Zen Asian in Lawrenceville is a pretty standard Chinese restaurant with average food. The best parts about this restaurant are the large portion sizes and that they deliver – let's face it, sometimes you just crave a massive Chinese takeout feast.
After buying the house we were renting on our defacto “moving day,” we wanted just that.
Grandma B's is a down home diner located in Pittsburgh's Hill District. Like most greasy spoons, this spot doesn't look like much on the outside. But don't let that fool you – inside is a huge well-seasoned griddle cooking up a menu full of classic diner plates.
On top of all that, the staff are as friendly and delightful as they come.
It isn't necessarily easy to find good tacos in Pittsburgh, so when we heard about Doce Taqueria on Carson St. in South Side we knew we had to check it out.
We jumped into this short order spot with anticipation and were, sadly, fairly let down!
Doughboy's Pizza is a popular Pittsburgh pizza spot located in McKee's Rock on the southern shore of the Ohio River.
After having this one recommended to us several times we decided to put an order in during a recent visit to the Rocks to see what goes into their pies.
When it comes to Giovanni's Pizza in Pittsburgh, we have to take a step back and make an important distinction: there are actually several Giovanni's in the region.
In fact, there are three very close by- two in downtown proper and one in Dormont, and they all appear to be independent of each other.
So it should be no surprise that when we ordered our pizza from Giovanni's, we assumed we were getting it from one when it in fact came from another. Oops.
As it turns out, we ordered from the Dormont Giovanni's which boasts that it is home to a winner of “Pittsburgh's best pizza” and “famous” bread twists- two claims we wanted to find out about first hand.
Barb's Corner Kitchen has been around for years in Lawrenceville, serving up a mix of homestyle and diner food like grilled sandwiches, pastas, and wings.
But given their early morning to mid afternoon hours (and limited late night hours on weekends), perhaps what they're most known for is their breakfast food- consisting of omelettes, eggs benedicts, waffles, pancakes, and more, all served up in a very eclectic diner-style atmosphere.
We heard many good things about Barb's from friends, and most had fond memories of eating there back when there really weren't that many other dining options in Lawrenceville. So we visited this one with a fair bit of excitement as we continue our quest to find Pittsburgh's best breakfast spots.
Maybe we were just there on an off day, or maybe we had one truly awful waiter, but we felt the quality and service was lacking a fair bit and we cannot let it go unsaid.
If we made a list of all of the foods we could eat day in, day out and not get sick of, tacos would be high on our list. In fact, when we spent about four weeks in Mexico I ate well over 100 Mexican tacos on my own in addition to a plethora of other delicious and local foods- much to my stomach's delight.
If I saw a street cart serving tacos I would order at least one, if not three, even if I had just ate a meal. It was kind of like that.
In Pittsburgh, the topic of authentic Mexican fare is a hotly contested debate. Some will tell you our Mexican cuisine is terrible. Others will argue we have great Mexican but will pull out many examples that are, sadly, not Mexican. We have mixed thoughts on the topic, but generally think that you can find good Mexican fare in the city if you look hard enough.
Our quest for the best tacos in Pittsburgh is not that. While we will say that most all of the best tacos are authentic Mexican, we do recognize that you can make a stellar taco without it being traditional in the slightest.
In this quest, we want to find some of the city's best. Are they good because they're authentic? Are they good because they're unusual? Are they so cheap they command attention? Or are they simply good and we need not say anything else? All of these are on our radar and can be called a “good taco.”
Note: In the past, our quest style articles organized tacos in various categories from below average to excellent. Since then, we have decided to remove any category style tier. That said, tacos in this article loosely ordered by increasing preference in this article. So if you want to see our very favorites, scroll to the end!
Johnny's Diner is a classic diner in the West End with a no-frills menu that includes breakfast and lunch staples from the griddle like pancakes, omelets, and sandwiches.
Royal Myanmar in West View is one of the only places we know of in the city to get traditional Burmese food. As we had never had Burmese food before eating here, we can say that this place is a great introduction to the cuisine.
The restaurant itself is a tiny hole-in-the-wall type place where service is friendly and everyone knows the regulars – it's almost like what I would imagine a Burmese diner to be like.
Pittsburgh's barbecue scene is often considered to be lacking among other similarly sized cities. We have many joints in the region serving up barbecue, but little to none of them have the fanfare and almost cult-like following like you see in other spots around the country.
That is, except for Two Brothers BBQ in Presto, PA.