Best Pizza in the Eastern Suburbs

Adagio Lounge and Pizza Factory
Adagio is one of the more unusual pizza joints we came across. The “Factory” sits in the back of a strip mall behind the Adagio Lounge. Place your order at the lounge, cruise around to the back door twenty minutes later, and, presto, instant pizza. Or call in a delivery order and have it brought to your house. The best way, though, is to relax in the quirky ambience of this bar/family pizza restaurant. This is quintessential bar pizza, nothing fancy at all, but the sauce is salty and rich, the sausage top quality, and the deep dish pie is a monster. 2052 Silver Lake Rd., New Brighton, 651-631-9441

Brianno’s
Brianno's deli-Italia is a full-on Italian market offering salami, cheese, oils, and tinned goods, plus homemade and imported Italian foods. It also makes the self-proclaimed “best pizza in town.” Not sure we’d quite go there, but the great thing here is that you can order pies fully cooked, half-baked, or frozen. And all are made from authentic Mangine family recipes. The great pies are thin, thin, thin, with wonderfully acidic sauce, and the balance between dough, sauce, and cheese is superb. But why an exacting family restaurant of this type uses sheeted dough and commercial mozzarella is beyond us. That said, it’s still a great pizza. 2280 Cliff Rd., Eagan, 651-895-1088

Bricks Neapolitan Pizza
Best Heart and Soul
Bricks is the latest addition to the Neapolitan pizza family in the greater metro area. Its pizzas are very good, with a sturdier dough and a more generous pile of toppings than at its older local siblings. If the pizza at Punch is too wet for you or the pizza at Nea too sparsely topped, you’ll love Bricks, a purely nonprofit venture, with all proceeds going to charities benefiting children in need. 407 2nd St., Hudson, 715-377-7670

Buon Giorno Italia Market
The best and perhaps only Roman–style cracker-crust pizza in the state is the phenomenally high-quality version that the Marchionda family and chef Filippo Caffari churn out from behind the counter of one of the best Italian delis you’ll find. The paper-thin, hand-tossed, crispity, crunchy pizzas are brushed with just the right amount of crushed tomatoes and olive oil, topped with superbly high-quality meats, vegetables, and cheeses, and are available to go or to consume at the handful of tables in the market. The sausage pies are so good because Caffari once ran a butcher shop in Rome and knows a thing or two about meat. The cheese pizzas are topped with fresh mozzarella, and the prosciutto-and-arugula pie is without peer locally. The carabinieri all hang out here. 981 Sibley Memorial Hwy. (Hwy. 13), Lilydale, 651-905-1081

Donatelli’s
“Old-time family restaurant” does not begin to describe this White Bear Lake institution. D’s offers numerous red sauce specialities, bread and a salad bowl with every Eye-talian entrée, and some pretty darn good pizza for this part of the metro. Pies are available in deep dish or sheeted thin crust. The cheese and sausage versions are pretty standard fare, but the Donatelli homemade red pizza sauce is a Midwestern pizza-lover’s dream. And D’s delivers. 2692 E. Co. Rd. E, White Bear Lake, 651-777-9199

Green Mill
Green Mill makes a pretty good pizza. The crust is chewy and dense, with nice crispness throughout; the mozzarella is a step above standard commercial product; the sauce is superb if you love rich, thick, and zesty with a sweet finish. Pies are seasoned with dried oregano—a nice touch—and the sausage is some of the best in town, with great fennel flavor. Slices are always available, and three crust formats—hand-tossed, thin, and deep dish—are offered. Calzones and stuffed pizzas are quite good, and the list of toppings is voluminous. Eagan, Hastings, Hudson, Lakeville, Roseville, Shoreview, and Woodbury

Italian Pie Shoppe & Winery
One of the best pizzerias in the west ’burbs is the New Hope outpost of Italian Pie Shoppe. What makes it so is the formidable and legendary thin-crust white pizza. Slathered in garlic, herbs, and mozzarella, it has the best flavor balance of any white pie we tasted in the metro. The crust needs work, but otherwise this one is an oasis in the desert. Eagan

Old World Pizza
This Inver Grove Heights newcomer sits in a strip mall just off the highway, a few doors down from a tanning salon. Oddly enough, 99 percent of all suburban pizza parlors are located near or next to a tanning salon—zoning, perhaps. The pizza comes in three sizes, with the fourteen-inch Top of the Line loaded specialty pie weighing in at a hefty four pounds—don’t drop it on your Corgi. There was no sheeted dough in the old world, as far as records suggest, but the sauce is very good and the cheese is gooey and salty—a hallmark of better commercial shredded mozzarella. The sausage is spicy and has a good pork and herb flavor. Table service is available, and Old World delivers, but in a new-world vehicle. 5816 Blaine Ave. E., Inver Grove Heights, 651-455-1551

Ronnally's Pizza
Best Sauce, Minnesota–Style 
With an autographed picture of the Doobie Brothers on the wall, dim lighting, deep booths, and plenty of cheap wood wainscoting, Ronnally’s is a throwback to another era. This thirty-five-year-old Woodbury legend makes the best conventional pizza in the east ’burbs. The pies are paper thin, the sausage and cheese top quality. The dough is sheeted, which is a minus, but the sauce is one of the best you’ll find anywhere in the metro. The flavor is deep and acidic, with a subtle hit of oregano and a strong tomato flavor that doesn’t die after you chomp through the crust. Pies come with a thin crust or deep dish, and the Italian burrito (really a calzone) is pretty darn tasty. The white pizza with chicken is a world-class guilty pleasure, and Ronnally’s ladles big portions of its red on pastas and sandwiches as well. The hot dago deluxe, served “sloppy” with mushrooms, is one of the best sandwiches in town. 1560 Woodland Dr., Woodbury, 651-739-3823