PizzaHacker – Vinyl Pop Up

Came out here Thursday night and it was packed. The pizza was great, i ordered the short bridge Italian sausage and mushrooms. The crust thin New York style. I must say the Pizza was great! Everything on the pie came out to perfection. I topped it off with some local brewed Porter. Check it out and get there early! It’s loud!

This is a regular eat in and take out haunt for us. This pizzeria is awesome. When you become a regular, everyone knows your name. It’s like coming home to a loving Italian mom, who is always ready to cook your favorite meal I highly recommend PizzaHacker — Vinyl Pop Up.

Amazing experience all around.
Small but lofty space with chalk board walls which listed the menu and had a «write your own name» wait list. Communal tables with an industrial yet welcoming vibe set the stage for some classically well executed pies with some flair.
While waiting, we were offered beer and wine from the counter. The local and seasonal rotation prompted us to get two amazing beers we would have never tried otherwise. We sat at the counter, which was intimate and gave us a front row view of the chefs at work.
Hipster is the vibe– but if I have learned anything about hipsters it is that they know how to eat. The staff was not pretentious in the slightest however, and were quick with suggestions. Although they did not have all the standard pizza toppings, they had a note next to the meat topping that would most closely resemble pepperoni. Although I did not pursue this topping and instead opted for a special pizza, I could see how some could appreciate this.
The menu was small and well thought out, which I adore. We ordered a kale Caesar and were very happy with it. The kale had been prepared well and was tender. The dressing was fresh and bright and was in perfect ratio with the rest of the salad.
The pizza was the true showstopper however– as it should be. The toppings were delicious and well paired, but the dough truly shined with this pizza. A lightly charred crust which had a nice crisp crunch and chew left us wanting more. I highly recommend the Calabrian chili paste over the standard crusted red pepper, which are both offered on the table. The paste provided a similar spice with a unique flavor.
Prices were slightly higher than your run of the mill neighborhood pizza parlor, but with every bite we understood why. You are certainly paying for a carefully curated dining experience here, and it was worth every penny.

So, my birthday rolled around again (apparently, it’s an annual thing) and I decided to have a house party. For half a second, I debated about what to do for food (it was a stupid half second). Then, I emailed my friends at Pizzahacker (who, since I first fell in love with them, opened an awesome brick and mortar spot). They quoted me a super reasonable price and my birthday went off without a hitch. Pizzahacker, I just can’t quit you.

Great pizza. Not to doughy, not to cheesy. Just right. Fort Point Beer Kolch is great with their pizza.

This is, without a doubt, the best pizza I’ve ever had in San Francisco.
Jeff, the owner, is insanely — insanely — passionate about the pizza he makes and serves. He is obsessive about every element. The depth of his of his knowledge and the level of his passion for pizza is, well, borderline nutty. The result is seen in the pizza. Perfect. When I say perfect, I mean perfect.
This place is going to become a real San Francisco institution. You heard it here first!

I’m 99% sure my family and I were sitting next to Unilocaler Nina B. and her dining companion on this, the first night of Pizza Hacker’s «soft opening» at his new brick-​and-​mortar location on Mission St. I second Nina’s experience. Jeff (the PizzaHacker himself) makes a fine pie, and I say this as an admitted NJ-​born pizza snob. I had a margherita, while my wife got the «Get a Room» and the menu’s lone (enormous) salad. We were equally impressed. The cheese is delicious, while the crust has a wisp of salt on it that really goes a long, long way towards punching up the flavor. The pizzas are all of good size, too.
Jeff did come by and say hello, and he took my lone suggestion to heart — that the cafeteria-​style benches, which they use two together to form a single big table — make you feel too far apart from the person sitting across from you. He said he’s already working on a solution to this.
As a frequent eater at nearby Gialina, where I always add a delicious egg on top of my pizza, I asked Jeff if he recommended an egg on his margherita (an egg comes by default on top of some of his other pies). He didn’t have strong convictions one way or the other and suggested I simply try it, which I intend to next time. For now I wanted to try the regular marg as a baseline, but I’m curious if dipping that deliciously salted crust into an egg yolk in the center of the pizza could take PH’s marg to a whole new level.
All told, I haven’t tasted all of the glorious Neapolitan pizza spots in SF, but I’ve been to a good number of them. And right now, on pure taste alone (factoring out things such as price, wait times, parking, etc.) I’d put Tony’s and Una Pizza Napoletana in Tier 1, Delfina and PizzaHacker in Tier 2, and Gialina and Zero Zero in Tier 3. The list goes on from there.
One minor before I end this overly long review: currently all the pies at PH are $ 15, and on Jeff’s website he says that this is a temporarily lower price than what they will eventually be. The two nearest top-​shelf pizza places, Gialina and Delfina, both charge $ 13 for their margheritas. So if PH ends up sitting too high (though to be fair, his price is WITH tax, so it’s currently more like $ 14 per pie in comparison to the competition), it may tilt me towards Gialina or Delfina more often than PH. Hopefully he’ll stay really close to $ 15.

Some said this man was a myth because i tried countless of times to find him until he found shelter at vinyl room. I went here twice. The first time i went there it was great i dont know remember the name of the pizza, but its the one that has lemon and arugula. That was one of the best pizzas i have tasted. The second time i came i ordered my favorite — Mergherita. This one was a fluke, The sauce was tried out and the cheese was scarce. Note, i did get the last pizza available for the night, so maybe that was the reason.
One of the reasons why i wanted to check out pizza hacker was because of the homemade fire grill he made, he might still using it in the back, but they use a white curtain in the back to block him, so i couldnt see what was going on. Overall he is still one of the better neopoilatan style pizzas in the city. Go check him out.

Growing up in New Haven, CT, I feel I am qualified to review pizza and Pizzahacker is by far the best pizza I have had on the west coast. I tried three different pies, and all were good, though my favorite was the Yo Vincent… I highly recommend Pizzahacker, particularly for east coasters looking for a taste of New Haven.

Probably 3.75 stars and I’m writing this at Vinyl while I’m staring at the last two slices of my delicious pie. It’s tough to really get me to rave about something in this neighborhood when you consider that the ambrosia that is Little Star is just a few blocks up the street but this is worth checking out.
I got The Farm, which included some arugula, insanely ripe tomatoes and more veggie goodness. The crust is seemingly drowned in olive oil … I’m not complaining. Definitely high-​quality ingredients.
I kind of feel the same way about this as I do Ragazza a block over: it’s good but not better than Little Star. It’s also quite expensive for a relatively small pie and we’re not even getting the fancy pants hacker oven.
Still, give it a shot.

So I saw this guys frankenweber sort of device, and thought I would support his endeavor to monetize it. On his website, he says he’ll be at Vinyl Café. After ordering, I settle in, and look around for this awesome brick oven device, and don’t see it. I’m horrified to scan behind the counter and see that the guy is using a standard restaurant pizza oven! Those things don’t get any hotter than 550 degrees F, and the «brick oven» pizza is only achieved when temperatures approach 1000.
Why go to the effort of building this brand where people expect something so different, and then just do the same thing everyone else is doing? Is this what they call the culinary bait and switch? I could have made pizza like this at home with a pizza stone — I do it all the time, and it’s just as good as this. If I ever get to experience pizza from the frankenweber, I promise to amend this review… but it’s doubtful — the schedule on his website only shows events at Vinyl.
I would have only given one star, but he used really good ingredients. If you order the margherita, expect the middle to be soggy.

To call this masterpiece mere «pizza» would be an insult. Defina? Little Star? Flour + Water? They can’t hold a candle to PizzaHacker! After the first bite it is incredibly obvious that the highest quality ingredients have been used for the dough, cheese, sauce, toppings, etc. We had a margherita pizza and Jerry’s something. Both were very different, but equally outstanding. The little tomatoes on Jerry’s are literally explosions of flavor in your mouth! Although one pizza could technically feed two, these are so amazing that you’ll want one pizza each.
A bit on Vinyl on Thursdays. On weekends, it’s a sunny coffee bar, but by night (Thursday’s at least) they transformed it into a sheik wine bar with curtains, mood lighting, etc.

Mm Pizzahacker was tasty! I had most recently been to Zero Zero so when I was offered three options, I went with the Margherita since that’s usually my standard style to taste. I also checked in on Unilocal and found a coupon — apparently I was only the second person to ever use one.
Anyhow, the pizza came out in six minutes and was charred just right on the crust with a few nice bubbles and just the right amount of cheese. Can’t wait to come back and try another pizza!

Madness is touched with genius — the PizzaHacker does his craft one pie at a time using a Webber grill that looks like it might have fallen from a low geosych orbit. You’ll have to follow him @pizzahacker on Twitter to see where he’s cooking, which he only announces like less than 24 hours in advance. Mad props to him for dishing out a Unilocal Checkin Coupon too!

Since I’ve been on a fig kick lately, here’s a belated review of the fig pizza I had at PizzaHacker earlier in the fall. After regretting not trying PizzaHacker after seeing Jeff set up at another party, I headed to Fabric8’s Street Food Friday to try his pizza. The line was shorter that night with only a few pizzas ahead of my order so I waited about 15 minutes for my figs, mozzarella, and gorgonzola pizza.
Everyone else in line ordered and raved about the Margherita which looked good too, but since I love figs, I went for the Crowd Pleaser ($ 14). It was fun watching Jeff and his assistant shape the pizza dough and carefully cook each pizza one at a time in his hacked mobile-​wood-​burning-​oven. The FrankenWeber oven is able to cook the pizza at very high temperatures that are ideal for making authentic Neopolitan-​style pizza. However, I found that my pizza, cooked at the high temperature, came out soggier than I’m used to, especially the wet figs, but I hear in Naples, the pizzas can be pretty wet. Maybe I should try the classic Margherita next time. I did like the nicely charred crust; the dough is inspired by Tartine’s bread-​making method.

I’ve never actually had his pizza, but he has a web site where he claims to sell the plans for a pizza hacking oven, but doesn’t respond to emails or orders for the plans. I’m sure his pizza is awesome, but I am tired of businesses having email addresses and then never actually reading or responding to the emails.
If and when I get a response I’ll update my review.

I love wood grilled pizza. I can’t quite say that PizzaHacker is the best I’ve ever had, but it is darn good. Wood grilled pizza is a totally different style than what you’d get at most other pizza joints. It has a thin, crispy crust that is smokey and charred (in a good way) from the wood stove. It is light on the sauce and cheese, not as heavy and greasy as other pizzas.
I went with the classic Pizza Margherita, which contains tomato sauce, mozzarella, and basil (named after Queen Margherita of Italy in honor of the Italian red, white, and green Italian flag). It’s pretty basic but oh-​so-​delicious. Pizza Hacker uses high quality ingredients and his miniature wood stove cooks the pizzas to perfection. I hope I can catch him again to try one of his more innovative menu items.

I’ve followed PizzaHacker on Twitter for awhile and yet never caught a tweet in time to trek down to wherever he was for a delicious looking pie. Have you seen this dudes YouTube videos??? If you haven’t, DON’T do yourself the disservice of watching them and then salivating yourself silly wishing you knew where the hell he was and kicking yourself every time you missed him on duty.
My encounter with the PizzaHacker was one of total luck. Some friends and I moseyed on down to «Outside In 5» after a Giants game last weekend as this one was happening in the Dogpatch. What a delight to see that Webber oven/​grill parked out in the lot with all the other vendors!
You take a playing card with your number on it, and they call them from Aces through Jacks. I was told it would be about 20 minutes until I could place an order, which was fine since there were plenty of other carts to get appetizers and small snacks from.
I’d missed them calling my number, but PizzaHacker’s assistant was nice enough to squeeze me next in line once I returned worried that I’d now have to wait another round of cards before they got back to a 10.
I ordered the «Crowd Pleaser» — rosemary, olive oil, mozzarella cheese, gorgonzola cheese, red onions, and figs. Mmmmm. Figs are a great cheese accompaniment. And since this pizza has no red sauce, it’s a nice addition of sweet to the savory of the cheeses.
The ingredients are all fresh– and PizzaHacker puts it all together right in front of you before sliding it into his homemade oven. The pizza takes about 8 minutes once its gone it. I have no idea what he uses for his dough, but its wheaty and thick and magnificent! $ 12 gets you 6 well-​sized slices out of one pie. Considering its organic, made to order, and prepared one at a time, its totally worth it.
If you’re like me, and only interested in pizza when it’s exceptional and original in flavor, then its worth waiting by PizzaHacker’s Twitter feed before you get your next pie. Whether its the one I got, or one of his other marvelous looking creations, its sure to be a crowd pleaser ;)

Forget what you know about gourmet pizza cuz The Pizza Hacker will blow your freakin’ mind!
Gourmet pizza from a street cart, cooked in a oven that would make MacGuyver jealous. Cooks in less than 3 minutes at temperatures over 1000 degrees.
Don’t think for a second that a street food cart can’t make a pizza that would put your favorite restaurants to shame.
This guy is like Da Vinci and the dough is his canvas.

PH made its debut earlier this month at MCK’s favorite spot. I didn’t get a chance to try it then, so when PH announced that he was going to Dolores Park today, I decided to drop by.
Jeff is the man behind this innovative made-​to-​order street pizza setup. His friend Marcel provided assistance. His food stand is equipped with a customized Weber grill, nicknamed «Bride of FrankenWeber» — a one of a kind homemade pizza stone/​oven fitted on top of the grill. A future improved version is in the works.
The pizzas ($ 15 – 20) are really good, fresh top quality ingredients, nice and light crust. It’s a personal size (about 10″), but it can easily be shared by 2 or more. I ordered the «Crowd Pleaser» — mozzarella, figs, blue cheese, caramelized onions, spices, and sopressata added at no additional cost. Yay! I even got a bottle of water on the house, they were super friendly and generous!
The other pizzas on the menu were 2 types of Marguerita pizzas ($ 15 each), one traditional and one using green zebra tomato sauce.
After placing my order, I decided to stroll around the park (not sure how long that was). On my way back, Marcel waved at me from a distance to say that it’s ready. There are no to go boxes, just paper plates, so you get to eat it right after it’s made. You can add as much fresh Parmesan cheese (grate it yourself), red pepper flakes, and olive oil as you want. Solid 4 stars for the food, plus another star added for the coolness factor and of course the friendly service = 5 stars.
This is the first mobile freshly-​made gourmet pizza in SF. As far as I know, no other city has any similar vendor. That’s VERY cool! Get updates on Twitter.