Greek Pizza?

This weekend my Aunt and I tried Athen’s Pizza. It is quite close to Emory. Going from Emory, head up North Decatur, make a right onto Clairmont and it should be the first right at 1341 Clairmont Road, Decatur, GA 30033. When you hear the name Athens you usually think Greek and that does not necessarily correlate to great pizza. At least when I think of Greek food I think of gyros, olives, feta cheese, and pita bread. Those may be only small aspects of Greek cuisine, but I never would think that Greeks would make good pizza.  I was definitely unsure of what to expect, but I was really hungry and was looking forward to something tasty. My aunt and I both started off with a Greek salad. Lots of lettuce, olives, feta, olive oil, and tomato slices are what we got. The salad was rather good and refreshing, but it just was not satisfying enough. It really was only a precursor to what we were waiting for, PIZZA! As I said in my previous blog post, a good pizza has to satisfy three critical criteria. The crust has to be excellent, the sauce has to be delicious, and the cheese has to be delectable. Athens Pizza only offers whole pizzas rather than individual slices. They come in 6”, 10”, 12”, and 16”varieties. I got a 10” pizza. When the pizza arrived I was greeted by the aroma fresh dough, tomato sauce, and melted cheese. I wanted the pizza to taste good, I really did, but it just wasn’t. The bread was way too doughy and the cheese was too stringy and gooey. The rim of the pizza was way too thick. Each slice had too little cheese and sauce and way too much bread. It seemed as though the pizza was undercooked. I feel as though if they left the pizza in the oven for about 10-15 minutes longer the crust would have acquired some sort of crispiness. As it was the crust was just too chewy. It had too much of the doughy taste and not enough of the cheese and sauce. The cheese was too mushy and chewy. Every bite was met with endless chewing and some taste. Before serving the pizza, the servers should have let it cool a bit so the cheese would not be falling off as I was eating slice. The overall pizza was not very good, but compared to the cheese and crust, the sauce was tasty and flavorful. It was sweet, but not too sweet and at the same time somewhat bitter. Athens pizza had a good experience with a good homey and traditional feel, but it did not have stellar pizza. I would recommend going there because it is a really well kept restaurant with a good feel. Get classic Greek food because that is what would be good at.