Wood-fired pizza and more served in stylish surroundings with your choice of noise
Casual dining, inside or out, at Wood & Fire on Atlantic Avenue in western Delray Beach
There is a long page of menu choices for diners at the stylish, but casual Wood & Fire in Delray Beach. And there are two choices of noise: earsplitting music combined with the din of the crowd inside, or the roar of traffic on Atlantic Avenue punctuated by yapping dogs on the outside patio.
Sofas.low tables add to casual outside vibe
An industrial ceiling dominates the interior
During a recent visit, I chose the latter, where there’s a mix of regular patio tables and hard metal chairs, high tops and couches. The noise inside the industrial-look dining room – bare-bulb pendant lighting, candles, stacks of wood, and an industrial ceiling – clocked in as high at 84 dB on my iPhone’s sound-meter app,8 times as loud as the 70 dB I recorded on the patio, or about as noisy as a diesel truck 50-feet away.
High tops on the patio bar
Surprisingly, two of us could converse on the patio.
Noise aside, the menu at Wood & Fire is fairly diverse and includes numerous pizza, pastas and Italian-American dishes, almost all cooked in a wood-fired oven. The wine list, too, is diverse, and while tilted toward California, there are a half dozen Italian choices. Most of the wines are marked up about three-times over retail. There also are a half dozen or so beers on tap, including three Florida-brewed offerings, but I wasn’t too sure how a Funky Buddha Pineapple Peach ale would pair with red sauce. Additionally, there’s a house-made sangria and a slew of cocktails. I played it safe with an insipid Pacifico Mexican Pilsner, only $4 for a pint, but a mistake in retrospect.
Portions are substantial and easily can be shared. The food was quite enjoyable.
Wood-fired mussels appetizer
Margherita Pizza
Colorful Delray Beach Salad
The Delray Salad ($14), a colorful melange of mixed greens, strawberries, apples, grapes, raisins, candied pecans and gorgonzola, was brightend by a Ω QQAsweet balsamic vinaigrette. It could have easily doubled as a meal or served two diners.
Wood-fired Mussels ($15), an appetizer, also could have stood in for an entrée given the bountiful bowl of plump bivalves, notwithstanding the few that failed to open. They arrived in a vibrant, garlicky, soupy sauce of white wine, cream, mostarda and verde herb oil, accompanied by crisp garlic toast.
Chicken Francaise ($23) arrived beautifully golden atop a mound of flavorful rosemary mashed potatoes, but the sauce, while tasty, veered to tart lemon flavor. My wife skipped the blistered green beans that usually accompany the dish.
And pizza, the eatery’s original signature item, arrived blistering hot. In this case, aMargherita ($14), made with a nicely balanced tomato basil sugo, fiore di latte mozzarella and fresh basil. The smallish pie, six slices, was well cooked, as promised on the menu, with a crispy, almost foldable, crust and it was certainly enough to feed two.
Wood & Fire, open for almost three years, is a sibling of a Pleasantville, NY-based restaurant with common ownership. When it opened in Delray Beach, it primarily served wood-fired specialty pizzas, along with a few other offerings. More recently, the menu has been expanded.
Definitely geared to a younger, hipper crowd than usually found dining in suburban Delray Beach, Wood & Fire is a welcome change, noise not withstanding, for a fun, tasty dining experience. Reserve via Yelp!
Wood & Fire
5199 W Atlantic Ave, Delray Beach, FL 33484
(561) 332-2300
www.woodandfirepizzadelray.com
