Recently I was watching the Travel Channel’s Top 10 series on the funnest places to visit in the United States. Basically the idea of the show is to showcase the top 10 places to pig out or top 10 fun restaurants, factories and amusement parks to visit here in America. I was really impressed with the top 10 list of best places to pig out and decided this got me thinking that maybe more research should be done on these places. Some of the places are institutions in major cities and you might not know these gems are in your own back yard.
I had to ask, what makes them stand out from the rest of the places around the country. Read on and you will soon see why you might want to give these places a 1st chance or even a 100th chance.
We are going to start this review with Pointers Pizza.
Pointers Pizza has been a Saint Louis, Missouri area institution since 1991. The atmosphere here is very family friendly and you will find a lot of college kids hanging out here. Some for the great food and some for a reason I will mention shortly. The dress code at Pointers is whatever makes you comfortable, the owners started the business to make you feel at home in a friendly, family business atmosphere.
Pointers is actually located in Richmond Heights, Missouri which is about 20 minutes outside Saint Louis. The restaurant is located at 1023 South Big Bend Blvd. which is just a short distance from the corner of Clayton Rd and South Big Bend Blvd. It’s pretty easy to spot being that it’s across the street from a large Office Depot and will be on your left hand side.
Their menu includes many classic Italian dishes such as baked ravioli’s, spaghetti and meat balls, pizza and other inexpensive dishes made with a home made touch. They also have sandwiches, salads, wings and much more on their menu. Pointers will even make you a box lunch with a sandwich of your choice, chips and a drink for $5 if it is a half sandwich and $7 if it is a whole sandwich. The hand-topped pizza at Pointers is quite good. It’s well-seasoned and comes with a choice of thick, thin or regular crusts, it’s prepared to hold plenty of toppings and flavorful in and of itself. Alfredo sauce and ranch dressing are available as substitutes for tomato sauce if a customer wants something a bit different.
But here’s the kicker, Pointers is more then just another pizza joint, Pointers is the home of the Pointersaurus which is a 28″ pizza cut into squares. This pizza is more then just a favorite with the college kids, it is a legend in the Saint Louis area. And, if you are bold enough, you could win a cool $500 just for attempting to eat an entire Pointersaurus. The contest works like this, if you and a partner (You can only have 1 other person do the challenge with you) can eat the entire pizza in 1 hour while in the restaurant you get the pizza for free and the owner of the place will give you $500.
The pizza itself starts off with 4 pounds of dough, hand tossed. Then 36 ounces of pizza sauce is added and an additional 2 pounds of mozzarella cheese. Then they add 2 pounds of Hormel pepperoni and 2 pounds of sausage. When the pizza is done it weighs just over 11 pounds. This pizza is a monster and rather heavy, but a great idea if you are in the area and hosting a party. Anyone attempting the challenge should call ahead as you need to reserve the time to attempt the challenge 1 day in advance.
Several teams have won the challenge, one winner was a Quarter back at the University of Missouri and sipped on Vegetable Oil to help get the pizza to slide down and get it out as fast as possible. The owner could care less how you get it down as long as you finish the whole thing in the time allowed. If the contest doesn’t sound like your thing though you can still buy the pizza for $33.61 and add $4.00 for each additional topping.
Pointers takes cooking Italian food seriously and it shows with the awards they have won for culinary excellence in Saint Louis. They have also been a top restaurant pick with the Saint Louis Today newspaper. If you’re in the area stop by Pointers, if for nothing else you can cheer on another Pointersaurus contestant.
