Looking for Mr. Goodpizza: The Post

By Robin Garr
LouisvilleHotBytes.com

I love pizza. You know that. I consider it one of nature’s most perfect foods, a balanced and nutritious blend of fat, protein, and mmm, mmm. carbs in a delicious meal on a plate that you can eat with your fingers or, if you must, knife and fork.

I’m so fond of this treat from Naples by way of New York City, widely modified across the United States and made indisputably our own, that I could review it every week if only my editors would let me.

But lately, it seems, I’ve been striking out on pizza just often enough to make me wonder if my tastes are changing or if pizza is.

I’m feeling the need to ingest some really good pizza to restore my faith in humankind. So this week we headed over to The Post in Germantown, a place widely celebrated as one of Louisville’s best.

The Post gets its name from its location in an old Germantown shotgun house that was long home to Lone Wolf Post #5636 of the Veterans of Foreign Wars. The vets’ heritage remains in a large 48-star American flag respectfully hung on a back wall and in a stylized wing-and-star logo that one imagines might have once adorned a World War II aircraft.

The Post’s menu puts pizza up front and center, as it should. You can buy by the oversize slice, New York City style, at $5 for a giant cheese slice, pepperoni slice, or the slice of the day.

You can make it easy with a dozen pre-designed combinations in 12-inch, 16-inch, and 20-inch sizes, priced from $10 (for a small Lone Wolf pie with pepperoni, sausage, ham, bacon, and more) to $39 (for the 20-inch, veggie-loaded Victory Garden). This selection ranges from the familiar (The Italian Campaign, a standard Margherita pizza) to the offbeat (The Chicken Dinner, with chicken, bacon, cheddar and blue cheese with buffalo or barbecue sauce). ??If none of those ring your chimes, you’re welcome to build your own, from plain cheese to your pick among 30 toppings ($12, $18, or $23 for the base pie, plus $2, $3, or $4 per topping choice).

In addition to pizza, seven hot sub sandwiches are all $10 for a half-size sandwich or $18 for the full deal on a 10-inch baguette. Calzones are $12 for mozzarella and ricotta filling plus $2 each for any of the pizza toppings. Full bar service offers liquor, wine, and an impressive list of 15 regional craft beers plus, er, Coors.

We dropped in on a Saturday and found this popular place packed. Service was quick and friendly, though, with the reasonable admonition that you should expect at least a 30-minute wait for your order, “as our pizzas are proudly bandcrafted and made to order.”

Salads here are very good, and you can make a meal with your choice of any of the five large models, which come on plates the size of hub caps and range in price from $10 to $14.

Side salads rarely earn high accolades, but the Caesar (left) and house salads at The Post are exceptional, from the fresh spinach leaves to crisp, airy croutons.

We went with the two salads available in smaller (but still generous) sizes for $7: A house salad and a caesar. The two looked so much alike that I wondered for a second if they had accidentally given us both the same salads: A pile of bright green, fresh baby spinach and field lettuces topped with shredded cheese and a few croutons, dressing in a small tub on the side.

On closer inspection, though, the caesar was loaded with a large amount of small, salty black olives that the house salad lacked, and it came with a tangy, creamy caesar-style dressing. The house salad added tomato bits and choice of dressing; the blue cheese was just right. Both salads included a few really delicious croutons, light, scented with garlicky oil, and impressively crunchy. And, happily, the greens were perfectly fresh, with none of the unappetizing blackened and slimy bits that too often creep into restaurant salads. Two thumbs up.

The slice of the day ($5) was a tasty treat, a foldable, NYC-style triangle cut from a 20-inch pie, topped with eight hefty chunks of spicy sausage, rounds of crisp pickled banana peppers, and dabs of feta on a discreet spread of tangy tomato sauce and mozzarella. The crust was thin and crisp with dark heat spots dotting the breadlike edge.

The White Flag, one of The Post's dozen standard pies, is an appetizing Mediterranean-style mix of red onion, spinach, and roasted red pepper on a garlic olive oil base, dotted with bites of ricotta and snipped fresh basil. — The White Flag, one of The Post’s dozen standard pies, is an appetizing Mediterranean-style mix of red onion, spinach, and roasted red pepper on a garlic olive oil base, dotted with bites of ricotta and snipped fresh basil.

A whole 10-inch pizza, the White Flag ($17) murmured scents of the Mediterranean with spinach, roasted red pepper, and red onions on a garlic olive oil base dotted with bites of ricotta and snipped fresh basil. The crust was very thin and crackery, and the toppings extended almost all the way to the edge. It was a very good pizza, and I was able to restrain myself sufficiently to save a few slices to take home for another day.

A hearty pizza meal for two, with salads to make it healthy, came to $38.16, plus a $9.54 tip.

The Post
1045 Goss Ave.
635-2020
thepostlouisville.com
facebook.com/louisvillepost
instagram.com/thepostlouisville

Noise Level: The rooms were packed on a Saturday, but thanks perhaps to its spacious layout and high raftered ceiling, conversation was possible. Sound levels averaged 73.1dB with peaks to 79.2dB.

Accessibility: Thanks to effective and extensive ramps, the old building appears fully accessible to wheelchair users and everyone.