This week I took a bike ride around Manhattan for the first time since March to see the effects of the pandemic on independent pizzerias. It was pretty brutal. Dine-in businesses were virtually paused while local favorite slice shops were mostly operating like normal. That being said, slice shops more popular with tourists were frighteningly still. This is a tough time for small businesses in cities like NYC so support them when you can by ordering takeout and purchasing gift certificates. Here are the places I checked out. More to come in the next few weeks.
Arturo’s took advantage of the downtime to repaint their exterior. Usually only open for dinner, they’re now open every day from 2-11pm and adding lunch service within the next couple of weeks. Brother-sister duo Scott and Lisa are doing thier best to keep this family run restaurant up and running. 
Emily in the West Village may be boarded up on the outside, but they’re still cooking on the inside. Online ordering is available and pickup happens at a window next to their entrance. They did a particularly lovely job on thier window boards, leaving room for the flower boxes. Gnocco in the East Village has transformed into a full-service takeout window. Like many others, they offer cocktails for takeout and expanded the menu to include takeaway items like house made potato chips. Joe’s Pizza is a classic slice shop, so the only real change is the addition of some signage and social distancing markers, most of which are ignored. Keste Bleecker Street is open for deliver and take-out to cover the west side of Manhattan south of midtown. Keste Fulton St is delivering to the east side of Manhattan and also into Brooklyn since traffic has been so light. Most of their activity has been from hospital deliveries and nationwide shipping via Goldbelly. Lombardi’s created a takeout portal at their Spring Street window. They added frozen margheritas and sangria as take-away items, perfect for a stroll around the super creepy abandoned SoHo neighborhood. 
Luzzo’s has a “grab & go” menu featuring a few standard options to keep their operations streamlined. They also have a sign on their window announcing that they’re certified by a company called Purity that sprays a foam they claim prevents COVID-19 for 90 ddays. Motorino is selling canned and bottled drinks to go in addition to their delicious pizza. Face mask signage is pretty standard these days. Patrizia’s isn’t on the most heavily beaten path and they’re more known for large group communal dining, but they’re open for take-out and delivery on 2nd Ave and 26th St. Prince St Pizza always has a line but now that they’re only letting 2 people inside at a time the line isn’t such a big ordeal. Insidde they have plexiglass guards between staff and customers so contact is limited. Sauce Pizzeria has been busy delivering to hospitals and protests since late March. They offer a system by which customers may purchase pizzas to be delivered to healthcare workers and Suace matches every pizza with one on their dime. The crew at Song E Napule is happy to be open again for delivery, takeout, and semi-legal outdoor seating. When the lockdown began, they used the opportunity to remodel the interior and replace their inherited oven with a new Acunto masterpiece. These guys are always a good time and thier pizza is incredible. 
Village Square Pizza is a typical slice shop so they haven’t needed to make many big changes beyond asking customers to limit their proximity and wear masks upon entry.
