I’d heard Morris Park, near the end of the Eastchester-Dyre 5 line, was sometimes called the Little Italy of the Bronx. Given that, there were certain things I expected to find there (pizzerias, Italian bakeries, cigar shops with young Sinatra’s mug shot blown up and displayed prominently), and I was not disappointed. When I spoke to a couple of Morris Park natives, they gave me some tips about the longstanding neighborhood favorites like Patricia’s (a classy Italian joint famous for its Spaghetti à la Frank Sinatra), Emilio’s (a pizza place that they assured me was “cheap but really good”), and Hawaii Sea (an Asian fusion restaurant where one of them had worked as a busboy when he was sixteen).

What I hadn’t anticipated was that the entire eastern side of the neighborhood would feel like an urban university campus because it was home to the Albert Einstein College of Medicine. Students are notoriously good at ferreting out good and inexpensive lunch spots, so I did some asking around. A young man of imposing size and thoughtful sincerity told me that “everybody” went to the pizza place named Coals. Several others had mentioned the same place, and when I walked past, the fragrant promise of copious amounts of garlic coaxed me inside.

This, perhaps, is a good time to address the problem of pizza snobbery that is rampant in New York. Continue reading →