Pizzicletta — Restaurant in Flagstaff

It really makes me a bit sad to leave this negative review as me and my family have been eating at Pizzicletta since they opened years ago. We had ALWAYS loved their passionately made food and cutting edge pizza. It’s been our only go-to après skiing through the many seasons.

Maybe last night was just an off night? But the meal and service both sucked big time and we feel sad that our cozy little go-to seems to perhaps be losing its groove. Where to start?

Ate last night with my 24 year old daughter at 7pm on Friday 9/15/23 on the drive from Denver to Phoenix. Long Island bearded waiter with cool oversized eyeglass frames waited on us. He highly (highly) recommended the Primitivo red wine by the glass - describing it as big & bold/ good flavor. Two or 3 other couple/groups sat outside in the rain just after we arrived. We ordered the salad with the goat cheese and balsamic + the pizza special - which as I recall was a cheese based pizza with ricotta, mozzarella, spicy sun-dried tomatoes, artichokes, topped with arugula.

The salad arrived quickly, and it was very basic. Some pinenuts, goat cheese, and field greens. That’s about it. Balsamic was a bit too strong. It was fine. I’ve had better salads here in the past.

When the wine arrived something tasted very off. The red wine tasted quite fizzy, bubbly on the tongue, and certainly not like any Primitivo (basically a Zinfandel) that I’ve ever tried. This was not a Prosecco or bubbly. It did not taste good. I calmly flagged the hostess behind me and described the off tastes - and she said that they would open a new bottle.

Some minutes later, she brought us 2 new glasses and said that they tried the wine and agreed something was off. Try this one she said. We tried it, and unfortunately, it had exactly the same weird fizziness on the tongue. Definitely not right. I’m a wine lover/traveler hobbyist for almost 40 years, and I know when a bottle has gone bad. My daughter didn’t want me to complain so I didn’t - but bubbles on the tongue from an Italian standard Primitivo? No.

Our waiter came by, and when I told him about the still odd fizzy taste, he seem to say that was normal, and that was how the wine was supposed to be. What? Honestly, I don’t think he knew what he was talking about - so we left it at that.

Then we noticed that the other tables near were served their pizzas. Some of those tables were seated five or 10 minutes after us, and we ordered before them. We patiently waited another 10 minutes and finally I asked the hostess if she could check on our pizza.

A few minutes later, the pizza came out. The ricotta was glopped on so heavily that it just overpowered the taste of everything else. It also weighed the pizza slices down, so you could not hold them. The dough & crust (as usual) was fantastic - but both my daughter and I agreed that this was not a great pizza because it was just way too much ricotta.

Overall, the bill was about $60 which was typical for this place. We don’t mind the higher prices here (usually), but on this occasion we were served unquestionably bad wine and no one seem to care. The food was very slow to come out, and no apologies came from our waiter.

I’m gonna be hesitant to come back here unfortunately. I make amazing pizza at home these days. We used to love Pizzicletta - for many years. But I think they’ve lost...

Overall: You might not know what you're going to eat, but you'll likely end up giving it 5 stars.

Pro: When looking online for good food this place consistently showed up, so I decided to check it out.

The hostess and wait staff were very welcoming and their timing was spot on.

We downloaded our menus and ended up ordering the buratta caprese and the daily special pizza. While reviewing the menu I spent some time translating the formaggi (cheese) and salumi (meat) plates and it seemed like they had a good variety. I nearly got the cheese plate instead.

Buratta caprese was 5*, frankly I don't think I've ever had better. I'm not normally a fan of focaccia, and usually question why it got added to my caprese. I had no such issues here.

The daily special was a white pizza that had corn and some kind of spicy tomato stuff. It was very good, not my favorite, the dough and the cheese were great, I wasn't bothered with the corn, I wasn't a fan of the spicy tomato stuff.

The atmosphere is downtown take out pizza place. Minimal seating in dining area, a smidge more seating outside and an open windowed off kitchen area.

They had given us an approximate time for our table to be ready which was spot on. We had given them our cellphone number to be texted but it turned out they'd accidentally hit an adjacent number (since the timing was spot on I'm not deducting a star for what turned out to be a very minor human error).

Con: I am however deducting a star for being required to translate my menu. If I've never even heard of the cheeses or meats you have, please don't make me have to ask either the waitress or Google. Especially when I just had to download it, they can stick a page in with definitions.

Google what is pecorino? 'Not parmesan' Ok, what is salumi? 'Meat plate' Speck? 'Award winning Android and iphone cases' Fine, Speck meat? 'Not quite prosciutto' hot coppa? 'Kinda salami' Finocona - No wait, finn-cchi-ona? Google - "finocchiona" is a fennel salami... good Google

I had not yet gotten to the pizzas....

There's a reason why I ordered the daily special. When I saw a word that started with an apostrophe. I gave up.

I'm 3rd generation Italian, my husband is 4th generation Italian. We both grew up on Italian food. Neither of us are Italian enough for this menu.

'nduja - spicy...

If you know Italians , you know they are close minded ( when it comes to food ONLY). And when I see pizza .. I see gold! This was by far my favorite pizzeria in AZ.. forget Pomo, Bianco, Forno this WAS the one..Now something has drastically changed maybe new management, maybe we need to save on ingredients because life in Flag is pricey ( although I saw the 50kg bag of Caputo), not sure what it is but I can list what isn't working anymore..and reason I am doing it is because I didn't order from Peter piper and didn't pay Peter piper price( understand what I mean..the expectation bar is higher when I have to pay lot more...lots) Service was they highlight.. although does not fill my stomach.. she was pleasant But she thinks ( or she is instructed) flag is Rome and brings me warm water( don't forget it is summer..)with no ice( now I am from Rome and I can drink water or any drink with no ice.. but water as warm as the bidet water isn't too good to swallow...) so I think it's pure laziness... Menu: ok no too much imagination but pizza is pizza Pizza: I decided to order something different since I get accused by my American wife to always order a margherita...so I ordered a gorgonzola, kale,lemon Marcona almond pizza Gorgonzola: not nearly enough to taste it. Kale: it should not be for human consumption ( personal taste) but also cooked on pizza so after 12 hours I m still spitting little crusty pieces of burned grass. Lemon: no lemon, no lemon peel ,no lemon juice no lemon taste. Marcona almonds: I work in hospitality and eat Marcona almonds quite often you advertise something and gave me something else( illegal). Dough: I still have a ball of Dogg in my intestines there are 2 reasons: the flour.. but I saw the Caputo ( best in the world) so I guessing the second option lack of levitation ( you can see the cornicione too soft..and doghy) can't be digested. Wood burning oven: quite impressive... Marra? That's a good quality BUT let's talk about the temperature shall we? A too hot oven would burn the pizza without cooking it properly.. it was a bubble gum... Now as I said before I dreamt about the experience at pizzicletta.. but if I have to sell a pint of plasma to be pissed off after.. I wait to enjoy a pizza in Italy for half of the price.. you can send me the money...