Have pizza, will travel

For some people, pizza is a fun meal with the family. For others, it’s comfort food to be enjoyed with friends. Finally, there are the true aficionados who elevate pizza to a level of culinary reverence to which few foods can aspire. These people feel it should be an extraordinary eating experience that incites the taste buds and creates lasting, savory memories.

Lou Piccadaci is one of these people.

Piccadaci came to Maricopa more than three years ago from Boston and found a real void when it came to satisfying his passionate palate for pizza.

“I couldn’t find any place out here that served the kind of pizza I like: a thin, crispy crust, with great bread and a sauce that’s not too sweet, not too spicy, but is fresh and flavorful,” Piccadaci said. So he took the matter into own hands: he launched a mobile pizza business called Pizzadaci’s Italian Pizza.

“I’ve been making pizza since I was kid,” Piccadaci said. “No one makes pizza like I make it.”

Before indulging his passion as a pizza chef, Piccadaci worked as a cabinetmaker. But the challenging economy made that a difficult proposition, which led him to pursue something he always wanted to do.

“I used to have people over to the house, and I’d make pizza. They would say, ‘this is so good, you really should really open a pizza place.’ Now, I’m fulfilling that dream.”

Pizzadaci’s Italian Pizza is unique in that Piccadaci has custom-built a mobile kitchen with a full firebrick oven. Each Wednesday and through the weekend, he parks the trailer at the old Stagestop at John Wayne Parkway and the Union Pacific railroad tracks, fires up the firebrick oven to 600 degrees, and from 5 to 9 p.m., artfully conjures his unique take on Italian pizza.

“It’s definitely different than any other pizza you will ever have,” he said. “It’s really thin and very crispy on the bottom. It’s that really authentic Italian crust.”

Piccadaci chose to go the mobile kitchen route because he found storefront rents in Maricopa to be too high. “We just really didn’t have the resources to do a full-blown store,” he said. “I built this (kitchen) from scratch, converting a simple toy hauler into a what you see now.”

If you’re ordering from Pizzadaci’s Italian Pizza, come hungry. “We make a 16-, a 20-, a 24- and even a 28-inch pizza, which is fairly enormous; it will feed four or five people, but it’s a thin crust so you can eat a lot,” Piccadaci said. “This pizza is cooked on firebricks; it’s not cooked on a conveyor belt…this is the real deal, and that’s what sets us apart from everyone else.”

Piccadaci also makes a party-square, thick-crust Sicilian pizza. “It’s a different style all together,” he said. “It’s much thicker and takes a lot longer to cook.” In the Sicilian, he does a 16- and a 26-inch. “That pizza will feed a lot of people.”

Pizzas at Pizzadaci’s run from $10 to $20, depending on toppings. He also caters and offers free delivery. One of Piccadaci’s favorite pizzas is a fire-roasted red pepper, portabella mushroom and basil combination. “We use these huge portabella mushrooms that we slice and place all over the pizza. They are so incredible.”

Piccadaci’s goal is to one day have a storefront in Maricopa. But right now, he’s comfortable building up his customer base. He hopes to expand his hours to seven days a week. And if his early customer feedback is any indication, he will soon have more converts worshipping at the altar of pizza pie.

“Everyone who gets our pizza tells me it’s the best they’ve ever had. You can’t ask more than that right out of the gate.”

At a glance:

What: Pizzadaci’s Italian Pizza
Where: Mobile pizza kitchen, located at the old Stagestop at John Wayne Parkway and the Union Pacific tracks
Hours: Wednesday-Saturday, 5 to 9 p.m.
To order: 480-270-2184

Photo by Jim Williams