Our new favorite pizza in Shanghai is named Alex

Way back in '04, when we were young(ish) and brazen, we declared that Da Marco on Yandang Lu had the best pizza in Shanghai. "I’ve never been so sure of anything in my life," is what we said. It was easier to be so sure-minded about pizza back then, because there were very few reasonable options Shanghai. Are there more now? We think so. But perhaps, after nearly six years, our definition of "reasonable pizza" has changed a bit.

Da Marco may very well still have the best pizza in Shanghai, but our favorite Da Marco location doesn't exist anymore and, as far as we know, they have never delivered. When we go out to eat, we rarely order pizza — it's more of a staying-home-with-a-DVD option for us.

But anyway, you don't care about that. What we're here to tell you today is that, after several years of painstaking research, we have found a pizza place in Shanghai that we like, quite a bit. And yes, they deliver. The name?

Alexander Pizza Fabbrica

We found this place in an unlikely source: Sherpa's-clone Mealbay, which we kind of poked fun at when it launched in 2006. We really don't know much about Alexander Pizza Fabbrica (Mealbay actually calls it "Alex Pizza Fabbrica" — this Chinese site calls it "Alexander"), and there is precious little about it on Google. But we do know we like their pizza better than any other we've ever had delivered to our home in Shanghai.

You can see the menu here. Twelve-inch pizzas start at RMB 43 for the Margherita (pictured, homemade tomato sauce, mozzarella, fresh basil). Our personal favorite is the RMB 58 Capricciosa (homemade tomato sauce, mozzarella, cooked ham, mushroom, artichokes), but we swap out the cooked ham for either arugula or garlic. We have ordered several times, and the quality is consistent (the delivery is also consistently on the slow side). The crust is pretty much how we like it: thin but not so thin that it is crunchy. The crust will sometimes bubble up like good pizza crusts often do, and there's usually some flour left powdered on the bottom, which for some reason we find comforting. The toppings are always fresh and tasty.

According to Mealbay, Alexander Pizza Fabbrica is located at 757 Jiaozhou Lu near Yuuyao Lu, 胶州路757号(近余姚路), in Jing'an District. Has anyone been? Here's a map. Their phone number is 52567233. Mealbay can be reached at 51580168.

Give it a try and let us know what you think. And we're always keen to hear other suggestions — we're more open minded now than we were in 2004 (about pizza, that is).

Read the complete post at http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/shanghaiist/~3/248534153/our_new_favorit_2.php