To go off on a tangent, it's kinda of strange that in a city with so many pizza joints like Buffalo it's so hard to find a place where a single person can sit down and quickly get an individual slice of pizza with exactly what they want on it that hasn't been sitting in a warmer for 12 hours and do so without involving wait staff. It's like you're expected to buy an entire pie if you want it your way, and you're usually expected to bring it home. If I had a dime for every time I've gone into a place wanting a slice of plain-cheese non-pork pizza only to be told "sorry, there's only what we have in the warmer", I'd have a lot of dimes. It's actually one of my biggest gripes about living in Buffalo. There are a very few places I've found in Buffalo that meet all my criteria, but they're few and far between.
Back home in
As I can't get what I want up here, I don't eat pizza too often, save for the once a month at the Buffalo PHP meetup at Casa di Pizza. This is probably a good thing, given my family history of cholesterol problems. But it's ironic that when I visit back home, the thing that I want more than anything is not biscuits or sweet tea, but pizza.
I say try Just Pizza and see what happens, they do have places to sit down. But I think the real issue is that places bake entire pies so to change up ingriedants isn't practical for one slice. But that being said there are two places that I know of where you can get personal pizzas with what you want on them one of wich is Subway (don't know if it is all Subways or just the one by where I work) and pizza hut.
Pizza,
A topic I can go off on for hours.
1) North Carolina? Civilization? It is funny that you think of your native state as being civilization where as most New Yorkers would think of it as a bunch of backwards tobacco farmers with confederate flags waving everywhere.
2) I have experienced the same thing. You can get pizza by the slice at dozens of places. But they are all "Buffalo style" thick crust pizza that isn't very good. To differentiate their product they will slather on a Noah's ark of toppings. Pepperoni and Cauliflower. Baby Seal and Spinach. Carrot and finger. So that cheese pizza just sits there and dies. To be scraped into a dumpster.
3) Buffalonians seem to like their pizza like they have all their other food: with a giant zigguraut of meat and cheese on top. That subdued, understated, modern looking slice with just a crisp layer of cheese looks more like a napkin than a meal to some people. Or, at least that is how I imagine how the natives think.
Have you been to La Nova? We usually get a whole pie (thier NY style cheese is big, but very very good) when we go, but i have seen people leaving with wee lil miniature boxes that i assume have wee pizzas or a slice in them.
I think we just don't have the cultural niche of pizza-by-the-slice in Buffalo. When I eat pizza it's always at social events with at least three other people, so we always get pizza pies with the toppings on different sides and what-have-you-- I just don't think it's ever occurred to me to buy just a slice of pizza.
But I've done it elsewhere. Funny, that.
Hmmm.. guess its a good thing then that I am sworn off pizza for the whole of 2007. Come to think of it, its probably the only new-year resolution in all these years, that has made it past the fool's day.
There's a place down on Elmwood near Buff State where you can get two for one individual slices. I'm not sure if its any good, though.
That's strange. Here in NF/Lewiston I always have a craving for greasy pepperoni only to be denied with, "We just have cheese at the moment." Actually one of my favorite pizza places [Pizza Pizza] over in Canada always has a cheese slices ready to go in the oven.