CMH Gourmand – Eating in Columbus & Ohio

Tonight I served as a judge for the second annual Slice of Clintonville, an evening of all you can eat pizzas from the greater Clintonville area. This was the first year for judging so my honorable colleagues and I had the daunting task of tasting and evaluating three to seven types of pizza from each of the following: Ange’s, Bella Pizza, Donatos, Hounddogs, Lucky’s, Mama Mimi’s, Mikey’s Late Night Slice, Pizza House, Sbarro (open 4 days just down the street), Smiths Deli, Villa Nova and Z Pizza. If you are now full from reading that imagine how I feel right now.

We opted to try to tame that overwhelming variety by getting creative with our criteria. We tasted the standard Pepperoni pie from each place then compared our top three choices among the three judges to determine best in show. Then each of us picked our favorite specialty pizza for an honorable mention. The end result: Pizza House was our winner. Late Night Slice, Hounddogs and Mana Mimi’s got Honorable Mention and Villa Nova received the diversity award for their Taco Pizza. The People’s Choice award went to Mama Mimi’s. It was a good showing by all.

There are many events in Columbus – typically too many to choose from. Some are too big, some are too small, a few too frequent and a very small number are just right. This is a true community event, at least for me. I was able to judge with Nick from Breakfast with Nick and spend some time with his family. I was able to sample pizza and catch up with friends from Late Night Slice and Hounddogs that I work with on the Pitchers and Pizza Tour and see other that I have known for years serve pizza from their shops and see neighbors I have known, in some cases all my life, enjoy the fruits for these local pizza slingers. And finally a few Clintonville charities were able to show off what they do. It is hard to create an event that truly represents the community but Slice of Clintonville is just that a slice of what the community has to offer. See you next year.