Noce's Pizzeria

I grew up in upstate New York, and Kentucky has taught me plenty about pizza since I moved here. What most pizza joints here haven’t done often is hand me a slice that tastes like the one I grew up folding. So when a strip-center storefront on Barnwood Drive in Edgewood puts "New York Style" on the sign, I walk in hopeful but not terribly optimistic.

Noce's has been here since 2008. The owner, Jay Noce, is from Syracuse, and he's the one at the ovens. The night I went, he made all three of my pizzas himself while a teenager helped out up front. There's no dine-in. It's by the slice, delivery, and carryout, and the painted parking spots out front say NOCE'S ONLY in case you missed the point.

The Vibe

The room is a slice shop that has stopped pretending to be a dining room. Tiled walls in an Italian-flag stripe, a checkerboard drop ceiling, terra cotta floor, and a curved counter with two New York license plates hanging over the pass. There's a wooden bench and a couple of chairs, a chalkboard listing weeknight specials that come with two garlic knots and a salad, a five-dollar minimum on cards, and a small plaque over the doorway about kindness being the one thing you give away and usually get back. You can see the deck ovens and the sheet-pan racks from where you order. That's the whole show.

Jay's suggestion for the wait: walk next door to the Edgewood Tavern and have a drink. He'll bring the pizza over when it's done if you ask. I did not need to be told twice, but I told him I’d come grab the pizzas myself. He called while I was there and said “done in about 15 minutes.”

The Food

I ordered three larges: pepperoni, the Noce, and the Mattie Deluxe, which Jay recommended as being extremely popular. The Noce is sausage, banana pepper, and onion, finished off with a dash of Romano, black pepper, and oregano. The Mattie is pepperoni, sausage, mushroom, onion, and green pepper.

Start with the crust, because that's the whole argument. This is a foldable crust. If you want a slice that stands out horizontal when you grab it by the edge, you've got the wrong shop. It's a light crunch off the char, and it isn't the kind you bite straight through. This is a grab-with-your-teeth-and-pull-slightly crust, which is exactly what I expected and exactly what I got. It's incredibly good.

Check out the pictures. We couldn't wait. The boxes smelled so good coming out of the oven that we dug in on the drive home. Here's what I noticed while I was eating a slice and steering: zero grease on my fingers. None. What little there could have been got absorbed into the dusting of flour on the bottom of the crust.

Eat it fresh. This is good pizza warmed up but that crust right out of the oven or shortly thereafter is where it's best.

I didn't notice the sauce, and I mean that as a compliment. On a New York pie the sauce is supposed to stay thin under the cheese and get out of the way, and this one did. If it had been sweet or heavy, I'd have caught it on the first bite.

Toppings were done right and not piled on in excess. Both specialty pies were balanced, the sausage sliced rather than crumbled, the mushrooms and onions cooked down properly, the banana pepper rings whole.

I liked all three. But the one I'd point to is the pepperoni, and I say that as someone who loves banana peppers and sausage and had a pie built for him sitting in the same stack. I've been eating a lot of pizza lately, and what separates a pizzeria is whether it can do the simple thing very well. A pepperoni pie has nowhere to hide. It's crust, sauce, cheese, and one fatty topping that either sits clean or slicks everything. This one sat clean.

The Bottom Line

I went a little out of my way to try Noce's, and I will certainly get it again. For a pizza place, that's praise. Worth a Short Detour for sure.