Pizza Studio with Kirbie

As I approached C Street from 6th, the San Diego trolley trundled by...

and I thought of how I would soon be walking on the same street afterwards in search of a coffee shop, but I'm getting ahead of myself here.

I was on my way to have lunch with Kirbie at a new customizable pizza place downtown...

Having devoured my mini apple fritter from Donut Haven in my car, I ventured out into the actual world and made my way to Broadway, first passing by the obelisk near the Lyceum...

then headed out on Broadway near the historic Spreckels Theater.

A few doors away from Sushi Deli, and right next to the Spreckels Theater is one of San Diego's newest pizza places, Pizza Studio.

I remember getting a coupon for their grand opening, put it away then forgot about it. After lunch with Kirbie, I "found" the coupon again underneath a pile of papers and whadda ya know? It had expired already. Sad Lorax.

It was the height of the lunch hour and as I waited for Kirbie, I saw groups of people come and go in the restaurant.

Like Project Pie, Social Life Pizza, and Urban Pi, Pizza Studio offers customers the choice to customize their pies with unlimited toppings. The price point is pretty much the same, $7.99. The difference here is that there are five different types of crust to choose from, at Project Pie, there is only one kind of crust.

The lines moved pretty fast. There were actually two of them. The workers were very efficient and friendly.

I chose the Firecracker crust...

Because it was Friday, I didn't get any meat toppings (although I wanted to), so my pizza ended up being vegetarian.

My pizza is on the left; Kirbie's is on the right.

I had red sauce, mozzarella cheese, artichoke hearts, corn, red onions,sliced red peppers, broccolini, garlic, olives, and zucchini.

I really liked my crust - it wasn't too thin like Project Pie, or too hard like Social Life. It wasn't as spicy as I feared it to be either.

I really liked the different choices of vegetables as well. Very healthy. I chose not to have any "finishing touches" or "spices" added to it.

Kirbie tried the traditional crust with mozzarella and parmesan cheese, along with turkey and chicken sausage, brococolini, pesto, and chicken.  She also had Old Bay seasoning sprinkled on the top, but I couldn't really taste it.

The chicken bits were chopped kind of small and got dried out during the baking. If you don't get anything to drink, your pizza will be $8.63 ($7.99 + tax). Not bad especially with all of the toppings here.

Wait a minute, how do I know? Well, I uh, tasted it and as you can surmise, the Lord did not strike me down with lightning or hell fire for "tasting" a tiny bit of meat on a Lenten Friday.

Here is Kirbie's original post which came out during Pizza Week:
March 2014 as well as her recent recap from our lunch!

Pizza Studio
121 Broadway
San Diego, CA 92101

pizzastudio.com

It was nice sharing a good meal with Kirbie as well as trading birthday gifts (which will be a separate post). We were able to snag a seat in the crowded restaurant, but managed to find a quieter spot outside in the Spreckels' lobby when we opened our gifts. There was a noticeable difference in the decibel level, so we will remember to sit there next time! I'd like to go back here with TC and Bert and try some different combinations of crusts and toppings...

Now, it was time to feed my coffee obsession at the aforementioned C St. There was a coffee place there located in an old historic building I wanted to check out...