Now, without drilling too deep into the food science behind this, generally speaking NY municipal drinking water is among the healthiest and it’s unique mineral content makes it among the smoothest to drink. For over 100 years – New York bakers, pretzelmakers, bagel joints and pizzamakers have been crediting the water with being the stuff of legend. Brilliant marketing? Maybe.

Well for us, we needed to see if tap water from NZ stacked up, and had no choice but to challenge that most sacred of NY pizza tenets. So we did the hard yards in April 2008 – with Nick going all the way back to Auckland just to grab 5 liters of tap water and bring it back to NY in his suitcase.

A few days later we were using that water to mix the flour in the back of Sal’s kitchen – in Little Neck, NY. A day later, after sufficient retarding, we used those doughs to make pizzas and served them to regulars of Sal’s – and for us and the regs. there was no discernible difference – everything tasted delicious. This was a huge day for us!

So, as it turns out – quite poetically,  NZ water works too - beautifully smooth and great for making a tasty pizza crust. We certainly pride ourselves on importing the same cheese, tomatoes, flour and pepperoni used in the best NYC pizzerias, but we love our NZ water!

Now the story behind this story has to do with the name of our company in NZ. As you know, we trade under ‘Sal’s Authentic New York Pizza’, but our actual company name is NZ Waterworks Ltd. – people never understand that and assume we’re a water supply/power company or something. Well, now you know the true story behind our company name:)

You see, Sal didn’t have any of his recipes/secrets written down – it was all in his head and to the feel of his hand, like many a legend.

So because of this it took us a long time and a lot of very close observation to finally nail everything down – which ofcourse we were more than happy to do, as it made for a great apprenticeship. But there was this one time (after we’d arrived in NZ) where we were having a small problem with the percentages of yeast to use in our/his dough formula and decided to send him a quick email to see if he could clarify the amounts needed.

We received a simple response from Sal’s wife Angie that said, ‘Daddy doesn’t do percentages, sorry’. We love that story to this day, and Angie and Sal bless their hearts for being cool with us publishing this hilarious little bit.

I know there has been speculation for some time now about the whereabouts of our next shop – and after carefully taking all of your feedback and comments into consideration, checking out many many locations – we have finally found a great place. The deal was closed this morning!

We will announce the location of our new pizzeria on Saturday night at 5:00pm right here - http://www.sals.co.nz/pizzerias.php. Please stay tuned…

On the afternoon of Thursday January 3rd 2008 (EST) Nick and I were sitting on my luxurious blue corderoy couch in Douglaston, NY suffering from the lingering effects of a slightly extended New Year’s Day celebration.

We decided to order a large cheese pizza from my favorite pizzeria – Sal’s of Little Neck. Not to state the obvious but #1 we were starving after waking up late and #2 pizza always tasted that much better after a good night out.

After demolishing the pizza (plus a bottle of Coke) and feeling good about it all – we got to talking about how great it would be if there were a pizzeria that served pizza ‘that good’ in New Zealand. Now this wasn’t a new thought for either of us, but it wasn’t until that conversation 4 years ago today that the stars aligned and we decided to seriously begin researching the idea of actually doing it.

6 weeks later Nick was back in the US – coming through LAX – with 5 liters of Auckland tap water in his suitcase. After miraculously being left alone by US Customs he continued on to JFK and the next day we were using that tap water to mix the flour in the back of Sal’s kitchen – Little Neck, NY. A day later we used that same dough to make real pizzas and served them to regulars of Sal’s (as well as copious amounts for ourselves) and everything tasted delicious. It was a Eureka moment for us!

That my friends is the true story of how it all began! So, here’s to making 2012 a great year and may all your crazy dreams come true too…

ps – We just shared a large 1/2 cheese 1/2 pepperoni and mushroom pizza from Sal’s on Commerce St. to mark the occasion.

Sal’s Holiday Trading Hours

December 24th – Christmas Eve: All pizzerias close at 8:00pm.
December 25th – Christmas Day: All pizzerias CLOSED.
December 26th – Boxing Day: All pizzerias CLOSED.
December 27th – December 31st – Commerce St. and Takapuna: 4:30pm – 10:00pm; K’ Rd – CLOSED.
January 1st and 2nd: All pizzerias CLOSED.

January 3rd and beyond we will resume normal trading hours which can be found on our website: http://sals.co.nz/pizzerias.php.

All the best for 2012,
Sal’s Pizza

Unfortunately, as of right now, the Auckland talks have stalled out (again) and Hamilton has been pushed out to the new year (although we’re very excited about the prospects there). So rather than continuing to wait for ‘the location‘ up here, we’ve decided to keep moving forward and take a real close look at a few spots in central Wellington.

We’re gonna fly down there next week –  pound the pavement for a few days, do a little people watching, and see what we come up with. If we find something special – then we’ll open talks right away and hope to make it happen.

It would be very exciting for us (and we hope you) to have a little neighborhood Sal’s in Wellington (maybe off Courtenay Place perhaps). This way we can flank the entire North Island (a classic war tactic) – doubling back as the right locations become available – opening at least 1 more pizzeria up in Auckland and Hamilton.

Bottled Promise

Although these are our feelings right this minute – last time (our first blog post) I was left eating my words within days;) I hope we fare a bit better this time around. More to come soon on all this…

Sadly, we still don’t have an announcement about a 4th Sal’s location. In fact, atm we are pretty much back to square one. We’ve come very close to verbally committing on 2 separate occasions – in Newmarket and Henderson – but something just wasn’t right with the space(s) – so we walked away.

We are actively looking and eager to find the perfect spot – chasing down leads (from Albany to Manukau) almost daily. And as much as we are interested in exploring the idea of opening a shop in a Hamilton, Whangarei, Wellington or Christchurch, right now it’s very likely we will open #4 somewhere in Auckland and not get toooooo ahead of ourselves…