Milo and Olive bake their pizza at too low a temperature. Their oven is around 600 F, while Gjelina/GTA’s is more like 800 F. As a result, the crust at M+O comes out more browned than charred. You can ask for it well done, but then the pizza cooks too long, which leads to a hard, dry cornice I find unappealing.
Here’s a picture of the lamb sausage pizza from my last visit to Gjelina. It’s a little blurry but you can see much more charring, especially on the undercarriage.
Try ordering the aforementioned lamb sausage pie and comparing it with the pork belly sausage pizza at M+O. It’s not a perfect comparison, but I personally find the sauce and toppings to be much tastier at Gjelina.
BTW, if you can get over to Abbot Kinney for lunch, Wednesday and Thursday are great days to do so. There’s street sweeping along 6th until noon, so there’s almost always parking on one side at lunchtime.
Thanks for all the info! I actually don’t mind a browned crust, so I wonder if it’ll end up simply being me feeling that they’re 2 diff styles of pizza (as @bulavinaka mentioned), which would be a very happy result indeed.
Don’t know if I’ve ever the pork belly pizza at M+O b/c I can’t tear myself away from the pepperoni or the mushroom. But maybe I need to try something new.
My favorite pizzas are really both. That’s the appeal of a super hot oven imo. In the right hands, it yields a crust that is simultaneously crisp yet supple. The trade-off is it takes skill and attention to get consistent results. IIRC, Mozza lowered the temperature on their ovens a while back for precisely this reason.
For sure! It’s a style that’s very popular as evidenced by the success of places like Milo and Olive and Stella Barra. And I’m obviously being a little melodramatic when I say “everything wrong with pizza” Back when there were fewer pizza options in LA, there was greater urgency to my complaint bc I didn’t want to see this style crowd out the alternatives. Now, however, there are plenty of places doing pizza the way I like it. Everybody wins!
Such a coincidence you mention that, since I like Stella Barra, too! Although I prob like M+O more. I had never considered that they had similar crust styles!
Since nobody answered your initial question
I crave the fish plate and their salads. They have a lot of other great items like the sandwiches - butcher, chicken parm, Italian, etc… but I think their fish plate and salads are perfect. Hard to beat.
Here’s the problem with Milo and Olive’s pizza in a few pictures. Check out this meatball pizza I ordered the other day. On top, everything looks great, right?
But take a look at the underside. More pale and flaccid than a white nationalist’s wee wee. It’s also dusted with cornmeal, which throws off the taste, especially on a crust so thin.
I actually hadn’t noticed the cornmeal on M+O’s pizzas! Is it always dusted w/ that? I wonder if they’re just going for a “breadier” crust (which I don’t mind)?
excited about a lunch rez coming up this weekend… wonder what i’ll eat. havent’ been there since the birthday dinner years back when they sat John Legend next to us while he was wooing Chrissy
Back when there were fewer pizza options in LA, there was greater urgency to my complaint bc I didn’t want to see this style crowd out the alternatives. Now, however, there are plenty of places doing pizza the way I like it. Everybody wins!
