For October’s edition of Take it or Make it, we decided to honor yet another fallen holiday due to COVID: Halloween! Both reviews are of foods featuring pumpkin. Candice and Emma opted to make some pumpkin cupcakes, while Eva ordered a roasted pumpkin pizza from Pitfire Pizza.
Recipe of the Month: Pumpkin Cupcakes
For Emma and Candice’s video, click here.
Take-out Meal of the Month: Roasted Pumpkin Pizza
Pumpkin Pizza. It sounds weird, I know. With the domination of Pumpkin Spice Lattes and various pumpkin-spiced sugary treats, “pumpkin” and “savory” just don’t seem to fit together anymore. Pitfire Pizza’s Roasted Pumpkin Pizza changes that game.
Pitfire itself is a SoCal based chain, the closest location of which is on Westwood Boulevard. The menu has a few fan-favorites, like a Margarita, but boasts some off-the-wall combos like “The Burrata” (with Pesto, Caramelized Onion, Arugula and Hazelnuts) which distinguishes the restaurant from other normal pizza chains.
The restaurant space would be a perfect destination, if the world were normal. Unfortunately, the world sucks right now, so the only options to eat in-restaurant are very limited in terms of amount of people and setting. You can either choose from a two-person table in what is basically an alleyway or a more spacious table on the patio. Frankly, both options aren’t the best, so it is better to order your food and take it home, even if the food gets a little cold.
The menu, like I said before, is zany. It’s also ginormous. There is a kids menu, for all of those high school students who refuse to eat tomatoes but love red sauce and ketchup. A small, but hearty pasta section includes normal staples you can find anywhere. There are basic salads, sides, and the like. As the name suggests, the pizza section is where the diversity of the menu really shines. There are 12 different pizzas, eight of which are completely unique. The seasonal pizza tends to fit right in with the feel of the weather, and the fall pizza is no different.
The Roasted Pumpkin is really something. In a good way. Six slices of perfectly chewy dough, topped with crispy greens, pepitas, goat cheese, and (of course) chunks of roasted pumpkin. Despite the strange-sounding ingredients, the flavors blend together perfectly. The creaminess of the goat cheese balances out the slight bitterness of the greens. Pepitas, normally too hard and crunchy to be on a pizza, fit very well with the overall flavor profile of the dish.
Only one drawback, and it’s a doozy: the pumpkin. While it made the pizza look pretty and balanced the overall color scheme, what was supposed to be the main centerpiece of the dish fell short. The pumpkin itself was damp and lacked flavor, which was a real bummer. I would have really loved to taste some of the charred flavor you normally get when roasting veggies, but it seemed boiled rather than roasted. The least they could have done was season the pumpkin more, if at all.
Despite the frankly strange drawbacks, Pitfire’s menu leaves much more to be explored. I can definitely see myself ordering from here again. I just don’t think I’ll opt for a pizza with gourds on it.
You can visit Pitfire Pizza at 2018 Westwood Blvd.
