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Wednesday, June 17, 2009

Starvin' Marvin's, Lake Avenue

At any given time, some local pizza chains are expanding, and some are shrinking. One of the expanding ones right now seems to be Starvin' Marvin's, which has locations on Lake Ave., Culver Rd. near Sea Breeze, and in the Village of Webster, with another one in the works for Brockport. (Brockport has seen another pizzeria, Avanti, opening recently, and already has a pretty good NY-style pizzeria, Main Street, so I need to get out there soon. Gotta love college towns for pizza.)
I tried the Lake Ave. location, which is not far from downtown Rochester. The only lunchtime slices available were plain cheese and pepperoni. I tried the pepperoni. They were not "huge" slices, but you can get two with a 20 oz. bottle of pop for about $4.30 with tax.
The pizza had clearly been cooked on a screen, and had a uniformly brown, slightly greasy underside. It was pretty soft, with no "crunch" on biting into it, except at the edge. The slice was medium thin, with a chewy texture and not much breadiness, except, again, along the outer edge.
The sauce had a mild flavor, with some specks of herbs here and there, and the mozzarella was applied moderately, in good balance with the other components. The wide-and-thin pepperoni had just a bit of crispness.
Although the slices at Starvin' Marvin's aren't huge, the menu is. They offer wings, calzones, subs (referred to on the menu as "hoagies," a term I haven't seen in a while), salads, pasta, fried seafood, wraps, sides, "plates" and desserts.
As I'm eating and thinking about a pizza, oftentimes a word or phrase comes to mind. This time it was "middle of the road." There was nothing wrong with this pizza, but it wasn't really distinctive or outstanding in any way either. The crust was OK, but not crisp enough for me, and the other components were in balance with the crust, but the pizza had a certain generic quality to it. If I'm jonesin' for pizza, this would do just fine. But I doubt that I would ever feel a particular craving for Starvin' Marvin's. So given my criteria, I almost have to give it a C (average) grade, but for offering "normal" size slices and the friendly counter service, I'll bump it up to a C+.
Starvin' Marvin's, 534 Lake Ave. 458-MARV (6278)
Update: Starvin' Marvin's is apparently now known as Marvin Mozzeroni's. (8/3/09)

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