Il Lazzarone

My favorite place to eat in St. Joe! Great pizza and best atmosphere– nice but casual. I’ve heard they’ve also opened a location at the River Market in KC– a great up and coming area!

The pizza here is fantastic. I could eat just the crust and be satisfied. Their rotating selection of beers is sure to satisfy, and the overall menu has a lot of great options. The space itself is a great reclaimed commercial/​industrial venue with a rough hewn, open feel.

Took our four kids here. Excellent. Pizza very good. Also liked the kale salad. Service was first rate.

This is such a fun place with a great atmosphere. It is fun watching the chefs cook and watch the oven as it is all in the open. It is Neapolitan certified. It is authentic Italian pizza. Definitely have the server explain their menu. Their pizza oven was imported from Europe and, I believe, is the only one in the U.S. Ask them about it. Enjoy!

One of the best pizzas I’ve ever had. Full of flavor! Unique. The pizzas are Neapolitan style baked in an oven that was made in Naples, Italy. I ordered the La Rughetta and the server suggested to add shaved Parmesan; a blend of the of the Formaggio and Rughetta pizzas. It enhanced the flavor of the prosciutto.
The service was also great; very personal. The restaurant also has patio seating which was very nice with either table or high top options available.
I would definitely return if I’m ever in St Joseph again. Highly recommend it!

Stopped in for dinner while in town for a baseball tournament.
They accommodated 26 of us on the patio.
It was lovely.
We all enjoyed our selections.
As suggested, most of us ordered our own pizza and there were no leftovers!
There are so many delicious ways to order a stone oven pizza here. all of them looked delicious.
Everything is fresh and well presented.
Service was attentive to our large group.
Every appetizer and pizza ordered was enjoyed.
I always wanted to try an authentic stove oven pizza.
This place did not disappoint.
Recommended

Excellent, real pizza, Italian style. We bring the grandkids; they love watching the pizza being made.

So happy this place is in St. Joe! So Delish!
Today, my sis & I shared a few items. All were amazing, & worthy of ordering again!
We ordered 2 salads: Cavolo riccio & the foglie. The salads were loaded with fresh crisp greens, great cheese & veggies, nuts & delectable dressings. Success!
Then we moved on to Pizza Time. We wanted one red, one white. So, we went for For Supremo & La Rugetta. I seriously loved both.
I did a lot of food gawking while there, & every item coming out of the kitchen looked worthy of heading to my table:)
I can’t wait to go back!

Maybe it’s normal for brick oven pizza to be burnt. But if it is, it’s not for me. Every time we have gone it’s been blackened to the point of not being enjoyable. I love the atmosphere and think the owner has done a great job in coming up with a creative menu, but sadly, I can only give this three stars. I’m not willing to pay a pretty penny for great atmosphere but sub par pizza. Fix the burned pizza and I would without a doubt give it 5 stars.

Top quality pizza, great service, the complete package! Five plus plus stars! Extremely cool oven which cooks it very quickly and in a not-​your-​typical pizza style. Incredibly tasty salad as well as pizza. Not for someone looking for chain style pizza!

This place is very hip pizza place with phenomenal pies. Looks like a place that could be in Brooklyn NY not st joe MO. My pizza had some of the charcuterie on it but it was a lot saltier than expected or wanted. I had this funnel cake like dessert as recommended by our waitress but it was incredibly tasteless and disappointing. Sorry I dont remember the name of it, our waitress described and then I ordered it. It supposed to have mascarpone cheese on it but it was nowhere to be found.

Rivaled the pizza we got in NYC! Nutella pizza with strawberries was wonderful as well. We enjoyed the industrial feel and also enjoyed watching the pizzas being made. Great place to eat. Will definitely visit again when we’re back in town.

I was traveling on business and this place was highly recommended by some colleagues that live locally. They were not wrong. Love the ambiance of the place. It is like clean industrial. The aroma captured me as soon as I entered — which was 15 mins before close. The service was polite and fast and enthusiastic. I ordered the bruscetta and the pesto pizza. The bruschetta was a fabulous combination of tart and sweet– the only thing i wanted was another wedge of cooked dough to sop up the leftover balsamic vinegar. The Pesto pizza was just as delectable. It is food art which shows the care these folks take to create an appealing presentation. The dough was light and satisfying– pesto fabulous.
The sausage is a nice meaty touch and blends beautifully. Will definitely come back

This is my second time here and it most definitely will not be my last! I got the Crepa and my girlfriend got the Carne. She asked for it without tomato sauce, just the olive oil and mozzarella base, no problem at all. We both loved it and will be back again.
Some bites will be more charred than others, but that’s what Neapolitan pizza is. And if you look on their website, it will tell you that in advance!
I also think that they may have knocked the prices a couple bucks from the last time I was there. Either way, I think that the pizza is of good value for what you get!
You will not be disappointed if you make the trip here.

This was our third visit since Il Lazzarone opened in St. Joe. We haven’t been disappointed. In fact, I think it’s improving.
The first thing novice Napoletanos need to know is, this isn’t Pizza Hut or Papa John’s, and there’s no buffet. I was laughing with our server, Paul, about the customer that comes in occasionally and asks, «Whatcha mean you ain’t got no meat lovers?» Anyway, if you’re expecting American-​style-​half-​inch-​thick-​pasteurized-​tasteless-​shredded-​mozzerella-​with-​fourteen-​ingredients, you’d best look for Pizza Hut coupons in the Sunday paper and drive on past Il Lazzarone. However, if you like a uniquely styled and prepared pizza, like you’d find in Napoli, Il Lazzarone is there to educate and satisfy.
The first thing one must know is that not every pizzeria is allowed to hang an «Authentic Neapolitan Pizza» shingle and start selling pies. The Associazione Verace Pizza Napoletana is the official watchdog for promoting and preserving the authenticity of the product worldwide. There are only a handful of these pizzerias in any given locale. (Il Lazzarone has opened another on Delaware Street in KC’s River Market.) Look for the «Vera Pizza Napoletana» badge of honor in Il Lazzarone’s window. The basics are a thin crust made with specific flour, a «less is more» approach to ingredients (i.e. sauces, cheeses, veggies, meats), prepared in a specific way and cooked for a very short time (less than a minute) in a very hot (900+ degrees) oak-​wood fired brick oven. The results are amazing!
If you’re not familiar with Neapolitan pizza, just ask your server for recommendations. They’re knowledgeable and great ambassadors for the product and Il Lazzerone. I’ve ordered a different pizza each visit. This last time I opted for the rosso (red) style with ricotta and prosciutto. I’ll definitely order it again, once I’ve worked my way around the menu a tad more. My wife had the traditional margherita and liked it a lot. The problem I have is that the pizza is so good I always eat it all before I find the willpower to ask for a box and take half home.
Il Lazzarone offers a nice selection of appetizers and salads in ample portions. We found the kale, apple and walnut salads a nice starter for the pizza to come.
The beer and wine selections are pretty good. Lots of craft beer in bottles. Ask your server for the current draught offerings, since they change. Ditto wine pairing recommendations. Oh yeah, if PBR is your fave, they’ve got that, too.
Finally, I’ve got to tell you I’ve never been to Italy. I’ve eaten pizza in Germany and Cyprus but never Italy. I have, however, had the signature pizzas in NYC, Chicago and St. Louis. All good. I’ve ordered pizza in good Italian restaurants and pizzerias across America, and I’ve consumed vast quantities of chain pizza forever. I even make a pretty good pizza myself. But at this stage of my life, I’ve found Il Lazzarone to be a most delightful dining experience.
Godere!

Up in St. Joe from KC on business, and I was surprised to discover Il Lazzarone. The décor is modern industrial, but the exposed brick walls give the place character; it doesn’t feel like a Chipotle. Seemed surprisingly hip for St. Joe — I felt like I could have been in the Crossroads District.
Lots of appealing options on the menu made it hard to choose, which is a good problem. We ordered and loved the peche pizza and the delicious whole leaf basil caprese salad. I am already making plans to come back to Il Lazzarone for more crispy Neapolitan pizza the next time I am in town.

A gem. Surprised to see this place in St Joe’s. Real authentic pizzas, save the supreme and carne because a paisan wouldn’t put that much meat on a pie. Nice beer and wine selection too. My pizza had Brussels sprouts on it, first time I’ve rolled like dat.
Service was an over under, overly attentive, then awol. Bottled beer at $ 5 bottle seems a bit high for the area too.

Just perfect pizza.
The oven was over 1000 °F at the start of lunch. It took them 40 secinds to bake my pizza. Amazing!
The Carne (meats) pizza is what I had on this visit, but it would be hard to go wrong with any of them to be honest.
I had a side of Foglie salad which was very nice… but the pizza!

Their website claims: «The Association of Vera Pizza Napoletana hereby certifies this establishment to sell true, authentic pizza Napoletana», so we had high hopes that this was going to be a memorable experience. It was memorable all right, but not in a good way.
The place looks more like a burger or barbecue joint than a pizzeria, having brick walls, wood floors, and country music blaring over the speakers. Not much ambience. We arrived at 7pm and you could shoot a cannon through the place without hitting a soul. We were quickly seated.
Glasses of average wine, Sicilian Nero d’Avola for example, started at $ 8, so I decided to have a «tap» beer. The menu said «ask server for selections» and prices were listed as «MKT», so based on the prices of the wine, I did not think the beer would be reasonably priced. It was not. If you like spending $ 1 an ounce for beer, this is the place for you! A 6 ounce Boulevard IPA (yes, that is the amount of beer I was served in the photo) was $ 7 … $ 7 … that is more than $ 1 per ounce … MAMMA MIA!
I asked the server if the Caprese salad ($ 7) came with bread and she told me it did not. Nuff said, not ordering a Caprese, thank you very much. But then she insisted that the «brushetta» (it is spelled bruschetta and pronounced brew-​sket-​a) was «the same thing», tomatoes and bread, same thing. I insisted that bruschetta (also $ 7) is not the same thing as Caprese and bread, having lived in Italy for three-​and-​a-​half years, traveled extensively all over the country and married an Italian, but she would not be swayed. I guess we agreed to disagree because she walked off. I guess the customer is not always right, particularly at Il Lazzarone.
The pizzas come in red (with tomato sauce) and white (without), so my wife ordered the «funghi» (mushroom — which the waitress also mispronounced) and I the «carne» (meat — salame, sausage, and American pepperoni). The guys making the pizza in an authentic Neapolitan wood-​fired oven were pleasant and helpful, so I asked who was trained or certified in Naples (a requirement of The True Neapolitan Pizza Association — Associazione Verace Pizza Napoletana or AVPN — a designation they claim on their website, menu and walls). He told me that he was trained by his boss who received the certification. OK, close enough I guess.
Anyway, back to the pizza. My wife’s pizza ($ 10) looked decent enough, right size and so on, but just was not pizza napoletana (Neapolitan pizza). The crust was good, but drier and crunchier than any pizza napoletana I have ever had (and I have had many — in Naples) and there was not enough cheese or mushrooms. My wife was generally pleased, but not elated.
My pizza ($ 13.50) was smaller than my wife’s, closer twelve inches in diameter, also with not enough mozzarella or «meat» and with an odd taste NOT reminiscent of pizza napoletana. Real («vero» in Italian) pizza napoletana is made with very specific ingredients. Tomatoes from the Naples area with just the right color and acidity, for example, as well as specifically sourced olive oil, mozzarella, and wheat. The odd taste had to come from the tomatoes and I assume that they «seasoned» them, something that would NEVER be done in Naples. Crushed tomatoes and only tomatoes are the first ingredient added to pizza napolitana, no basil, no oregano, no garlic … nothing … tomatoes.
For the Midwest, the pizza was fair, but that is not saying much. The prices were twice what you would pay in Italy, even in Florence where everything costs an arm and a leg. A much better meal with two similar pizzas and a beer or half carafe of wine would cost around $ 16, less than half of the $ 33 plus tip we paid for this meal. Finally, the server should not have insisted that I was wrong about the Caprese and bruschetta. She could have also benefited from a larger tab (and a larger tip) by letting me have a Caprese salad and bringing me some damn bread. Caprese should not be eaten without a fork in one hand and a decent piece of bread in the other. Get a clue … give your customers some bread when warranted.
CombatCritic Gives Il Lazzarone 4 Bombs Out Of 10 … More Bombs Are Better!

So refreshing to have pizza that isn’t papa johns or Pizza Hut. The place looked a bit rustic and cool. We were there for lunch and it was dead. I could see how lunch time would be packed. It was us and another couple. It’s cool to see the cooks toss and flip the south as they prepare your food.
The music was a tad bit too loud for my liking but the staff were super friendly.
We ordered the garlic bread and two pizzas. One with red sauce and one without, the menu of pizzas is separated in these two categories. The garlic bread was different. It was a bit sweet but tasted really good. It was sliced up in little strips and looked and tasted nothing like your normal garlic bread. It was a little burnt.
The supremo pizza was good but also a little burnt. It reminded me of authentic pizza like how I would get in rome or London. The dough is hand tossed and tastes very fresh. The other pizza which I can’t remember the name of was also really good. Wasn’t burnt but I probably prefer the white sauce pizza over the red sauce pizza. Covered with rocket and topped with a salami.
Overall I would come back since I love how it reminded me of pizza from Italy. :)