Periodically I find out about a new restaurant by a review or by social media, this time, it was almost simultaneous.  I found out about C. King & Co. the same time as most of the world, some were ahead of the curve.  As I have stated often, I have a soft spot for pizza, especially the old-fashioned type of my youth, and I am always concerned about new takes on pizza.  I am the first to admit that I have a problem with what I call frou-frou pizzas, but I still will give it a go.  C. King & Co. is housed in a building that originally carried that name in 1838, by an English mercantile dealer, just fifteen years after the founding of Ypsilanti, Michigan.  Very eclectic setting with a tin ceiling, cobbled benches and non-matching tables and chairs.  Fun and totally unpretentious and it works.  We got there almost an hour before our reservations, and it is in the downtown district near the City Hall, instead of the trendy Depot Town in Ypsi as well, and our earliness was not a problem. 

The menu was computer printed pages using clipboards.  There were specials, appetizers, salads, desserts, wines, and cocktails.  Very concise and probably ideal for when menus were being tossed after one person touched them.  We relied on our waitress to guide us through. She suggested that we share a pizza and a salad.  We had the Asparagus Vinaigrette Salad of Asparagus, Buffalo Mozzarella, shaved Parmesan, Prosciutto, and an aged Balsamic drizzle.  My Bride loved the Mozzarella and we were both a bit disappointed with the stringy-ness of the Prosciutto.  We also shared a Mushroom Pizza with Ricotta, Bacon, and Truffle Oil.   When she brought out our salad, she also brought out a Clam and Garlic Pizza that she mistakenly ordered for us, and told us to take it home, compliments of the restaurant. The two pizzas were excellent, and the so was the salad as a side.  We also shared a Baked Alaska with Mint-chocolate Ice Cream.

They had a nice neat wine carte, and as par for the course, for this last year or two, my first choice was sold out, an interesting Dry Furmint.  We had a bottle of Poderi dal Nespoli “Nespolino” Bianco Trebbiano-Chardonnay Rubicone IGT 2021.  The history of Poderi dal Nespoli has it roots in four generations of Romagna winemakers and almost ninety years in a mix of hospitality and wine production.  The Rubicone IGT basically covers the entire Romagna region that was blended into the Emilia-Romagna region during the unification of Italy.  It is basically concerned with varietal wines and sanctions almost forty grape varieties, outside of the restrictive DOC implementations.  A single varietal must have at least eighty-five percent of the named varietal and blends listed with two wines, the first variety must be at least fifty percent of the blend.  Trebbiano is the most planted white varietal and gone so far as to annex localities where it is exceptionally memorable, in France it is known as Ugni Blanc and best used in the production of Cognac.  There were no production notes to be found, but I will venture to say that the wine is produced using Stainless Steel.  The wine is a pale straw-yellow color, maybe leaning to a tinge of green and offers notes of pineapple and papaya (more from the Chardonnay as Trebbiano is usually just light and fresh).  On the palate tones of papaya and mango with good acidity and a short finish, but I think this would be best to be drunk young.