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Pizza Vinoteca, Grilled Pizza and Wines By The Glass on N. Glebe Road and Wilson Blvd. in Ballston - Closed


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Today, Dec. 12 and tomorrow, Dec 13, PV is open only for dinner. It is closed on Sunday, Dec. 14.

Starting Monday, it is open from 11am-past my bed time (I stopped listening).

I haven't been yet, but give me a few days.  Their claim to fame is 36 wines by the glass for under $10.

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IN the freezing cold, I dragged 5 of my neighbors to PV for a little happy hour, hoping to be dazzled but the dazzling will have to wait.  I enjoyed the wine I selected  as well as  the meatball appitizzer.  The warm olives were warm and plentiful.  While the arugula salad was sizeable, the beat salad was iminiscule, if not pretty; both tastety.  I did not try the flatbread in that I ate my lifetime supply of pizza in the 1990s.

I should also correct the record on wine. While all of them are under 10, I don't think they had 30+ on offer but I could be wrong.

The service was odd. We had a delightful young woman as a server but I would bet money that she had never, ever been a server before in her life; ever.

This place just opened less than a  month ago.  I am pro wine bars and muscle bar needs some competion so let's hope PV can be it.

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the beat salad was iminiscule

I am hard pressed not to imagine little bits of Allan Ginsberg, Lawrence Ferlinghetti and Neal & Carolyn Cassady with Green Goddess dressing on top of them.  Ain't sleep deprivation grand?

Coming from one so spelling challenged, this is just a comment on the imagery and not an accusation about spelling.  I am necessarily of the school of thought that spelling and grammar change we we introduce new usages.  

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I am spelling challenged, which is a huge embarrassment due to my overeducated state. The upside is that I have a pretty good vocabulary b/c if I can't spell something, I often have to come up with a synonym on the fly.    

Sometimes DR spell checks as I type and sometimes it doesn't.  Maybe it's the browser. 

I am also sleep deprived and I blame my staying up late kid 1 and my waking up early kid 2.

I have a choice right now: alter my post to correct my spelling thus making you look crazy, or leave it.  Hum"¦which takes less energy.

Off to Rus Uz tonight I think.  Let's see what a disservice I can do to that establishment in my review.  

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I am hard pressed not to imagine little bits of Allan Ginsberg, Lawrence Ferlinghetti and Neal & Carolyn Cassady with Green Goddess dressing on top of them.  Ain't sleep deprivation grand?

Coming from one so spelling challenged, this is just a comment on the imagery and not an accusation about spelling.  I am necessarily of the school of thought that spelling and grammar change we we introduce new usages.  

I'm thinking a Beat Salad would be intoxicating :P .  Perhaps one could find it on a menu in Boulder...

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I'm upgrading Pizza Vinoteca to Italic.

I didn't feel like venturing out to lunch today, so I ordered delivery through GrubHub, ordering a House Pizza (a bargain at $8) with tomato, fontina, mozzarella, and basil and a Tarte Flambée ($12) with crème fraí®che, fromage blanc, bacon, and onion. Both pizzas were delicious, grilled, and reminded me of the old Pizza Zero in Bethesda (Argentine).

Even more of a bargain: Pizza Vinoteca has 1/2-price pizzas at the bar for happy hour, Mon-Fri, 4-7PM. Assuming they're all available, this House Pizza for $4 would be ridiculous.

The restaurant offers 36 wines by the glass all for $10 or less every day (and they have drink specials during happy hour which I suspect include wine).

When you order, you'll get a coupon good for $5 off your first online order of $10 or more (to be used at Pizza Vinoteca) through GrubHub (which will actually be your second order, since you have to order once to get the coupon). I'd give you my discount code, but I worry that would be ripping off the restaurant. The coupon is supposed to only be good for your first GrubHub order, so theoretically I can't use it - why would they give it to me then? I'm sure it will be fine. (*)

Pupatella has nothing to worry about, but Pizza Vinoteca poses a challenge to Willow's flatbreads. I still give Willow the nod, but for delivery? This is by far the best delivery pizza I've found in the area.

One suggestion to Pizza Vinoteca: There's a fine line between having really nice delivery boxes (and yours are really nice!) and being environmentally conscious. While these boxes are both novel and very attractive, you might want to reconsider them once you get established (after you've hooked the fish, there's no need to keep fishing). This is a tough situation for restaurants, because you want to put your product in something decent (just like serving wine in a crystal decanter), so I understand the push-and-pull here.

(*) Note: It didn't work. I guess they have these things pre-stapled onto their take-out menus, and don't bother to take them off for GrubHub. If anyone wants the code, just email me - it's only good for the first time you order from Pizza Vinoteca, and I assume they want people to use it, or they wouldn't have it.

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Thanks for the recommendation Don!  I'd tried visiting Pizza Vinoteca before, but I couldn't find street parking so I gave up.  After having worked at home these past 2 snowy days, I was raring to get out of the house for happy hour.  I saw your post and went!

For happy hour, they had 3 kinds of wines by the glass for $5 each plus half price pizzas.  Among other things, I got the nduja meatball pizza with kale pesto, fontina, and tomato sauce (it was less than $5 at happy hour - cheap!).  I'd put both meatball and pizza in quotes.  The "meatball" was flat dollops of nduja (spreadable sausage), and the flatbread crust was crispy/chewy and surprisingly flavorful.  This is one of my new favorite happy hour spots.

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I will definitely give this place a try being a pizza lover and it being walking distance from my house.  I noticed a groupon but it didn't look like I could spend $40 for 2 people on just non-alcohol items so I'll go without the coupon.  I do enjoy Willow flatbread and is my benchmark for flatbreads.  If you want a really bad, bad flatbread, try the Margarita flatbread at Brio in Tyson's Corner.  Sliced winter tomatoes, non-melted mozzarella, tiny slivers of tasteless basil on top of what feels like matzo.

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We went Saturday night.  I wasn't that crazy about the pizza.  The crust wasn't horrible - a bit soggy, but the so-called "fresh roasted" mushrooms were rubbery and tasteless.  Plus it was a premium $4 topping.  I also didn't like the parmesan/romano they sprinkled on it.  I hate romano and will tell them to leave it off if I ever have pizza here again.  We did enjoy the eggplant parm and meatballs.  Myhusband liked the Caesar salad.  He thought the lasagna was so-so and I had a taste and thought it was too bland.  We also enjoyed the varieties of wine by the glass. My donut was also disappointing.   It was a small filled donut with tons of granulated sugar around it.  I guess for $2 it was okay.  Bottom line:  we will go back but probably not for pizza.   I don't think Willow has anything to worry about regarding flatbread competition.

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I went last weekend.  We got the Amazon local coupon and it made it a very good deal.  The food wasn't travel to the destination worthy, but it will definitely stay in my neighborhood rotation for a few reasons: one the alcohol prices were not through the roof for anything so it is a place you can go for a drink with a friend and not break the bank, it is always nice to have a place I can go with friends that don't eat out an a level that I do in terms of spending priorities.  Also I had the jowciale (sp?) pizza and it was really tasty.  I don't think it is the perfect flatbread crust, but I loved the flavor combinations, it was spicy I would say on the two-three pepper level.  And I am a big fan of spicy.  The caesar salad wasn't the best version I have ever had, but it certainly wasn't the worst, it was just basic, but a good portion for the price.  MK had a arugula salad that again was basic but good.  And the food prices made it a reasonable go grab a quick dinner type of place, unlike Rustico, Kapnos, Mussel Bar, etc.  I think every neighborhood needs a balance.  The service was very good, the only thing I didn't like is that when I used my coupon from amazon which had a qr code for the phone that they had to take my phone.  But in general I wish the US would switch to credit card processing systems like Europe where they do it at the table.  If you have an Amazon account, it's definitely worth getting the deal.  I would definitely go back, but it isn't a rush back type of place.  

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I went last weekend.  We got the Amazon local coupon and it made it a very good deal.  The food wasn't travel to the destination worthy, but it will definitely stay in my neighborhood rotation for a few reasons: one the alcohol prices were not through the roof for anything so it is a place you can go for a drink with a friend and not break the bank, it is always nice to have a place I can go with friends that don't eat out an a level that I do in terms of spending priorities.  Also I had the jowciale (sp?) pizza and it was really tasty.  I don't think it is the perfect flatbread crust, but I loved the flavor combinations, it was spicy I would say on the two-three pepper level.  And I am a big fan of spicy.  The caesar salad wasn't the best version I have ever had, but it certainly wasn't the worst, it was just basic, but a good portion for the price.  MK had a arugula salad that again was basic but good.  And the food prices made it a reasonable go grab a quick dinner type of place, unlike Rustico, Kapnos, Mussel Bar, etc.  I think every neighborhood needs a balance.  The service was very good, the only thing I didn't like is that when I used my coupon from amazon which had a qr code for the phone that they had to take my phone.  But in general I wish the US would switch to credit card processing systems like Europe where they do it at the table.  If you have an Amazon account, it's definitely worth getting the deal.  I would definitely go back, but it isn't a rush back type of place.  

Free delivery at GrubHub! The basic $8 is good, and the Mexican Bomboloni hit the spot (freshly made cinnamon-coated and dark chocolate-filled yeast donut holes).

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Wow that was fast. It's partly my fault. I didn't return after that first visit.  I just wasn't that into my first experience.  SER, on the other hand, brings me back.  Same is true for those neighbors mentioned in the above post. I think it might be more than parking.

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Every time I drove by, I wondered if the lack of parking would kill this place, and I suspect it did.

6 months.  That is a terribly short time, and expensive.  I like reading the comments on arlnow from the link above.  While there are the typical "snarky comments" there were various insights including some about the lack of easily viewable and accessible parking and some others about other restaurants in Ballston that are either having problems or might have problems.

Well I think to only have last 6 months, they had to have been under capitalized.  But that is just a guess.  

Man, that could be.   and/or they realized they were doing poorly and didn't have an idea in hell in how to change things around.

Now as a resident of North Arlington I didn't get over there.   Among the ArlNow comments  people noted that that part of North Arlington doesn't have a lot of foot traffic.  I've noticed that.  As an old retail person ....a business looking at an urban location should stand there at lunch and dinner and count foot traffic.   In a suburb you should do the same type of thing at a shopping center--> count cars.  That worked decades ago, it works now.  Compare sites.

If I were comparing sites in Ballston and I looked at that block and looked at some other blocks and the difference in walk around at the lunch period was 50 people in that neck of the woods and 400 people in a comparable area...I wouldn't lease it.  Or if there were 300 people a block away and they all turned in the other direction, my task is to get those people to turn in my direction.  I'd do the same type thing at dinner.

A second comment was one I think is sorely missed by a lot of restaurants today.   Paper and hand out flyers in the huge population center around a business.  Its astounding how many people living in a neighborhood don't know or ever see certain restaurants.  That is easily and always a first source of business.  One traditional trick for businesses when they open is to paper an area with flyers, both the business district (which is big in Ballston) and the neighborhoods.  Offer a discount in the first few weeks.  Run it into your pro forma.  Have the staff and team up to speed before you do that, so service will be sharp.   It is infinitely more cost effective to promote via discounts this way than through a web deal/wherein you pay a BIG split to the Groupons and every other deal offerer on the web.

Finally within North Arlington along the Rosslyn to Ballston corridor, the tremendous way to gain visibility among hundreds of competitors is to continuously every 3-6 months paper the high rises.  Its an area with tremendous turnover.  A food operator needs to continuously create a way to refresh their visibility in front of new residents.

But only 6 months.  Oh Geez.  That is sad.

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I think Dave has a point.  Act like you are running for office.  Walk around, meet people.  Hand me a free drink coupon and I will show, with coupon, and friends. My whole neighborhood can walk there and did we ever receive "paper" from them? No.

I lost a cat once and found that cat based on a flyer on a poll on that bike path that my neighbors would use to walk to Vinoteca.  Flyer that.  It might piss of some, but get the attention of others.

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The foot traffic issue makes me wonder though how Mussel Bar and PF Changs do.  I assume Changs does a huge amount of take out.  Mussel Bar seems to always be booked on weekends, and somewhat popular on weeknights too.  It would be interesting to know.  I have never been to the Buffalo Wild Wings or Green Turtle there, but that was more about food choices.  They did do some flyers, we got one and it had some deals, but we live really close by.  

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