and arugula and the seasonal pizza: goat cheese, fresh mozzarella, pesto and sun dried tomatoes. My favorite was the seasonal, but I think the others preferred the Delia due to the spicy bacon marmalade (I thought it was a tad sweet). One thing we all agreed on? That pizza crust was quite literally the best crust ever! They make their dough in-house from imported, all natural “Double Zero” Italian flour. I thought I knew all there was to know about pizza, but suddenly I was both surprised and educated. This is what pizza crust is supposed to taste like. I get it now. Consider it my pizza a-ha moment. 

In addition to the delectable caprese salad and pizzas, I also brought dessert back to my office. I asked my co-worker what I should get and she requested the Zeppole: fried dough, powdered sugar and chocolate sauce. I admit, I was skeptical due to past experiences with Italian places trying to take on the beignet, but I decided to just roll with it. Boy was I surprised! The fried dough balls were nothing like beignets, nor did they try to be. They were soft, moist, doughy and slightly cakey with a crispy crust, and the chocolate sauce was like a cross between chocolate mousse, chocolate pudding and chocolate sauce. I never thought I'd be so obsessed with fried dough dipped in chocolate....oh well, could be worse!

Moral of the story, Il Cane Rosso is now my favorite Dallas pizza destination. What’s yours? We’re dying to know!

http://www.ilcanerosso.com/