FOOD: Martina [NYC]

[caption id="attachment_93380" align="alignnone" width="506"] Photo from Grub Street[/caption]

I love pizza. I can't get enough of it. So when I heard a new fast-casual pizza spot, Martina, was coming to the East Village I was very excited and couldn't wait to go.

Fast-casual is such a lovely concept. Sometimes you don't want to cook (me, all the time) and ordering in gets old but you don't want to sit around at a restaurant for two hours. Sometimes you do, and that's great! But when you just want good food fast, this is the way to go.

My beloved Motorino order is the mushroom pizza. It's incredible but at $18 it's a bit pricey to do all the time. Not to mention it's quite filling. So when I saw that Martina had a mushroom pizza that looked very similar for $9, I had to go with that. It comes with onions but I chose to leave those off because it honestly looked like a lot, but if you're into onions, leave them on there.

I was pleasantly surprised at how filling and similar this pizza was to Motorino! Granted, the crusts are totally different, the pizza at Martina is super thin and crispy and much less filling, but the mushrooms tasted very close and now I can get my Motorino fix cheaper and faster (although nothing will replace Motorino to me!).

The ambiance on a Tuesday night at 9:30pm was quiet but not empty and the space is really open and bright. They had a really nice drink selection and everything is affordable and delicious. We started with the crochetta, which were awesome, but only came with two. I would have liked more, but for $4.50 I think that's ok.

All in all, Martina is an excellent addition to the East Village and the perfect place to have a quick meal that actually tastes good. I'm very impressed.

Martina
198 East 11th Street
New York, NY 10003