With three billion pizzas being sold each year, it is no secret that Americans have an affinity for pizza. Across the country, many often attribute the best pizza to New York’s thin crust, Detroit’s rectangular pan or Chicago’s deep dish. However, when friends debate which state has the best pizza, I am often met with bewilderment as I defend my home state, Connecticut, and our New Haven pizza. 

While it can sometimes fly under the radar, New Haven pizza (or as a local would say, “apizza”), is far from being the new kid on the block. You will often find people queuing around the block at Frank Pepe’s Pizzeria Napoletana, Modern Apizza and Sally’s Apizza, New Haven’s three most established and historied pizzerias—founded in 1925, 1934 and 1938, respectively. 

While Modern is located in another neighborhood, both Frank Pepe’s and Sally’s are located on Wooster Street by Wooster Square, which is the heart of New Haven’s Little Italy. During the late 19th Century, many Italian immigrants began to move into the area with the first Italian society, La Fratellanza, coming into existence in 1884. Not only with pizzerias but with a variety of Italian restaurants and grocery markets, from the late 19th to early 20th century, Wooster Square was a vibrant and bustling community for Italian immigrants. 

With Little Italy’s rich history in mind and Frank Pepe’s reaching their centennial this year, it begs the question, what is it about New Haven pizza that keeps people coming back each time? 

What makes New Haven pizza special is its thin and charred crust, which is made possible by a coal-fired oven. At Frank Pepe’s, they pride themselves on their dough, which has a higher water content so that when the pie hits their custom 100,000-pound brick bread oven, the dry heat produces a crispy exterior and bubbly crust. 

Another important characteristic of New Haven pizza is its simplicity. Unlike typical fast food chain pizzas, the New Haven style doesn’t overwhelm the pie with lots of mozzarella, instead focusing heavily on tomato sauce, making for a tangy and juicy bite. By using fresh and seasonal ingredients, the pizzerias are able to make pizzas unique to New Haven, like the white clam pie (clams, cheese, garlic and oil) that can be found at all three of the pizzerias mentioned above. Sally’s is a pizza purist’s dream, with their three classics: tomato sauce pie, mozzarella tomato sauce pie and white pie. 

Don’t take my word for it though, try it yourself! From Grand Central in New York City, New Haven is a two-hour train ride via Metro-North—trust me, after you try New Haven apizza, you’ll never want to go back.