First and Last Tavern-Mediocre Pizza

I got into New Haven too early yesterday to grab a slice of pizza. Instead, I went straight to Middletown, CT where I would be spending the day and evening attending Wesleyan University's Spring Fling. By the time I got to Middletown I was starving and it was now late enough to have lunch. We, my boyfriend and myself, decided to try the pizza at First and Last Tavern. We were still a little early and had to wait outside for about ten minutes. I was not sure about this place. It looked fancy. It has been my experience that the best pizza comes from dives or holes in the wall. But, I was too hungry to go anywhere else. We were seated and immediately brought bread. This bread was delicious- it tasted of salt, garlic, oil, herbs, and onions. Both of us like spice, so we decided to get half the pizza with just cheese and the other half with hot peppers. Whenever I try pizza from a new place, I make sure that I have at least one slice of just cheese. When the pizza arrived it looked good (sorry i don't have any pictures). But, there was nothing that excited me about the flavors or ingredients of this pizza. The cheese side was bland bland bland. There was plenty of cheese and sauce, but there was no flavor. Also, the dough and crust was nothing special. My boyfriend and myself were dumping parmesan cheese, hot pepper-flakes, pepper, salt, and even some olive oil to make the pizza taste better. The slices with the hot peppers, were pretty much the same. It was a green hot pepper, not the ones from the jar, and they weren't spicy. We even left a slice over, not even bothering to take it home, which speaks a lot for itself. Plus, it was expensive about 17 dollars with tax and tip!

Despite the failure of this pizza adventure, I still had an amazing time. It was a beautiful day! I love getting out of city once in awhile, despite the consequences of my allergies kicking in. There was a great energy on "the hill" at the Wesleyan campus. The students were celebrating the end of classes with some drinking, live music, bbq, and socializing. I got to reminisce my college years, while seeing someone vomit in a crowd of people watching The Hold Steady. I do not miss it that much, but I do miss constantly being surrounded by my peers.

So, the pizza wasn't good; but, we decided to try and compensate by making a delicious dinner. Actually, I didn't cook it. My only contribution was cutting a pepper and boiling the noodles. My boyfriend did all of the cooking. He made an easy, tasty, and spicy noodle stir fry. It had soba noodles, which are thick and doughy. For vegetables we added a red pepper, water chestnuts, shiitake mushrooms, green beans, peas, corn, and carrots. I don't know exactly what the sauce was made of, it seemed like six or seven different hot sauces and soy sauce.