To the surprise of no one, Pizzeria Florian is already excellent and worth a trip to East Aurora
The original founders of the award winning Jay's Artisan Pizza are back in Western New York and once again are making some of the best pizza in town.
The first time I met Jay Langfelder and his partner Amanda Jones they were working on their food truck, OG Food Wire in 2015. Leading up to that meeting, I had been emailing back and forth with Jay prior to their public opening and internally had built up an insane amount of hype for how good this pizza was going to be.
Not only was Jay telling me all of the things a food obsessive like myself would want to hear about ingredients and technique but he was also incredibly confident that his pizza would beyond anything the area had to offer. He was not wrong.
There is a certain level of dedication that it takes to become a great pizza maker and when I met Jay, he immediately came across as someone who had painstaking obsessed about every detail of the food he was putting out. He was also often his harshest critic. On multiple occasions, I’ve had Jay (unnecessarily) apologize profusely to me on how he thought his dough wasn’t right that day or how he was so upset with the end product. These apologies would come to me as I was already happily half way through my 2nd pizza and seriously considering contemplating if my body could handle ordering a 3rd.
When I found out that Jay and Amanda were moving back to WNY and planning on opening a new pizzeria, I was ecstatic. With all due respect to the other great pizza places in Buffalo that have opened since they left town, Jay and Amanda are different.
Jay was always known as the “pizza obsessive” of the two but over the years, I began to watch Amanda develop her own pizza making skills. From watching her work on that first truck to more recently after they had moved back to the area and I watched her first hand her making pizzas at The Grange. I had previously known Amanda to be a bad ass baker (she made my daughter Charlie’s first three birthday cakes) but now she had become a bad ass pizzaiolo too. She’s also appearing in a livesteam with @womeninpizza tomorrow on IG, tune in!
Pizzeria Florian, located at 650 Main Street in East Aurora, are not doing wood fire pizzas like Jay’s. They are using electric deck ovens to put out incredible pizzas that are inspired by traditional Neapolitan pizzas but also show a nod to the legendary NYC pizza spots. I have no doubt that as the duo find their footing in the Southtowns, additional varieties and experimentation will come.
If you want a classic Margherita or Cheese, you’ll find it. If you want the Calabrian Crunch, a pizza featuring their house made chili crisp, honey and pepperoni, they have that too and it’s so damn good. It’s not THAT spicy, the heat slowly builds and numbs your tongue and worked for a spice adverse person like myself.
Their Cacio e Pepe pizza with dollops of whipped ricotta is as good as it sounds (and may I recommend adding some Calabrian chili honey as well). Even something as simple as a chopped salad (pictured above), which started with a lettuce order gone wrong that required a quick pivot, is perfect in all the little ways that add up to the best pizzeria chopped salad you could want. They even have their own house made blue cheese that is great!
The restaurant is just over two weeks old and is already incredibly popular and busy, so adjust your expectations when you arrive. Some quick facts. They do not take reservations but they are taking orders to go. When you walk in, check in with the cashier to grab a seat and they are currently doing counter service. They move quick, so you will not be waiting long for food. They have cannoli’s for dessert and serve beer and wine. Check out their current menu here.
Knowing the incredible high standard he applies to his pizza, I asked Jay if he was already satisfied with what was coming out of the ovens. He smiled and said he was very happy with it and honestly, that’s all the endorsement you need.
