Witness-Protection Pizza – on Miner Street in Yreka, California: You’ll have to look it up yourselves, and promise not to tell anyone else they’re there.

Name withheld to protect...well, someone, apparently.

I like pizza. Ask me what kind and I’ll tell you, “Anything but fish.” But truthfully, you could wrap up a week-old trout in a calzone and I’d look pretty longingly at it. Deep-dish, hand-tossed, or rolled-out cracker-thin. Piled-high and soggy, or (my own personal creation) a crisp whole-wheat crust drizzled with black truffle oil and a restrained helping of freshly-shredded parmesan cheeses. I’m partial to red sauce, but I’ve enjoyed everything you might dab, smear, spread, or pour onto the crust as a substrate for whatever number, thickness, and/or type of toppings. I’ve eaten pizza that arrived glued to the inside of the box, looking like it had been through a cement-mixer. I’ve eaten some truly bad pizza. And had more of it, cold, the next morning.

Neon never lies. Usually.

That having been said, you also need to understand the context of the rest of this post. Because, I really like this pizza. Enough so to go out of my way to have it again. Even though multiple prior attempts at doing so had been thwarted.

Once, the restaurant was simply closed during times the sign said it would be open. We still tried a second time to repeat our first experience there. Again, though, they were closed, according to a sign in the window, for five days. And so, this last Saturday, I was thrilled to find them open, especially since we had other hungry travelers in tow as we made our way home from the Medford, Oregon airport.

You have to start with the right consistency of dough. But to give its exterior a nearly cracker-like crunch while maintaining a pliable, chewy interior requires an oven that is kept significantly hotter than the usual mass-market pizza joint chooses to do. This means more energy, more expense. And this is happening in a relatively small town where there are other pizza choices available. The result of this extra heat on the topping is as remarkable as what it does to the crust. Pepperoni, especially, responds well, curling to give you an outer ring of crisp, condensed flavor while remaining succulently oily in the middle. Vegetables get just a slight carmelization on the more thickly layered combination. And where some sauces draw excessive attention to themselves by too much sweetness, heat, or saltiness, theirs is a seamlessly integrated component of an excellent whole, with the one standout flavor being the tang of roasted tomatoes around the edges. Did I make it clear? I really like this pizza. (Both of them: double-pepperoni, black olive and garlic; and traditional combination with extra garlic.)

"...subject to change, without notice."

So, then, after trying so hard to get a second helping of this particular pizza, and having it entirely live up to my memory of its excellence…why did I walk away with a bad taste in my mouth and a knot in my stomach?

Part of being “Death Pastor” is the constant realization, “Life’s too short.” Thus, the motto for this blog is “Eat well; eat now.” My overwrought sense of mortality also motivates me to be even more of a people pleaser than I would otherwise be. I want people to enjoy life. (For some, that means simply trying to get them to live life, but we’ll talk about that some other time.) When I see someone having a bad day, even when it has nothing to do with me, my impulse is to bring them at least a little brightness, or at least commiseration. I try even harder when it seems I’ve contributed to that bad day…by patronizing their employer. So, I tried.

But she was having none of that.

“She,” in this case, was washing dishes when we entered. While I was focusing my camera on the lovely arrangement of baked goods in their display case, she covered the distance to the front counter and shouted at me, “Don’t take our picture,” adding as an afterthought—it seemed to me—“please.” I impulsively addressed her anger with an apology, apologized a second time after we were seated, and a third time when placing our order at the counter.

The incriminating baked-goods case.

As I said, she was having none of that.

My shocked companions know I’m a people pleaser. They were patient as I offered a variety of possible explanations for her mood, not the least of which was that instead of most people’s cigarette-pack-sized hand-held phone/camera, I carry a “real” (and really large, relatively speaking) camera. But I also imagined aloud that there could have been some prior altercation, some previous negative experience with photos in social media, or a recent scolding by her least-favorite marshal in the witness-protection program about keeping her face hidden from the general public. Whatever the cause, the symptoms were many.

No dishwasher in sight.Still pixelated for their protection.

We ordered two larges, so that we would have extra to take home. Perhaps I should have explained that to her. I might have saved her the trouble of asking, “Have you looked at the size of our ‘Large’ pizza?” Her mood was, apparently, contagious. I know I caught some of it. But when her helper brought our salads, one each for my wife and me, another to be split between two others (which I did explain when ordering them), they came with just three forks. One of us asked if we might have a fourth. “Extra forks are on the counter,” was the concise and accurate reply. (I should note, though, that the fresh iceberg lettuce came with a generous side of good, albeit commercially-produced, blue cheese dressing. Kraft’s “Roka” comes to mind.) When I tried to return the empty salad plates to clear some landing space for the pizzas, I was reminded of their immensity. “We’re going to have to put your pizzas on another table. There’s not going to be room for them.” At least she did take the plates from me, though. But the mood at the table was badly dampened, even after we managed to move to other subjects beyond customer service.

If I showed you the pizza, you might go there. Don't.

So, the question I’m faced with, before my next trip to Ashland, Medford, Grants Pass, or other points of interest north of Southern Oregon, is whether I want to try again. (Yes, the pizza’s that good.)

I’ve wondered before, “Can great food overcome sometimes slow service?” And the answer I keep coming to is “Yes and No.” Yes, great food can overcome slow service, if the food all comes to the table together (as with Crumbs in McArthur, California where the one-man-show visible through the open counter is even more fun to watch when they’re swamped with both table and to-go service). But when a table’s orders come sporadically spaced over incredibly long periods (as with the now-defunct Highway Diner in Burney, California), people who have chosen to eat together will gravitate to other options.

But will I go back to Yreka for more of the best pizza I’ve ever had? Even though the pizza really is that good, I have to be honest: no, I won’t be back. (And since that seems to be what the proprietors would prefer, that suits my people-pleasing tendencies just fine.)