Flippin’ Pizza, like every other pizza place outside of Chicago, advertises itself as an authentic New York-style pizza place that serves the stuff your blue-collar workin’-stiff grandpa ate during his lunch breaks, when he sat on steel bars and built skyscrapers in Manhattan before playing stickball in Brooklyn while Joe Dimaggio drove by in his Packard convertible.
Flippin’ Pizza, like every other pizza place outside of Chicago, advertises itself as an authentic New York-style pizza place that serves the stuff your blue-collar workin’-stiff grandpa ate during his lunch breaks, when he sat on steel bars and built skyscrapers in Manhattan before playing stickball in Brooklyn while Joe Dimaggio drove by in his Packard convertible.
Bad history aside, Flippin’ Pizza serves pizza for the workin’ man, and if you got a problem with that, then shut uppa’ yo face! But while Northern Virginia is overwhelmingly populated by blue-collar joes who miss America’s golden years and should easily latch on to the working-man atmosphere that Flippin’ Pizza desperately tries to demonstrate through their menu, the pizza is priced more towards the heartless billionaires who employ the average joes.
Located in the bizarrely-decorated flower building on West Broad Street, Flippin’ Pizza serves pizza and pizza-related objects such as garlic knots, calzones and salads. As you may or may not have guessed from the previous paragraph, their pizza is not meant for those seeking delicate artisan masterpieces that you can nibble on over a game of badminton. This is pizza for the people!
However, with an eighteen-inch cheese pie going for almost $15, and the regular pizzas with various topping combinations, such as the Triboro’s mix of meatballs, sausage and pepperoni or the Pesto’s blend of roasted red peppers and (surprise) pesto going for almost $20, the working man cannot afford to celebrate his humility with lavish pizza that, although large, is not particularly fantastic.
I did like that the crust was stiffer and crispier than it usually is in many “authentic” pizza joints in New York (people in New York fold their pizzas like animals do), but if Flippin’ Pizza is supposed to be authentic above all else, this then betrays their prime directive. The toppings are adequate, but bring to mind a slightly-better Sbarro, which does not make someone feel more inclined to get a bunch of pizzas for a party or whatever. The cheese is all right, but nothing to write home to mama about. Therefore, if you are my mother, please do not read this sentence, as doing so would make me a massive hypocrite.
But don’t think that this pizza is bad. It’s not. It hits the spot, regardless of what that particular spot may be. But it simply isn’t worth the mortgage that you might need to take out in order to get a pizza or two. However, I highly recommend their one slice and a drink for $3 or the two slices and a drink for $5 deals. These deals provide you a perfect sampling of the individual slices without forcing you to go broke getting a whole pizza. During my visits, they had cheese, white, Triboro and a few other pizzas up for slices, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they had any and all pizzas available as slices.
Flippin’ Pizza makes the mistake of glamorizing the working man and then selling their idea of him to people with more money than the working man. While their deals are great for working-stiffs and cheap people such as myself, did they never consider that the working-man may have worked to aspire to something greater, so that his children might have a life greater than his? Aspiring to the simplicity of the past is just an excuse to ignore the changing world, but if Flippin’ Pizza wants to stay alive, they must upgrade the pizza to reflect the prices or downgrade the prices to reflect the pizza. It’s what grandpa would’ve wanted.
Flippin’ Pizza
800 W. Broad St., Falls Church
flippinpizza.com
703-752-8672
Hours:
Sunday – Thursday, 11 a.m. – 10 p.m.
Friday – Saturday, 11 a.m. – 11 p.m.
