Search pizza near me in New York and the results flatten a real distinction into one word. Square pizza in this city is at least three separate foods: the thin, garlicky grandma; the thick, airy Sicilian; and the Bensonhurst upside-down slice where the cheese goes down first and the sauce sits on top. They are made on different doughs, proofed for different lengths of time, and are good at completely different moments in the day. Knowing which one you are walking towards is most of the battle.
Karpo can tell you which square trays have come out of the oven near you in the last hour, because a grandma slice is a completely different thing cold.
Grandma, Sicilian and upside-down, actually explained
Grandma is the youngest of the three and the least fussy: a lightly proofed dough pressed into an oiled sheet pan, baked flat and fast, dressed with crushed tomato, garlic and basil. It is thin, crisp on the bottom and closer to focaccia than to a round pie. Sicilian is the opposite — a long proof, a tall open crumb, and enough structure to hold a heavy topping. The upside-down slice is a Brooklyn variant of the Sicilian in which mozzarella goes onto the dough first and a sweet cooked sauce goes on top with grated cheese, which keeps the crust from going soggy and gives the whole square a different balance. The three also stale at different speeds, which is why the same shop can be brilliant at 6pm and disappointing at 9.
L&B Spumoni Gardens, 2725 86th Street, Bensonhurst
The reference point for the upside-down square, and worth the trip precisely because almost nobody replicates it properly. The slice is thick and springy with a fried-tasting bottom from the oiled pan, sweet sauce on top, and a lot of grated cheese. It is a counter operation with an outdoor seating area, and the spumoni after is not optional. Bensonhurst is a long ride on the D or the N, so treat it as the destination rather than a stop — and expect a real queue in summer, when the ice cream side of the business doubles the crowd. Order a corner square if one is left; the double-crust edge is the best part of the tray and it goes first.
Prince Street Pizza, 27 Prince Street, SoHo
The pepperoni square that made the style famous again, with cupped pepperoni that chars into little bowls of fat, a thick crumb and a crisp base. It is genuinely good and it is also the single most-queued square in Manhattan, which changes the calculation: at 1pm on a Saturday you are buying forty minutes of standing. The trays come out on a cycle, so the useful question at the window is not what is available but what just came out — a square that has sat under a lamp for twenty minutes is a materially worse slice. Go on a weekday afternoon and the queue is a few minutes rather than half an hour, and the tray turnover is fast enough that you are almost guaranteed a fresh square.
Best Pizza, 33 Havemeyer Street, Williamsburg
A small wood-fired shop that has been the neighbourhood slice for well over a decade, with a grandma-style square that leans thin and garlicky rather than tall. This is the version to eat if you think you dislike square pizza — it is closer to a crisp flatbread than to a slab. The room is tiny, mostly standing, and the white slice is the one regulars order. Havemeyer Street puts it a short walk from both the L at Bedford and the J at Marcy, which makes it an easy add to a Williamsburg evening rather than a special trip. It keeps shorter hours than a late-night slice shop, so it is a plan-around-it rather than a fall-into-it address.
Williamsburg Pizza and the wide-tray shops
A category rather than a single address: shops that run several different squares at once — grandma, Sicilian, vodka, sometimes a seasonal tray — and let you compare them side by side at the counter. This is the best way to work out which of the three styles you actually want, and it costs about the price of a sandwich. The tell for a serious tray shop is whether the squares are stacked in the window at all: the good ones keep them on the counter, sell through, and bake again. Ask what is freshest rather than what is best; in a shop running four trays at once those are usually different answers, and the staff will tell you honestly because they want the old tray gone.
How to order a square so it is good
Ask for it reheated unless it came out in the last fifteen minutes — every square on this list is designed to be eaten hot and none of them survive the warming shelf gracefully. Grandma reheats best and fastest because it is thin. Sicilian takes longer and can go leathery if the oven is rushed. The upside-down slice is the one to eat where you buy it. And if a shop offers you a corner piece, take it — the double-crust edge is the whole reason the style exists.
Practical notes
Square slices cost more than a round plain almost everywhere, generally in the $5 to $8 range depending on the shop and the topping, and portions are heavier than they look — one square plus one round is a full meal. Trays come out on a cycle rather than continuously, so the best question at the counter is what just came out of the oven. Several of these shops are cash-friendly but card-capable; the outer-borough ones are the more likely to prefer cash. Weekend afternoons are peak everywhere, and prices and hours move, so check before a long trip.
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Ask Karpo first
Want to know which square just came out of the oven near you, and whether the line is worth it right now? Ask Karpo for the closest tray shops, the ones with a queue you can skip at this hour, and a walking order if you want to try more than one style.
