A Blind New Haven Pizza Test Shows “Big Three” Aren’t So Big
Sally’s Apizza did the best out of the “Big Three,” but the others do not shine in their scores.
Are “the big three” New Haven pizzas wonderful even without their prestige? I set out to answer that question as my 27th birthday present.
I had fifteen friends come over for a pizza party, but with a task at hand. My sweet partner, Alec Wallace, went out as the principal investigator, and bought cheese pizzas from seven different New Haven pizza spots. He then transferred them independently to the same looking pizza boxes, and assigned each a number on the top. Each participant/friend tried a slice from each pie, and ranked them best to worst, with notes remarking the taste, sauce, crust, and other important features of the “apizz.” Although the big three (Sally’s, Modern, Pepe’s) were represented, other noted but still beloved New Haven spots were included: 163, Atticus Market, and Zeneli’s. Domino’s was included as a wild card.
The results were remarkable:
While one of the big three did win, Sally’s, the two other spots were held by Atticus at #2 and 163 at #3.
The only pizza that was not last for anyone was Atticus.
With a one point difference, Sally's and Atticus are basically even for first, and Domino's and Pepe's are basically even for last.
If you organize the data by mode, Pepe's was actually last. (Participants noted: “weak cheese,” “bad crust,” “bad, thick, weird cheese,” and “mid.”
I have a sneaking suspicion that Domino's should have been higher. A participant was caught eating 2-3 pizza slices of Domino's, and wanted to rank it higher, but did not have the courage. However, one participant put it #1 confidently. Bravo.
Before doing this test, I always stood by Modern as my favorite, with Pepe’s as my least favorite. These survey results confirmed Modern is my favorite, even blind. But the results were still surprising, as I put some of my ultimate favorites much lower than expected.
Please find the results for your amusement:
