BJ Pizza Wars VI: Scott's Family Restaurant v Nasca Cafe

The most salubrious of greetings to you, my good pizza-eater! Today, we've sourced up a couple of lesser-known joints in the Sanlitun-ish regions for you: Scott's Family Restaurant (situated in a location just as twisty as Bowie's Labyrinth, but with fewer foxy patrons) and Nasca Cafe, Beijing's only quasi-Kiwi-style pizza purveyor. And the bar? SUPREME.

A quick Google finds that the Supreme Pizza (with some 2,540,000 search results) is a great deal more popular than the Knights of Columbus Supreme Council (677,000), but lags somewhat behind Coltrane's A Love Supreme (48,600,000), Supreme, Louisiana (35,200,000) and the Supreme Court (106,000,000!!) There appears to be some controversy over exactly what goes on a Supreme, but most menus we consulted offered up some variation upon the ham-and-bell-pepper combo. Shall we plunge ahead?

In the Red Corner: Supreme, Scott's Family Restaurant (RMB 68, large)

Style: Faux-thentic. Lots of the right elements – a good oven, Italian-trained pizza chef, reasonably Italian flavor selection – but a few grissini shy of an antipasti platter.

Crust: Hopes were high upon seeing that the establishment possesses a brick wood-fire oven, but these were tragically dashed. A good color, with just a whisper of salt. Comme ci, comme ça.

Cheese & sauce: Not enough of either.

Toppings: Well-spiced slivers of chicken are impressive, as are the (two!) different colors of bell pepper. I'll forgive the cocktail olives, but the "sausage" is unpardonable. I've always opined that Chinese huotuichang sausage (火腿肠) tastes like Spam ate itself and then threw up, if you'll excuse the image, and that's what they put on this pizza.

Satisfaction: The first part made me sad in the stomach-parts, to say the least. Later bites (sans-sausage) were better, verging on "good." Unfortunately my earlier trauma may have colored overall judgement.

Morning after: Not a pizza that does well with refrigeration. The chicken is much worse for wear, and the sausage even more offensive second time around. Two bites and in the bin it went.

Next up ...

In the Blue Corner: Super Nasca, Nasca Cafe (RMB 49, small)

Style: A distant relative of the quiche-za, this might be best described as a clump-za. Flattish, thickish and slices rather resistant to being pulled away from the pie.

Crust: Generic Pizza Hut Pan Crust, but slightly thinner on the bottom. I'm running out of synonyms for "mediocre."

Cheese & sauce: You'll notice that Nasca, unlike many of our other contestants, have chosen to sprinkle their cheese over their toppings, as opposed to under. We can only applaud their structural wisdom. With this technique, a fritter-like raft mass is formed, and gels rather nicely to a bed of tomato.

Toppings: Squarely sizeable. Supposedly three kinds of pig meat went on this (bacon, salami and ham) – but it tastes like one. Not altogether a bad thing. Pineapple a nice touch – you could call it a souped-up Hawaiian. However, the combination of many wet toppings, no cheese buffer and thinnish bottom crust means that this pizza drips moisture like a snotty five year-old.

Satisfaction: As far as miniature pizzas go, this one is about as wide as my hand – at a stretch, six inches? Now you know why I stopped playing piano. It's very filling. Will feed a regularly-appetited man, or one-and-a-third ladies. Frankly, I was impressed. Still, RMB 49?

Morning after: The sog that was somewhat irritating last night has now completely taken over the crust. Peel off all carbohydrate elements for cold comfort.

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It pains me to write this review, as Scott's does some of the best budget pasta in the city: their spag bol is an RMB 28 home-delivered box o' comfort. On the flip side, they also charge RMB 20 for a Lipton tea bag dunked in hot water. For your personal reference, a box of twenty bags at BHG supermarket costs RMB 21 and change. Whoever answered Nasca's phone needs an English class or two, but cluelessly friendly is better than just clueless. It's not really a contest.

Verdict: Nasca.

Stay tuned Mondays and Thursdays at 2pm for more head-to-head Pizza Wars battles. In the mean time, take a gander at our first five matchups:

Episode V: Vineyard Cafe v Alba
Episode IV: Tavola v Pizza by LMPlus
Episode III: The Den v Pizza Buona
Episode II: Eatalia v Pyro Pizza
Episode I: Hutong Pizza v Pass-by Bar

For a full list of matchups, head here: http://www.thebeijinger.com/blog/BJ-Pizza-War

Photos: Susan Sheng