I grew up in Detroit in the 50’s and the 60’s, and there was a fad in the restaurant world that caught on, and it was called “pizza.”  In my old neighborhood, we even had a couple of nice sit-down restaurants and several carry-out places.  There were no chain pizzerias, in fact there were only a few chain restaurants back then, and none that we went to.  It was a simpler time, and food was not fussy, but it had to be better than what we could get at home, or it wasn’t worth the time, effort or the money.  To this day, pizza is a treat for me, because it isn’t something we make at home from scratch, though I am not a fan of frou-frou pizzas, I like a big slice of pie with long stringy cheese, covered with a ton of toppings, so that the cheese is almost hidden, and pie that can be folded in half.  My Bride likes a knife and fork when eating pizza and it is one of the few items that I actually like to pick up and hold while I am eating.   I don’t put a lot of demands on pizza, other than it has to be good.

I had heard of Corsi’s often and it was not really far from where we live, but we had never tried it.  We had gone to the Plymouth Ice Festival to get our daily walk in, as we like to walk a couple of miles each day, though it was hard to maintain a good pace with the crowds, we did get a chance to see the ice sculptures and see all of the snow that they manufactured in the downtown park, because as of yet, we haven’t had any snow, and I probably have just jinxed us.  We saw an ice sculpture of a pizza maker and that cinched the idea, and we decided to try Corsi’s.   We must have used a “way-back machine” to get there, because it is family owned and operated since 1958 and I don’t think that they changed the décor since they opened up.  As they say it was Deja-vu, all over again.  They have quite a nice menu, but I only had one thought in mind and we ordered the Corsi’s special and in the medium size of ten slices.  I was in heaven, or that moment when nostalgia takes over.  We didn’t have a salad or anything else, and the wait seemed forever, and I guess that is good, because they were actually making a pizza and probably using the industrial ovens that they installed in 1958.  The pizza finally showed up, and it was the pizza of my youth, with irregular pizza dough with bubbles and sporadic “burn” spots, and they are very generous with the toppings, it doesn’t appear that they were counting the pieces.  The final blessing to the meal, was that they had the old-fashioned pepperoni that would curl up in the oven, and would offer a couple of pearls of grease in the curled bowl.  It was pizza, and damn good pizza, that maybe was not the healthiest thing to eat, but once in a while, the soul has to be placated.

I being the yokel that I am at times, asked for the wine list, and our waitress pointed to a small plastic stand on the table that listed I think five wines and three were the common catering hall type of wines, which makes sense, because Corsi’s also has catering halls from day one, and the signage that was up that evening giving directions, looked like they had three different parties going on.  My Bride asked me what Fortissimo was, and all I could think of was the rows and rows of gallon jugs of Fortissimo that would line the floors and shelves of the old Italian markets of my youth, the wine that always reminded me of the “Dago Red” wine that we used to get as gifts from some of my Father’s friends.  Fortissimo is still made by CK Mondavi Family Vineyards, but I decided to order “Chianti.”  I asked to see the bottle, as they sell the wine by the glass or by carafe, also shades of the old days, with those small wine glasses that I am surprised that are still being made, where they fill the wine up to the rim of the glass.  The Livingston Cellars California Reserve Chianti NV was the wine, and the winery was established in 1933 in Modesto, California.  I was surprised that the wine could be labeled as Chianti, but maybe they have been grandfathered in, just like there are still a couple of California Champagnes.  The grapes used for this wine are probably only known to the winemaker, or maybe not, because nowhere could I find what this Chianti was made of.  You know what, it doesn’t matter, it worked with the ambience of the moment, it was fun, and neither of us complained of heartburn, even with the addition of the cracked red pepper flakes.