Ordering

Why the telephone

A telephone call lets us say things a web form cannot. That the kitchen is forty minutes behind and you should eat at half past eight rather than eight. That the tray you were going to order a slice from came out twenty minutes ago and the next one is eight minutes away. That the Neapolitan margherita you have chosen will be a considerably worse pizza by the time it reaches Sunnyside, and here is what to order instead.

None of that is a sales technique. It is the difference between you getting a good dinner and you getting a disappointing one, and every one of those sentences costs us a slightly smaller order.

So: telephone 000-000-0000, or come to the counter at 37-32 61st Street, Woodside, NY 11377 and order there.

How long things take

• A slice

  Two to three minutes — the time it takes to reheat it properly. Almost never longer.

• A New York or square pie

  Twelve to fifteen minutes once it goes in the oven.

• A Neapolitan pie

  Ninety seconds in the oven, so the answer is entirely about the queue in front of it.

• Rice balls and zeppole

  Ten minutes, because they are fried when you order them and there is no way round that.

• Friday and Saturday, 6 to 8pm

  Add half an hour to any of the above, and telephone rather than turning up.

Things worth saying when you order

• “Well done” — two or three extra minutes, a darker base and drier cheese. Free, and a lot of people prefer it.
• “Light cheese” or “light sauce” — both are real requests and both are free.
• “Cut in squares” — on any round pie, if you are feeding children or picking at it.
• “Sauce on the side” — for knots, calzones and anything travelling.
• Anything about an allergy — say it first rather than last, and read the allergens page before you order.

An estimate is not a promise. Every delivery time we quote is an estimate, not a promise, and we will not offer you a guarantee we would have to break on a Friday at eight o'clock. If the kitchen is running long we would rather tell you thirty minutes late on the telephone than let you find out at the door.

A shared flour kitchen, and what that rules out. Our kitchen handles wheat flour in open air all day, along with milk, eggs, soy, tree nuts and fish. Flour becomes airborne every time a dough ball is opened, and it settles on every surface in the room, including the peels, the oven floor, the cutting board and the wheel. We can tell you what we put on a pizza, and we will tell you honestly. We cannot tell you that anything leaving this kitchen is free of an allergen, and we will not say it. If a reaction would send you to hospital, this is not a safe kitchen for you, and we would far rather say so than take the order.