Cheese the Day
The same thin sourdough crust, zesty sauce and “world-renowned” cheese. Almost triple the space in which to serve up his slices of heaven. After going lean during the pandemic, the proprietor of Pizza Supreme Being goes all in with an expanded downtown showcase for his one-of-a-kind pies.
Pizza Supreme Being chef-owner Ben Roberts found a way to guarantee he would get along with his new neighbor. About two years after Zia’s Delicatessen moved out of its corner spot next to his walk-up window eatery at 14th and O streets in downtown Sacramento, Roberts took over the space.
“Zia’s owners were really awesome neighbors. They were sweet and warm, and helped me out with anything I ever needed,” Roberts says. “I was kind of worried that we wouldn’t have neighbors like that again. The joke is now I can be my own bad neighbor.”
Keeping his restaurant’s original footprint, which still contains his pizza oven and takeout window, Roberts almost tripled the size of his popular pizzeria—which grew from 1,100 to nearly 3,000 square feet—last September when he expanded into the former Zia’s space, reopening it with a fresh coat of blue paint, new decorative tile work and fast-food-style booths.
The casual vibe suits Roberts, 36, who started Pizza Supreme Being as a pop-up in 2015 and turned it into a brick-and-mortar operation four years later. He calls Pizza Supreme Being, which offers some of the best pies in Sacramento, a “pizza parlor,” as if he is running a 1990s Straw Hat franchise.
The downtown pizzeria took over the corner spot at 14th and O streets formerly occupied by Zia’s Delicatessen and reopened the space last fall.
But even while scrupulously avoiding pretentiousness, Roberts—who previously worked as a line cook at the upscale Ella Dining Room & Bar—brings exquisite, fine-dining detail to his 20-inch pies. Expertly crisped thin sourdough crust holds its shape and firmness in your hand despite the slice’s large size and the weight of tomato sauce, cheese and abundant small circles of Ezzo pepperoni. More impressive still is how you can discern individual flavors, from the smokiness of the pepperoni to the brightness and depth of a sauce made from puréed organic, California-grown, canned Bianco DiNapoli tomatoes co-created by celebrated pizza chef Chris Bianco.
And then there’s Midnight Moon, a Gouda-style goat milk cheese from Cypress Grove in Humboldt County, which elevates Pizza Supreme Being’s standard three-cheese blend, along with provolone and mozzarella. “The distinct taste you get from our pizza is the Midnight Moon. It is just the best cheese on Earth,” Roberts says of the delicacy that was regularly served on a dessert cheese board during his time at Ella. He notes the cheese’s salt granules and flavor notes of caramel, along with its excellent melting capacity. Just as importantly, serving cheese that costs him around $180 per wheel fits Roberts’ egalitarian approach. “Not one person in the world should not be able to try Midnight Moon cheese,” he says. “So I make a pizza where everyone can have that. Someone’s going to come in here and give me $4.50 [for a slice] and is going to try this world-renowned cheese.”
That said, meat-free, dairy-free diners should feel no FOMO—Roberts’ vegan pizzas are also extraordinary. For those pies (they’re not sold by the slice), the pizzaiolo doubles the tomato sauce and crafts a tasty ricotta substitute from tofu, lemon, lemon zest, oregano, and garlic and onion powders.
Speaking of fear of missing out, on some nights, Pizza Supreme Being runs out of sourdough, which requires a 48-hour fermentation process. For this reason, the restaurant’s website lists hours of operation as Wednesdays through Sundays, from noon to 8:30 p.m.—“or if we sell out of pizza dough.” (Roberts says this tends to happen only on exceptionally busy nights like Fridays. Savvy Pizza Supreme Being patrons learned long ago to order ahead.) Like the local establishments where Roberts honed his skills (in addition to Ella, he worked at the Shady Lady Saloon and Paragary’s R15 Bar), his pizzeria operation emphasizes quality over volume.
“You can speed up the process, but when you speed it up then you run the risk of just becoming Costco,” he says. “I could buy conveyor belt ovens and presses and things like that. But what makes our pizza good is that we make it like an Italian grandma would make it. Every pizza is made to order. They are all made by hand.”
Roberts does not have an Italian grandma, but he does have a wife, who originally suggested flavorful sourdough for his pizza crust. (He says that navigating the vagaries of sourdough is both challenging and fun—and as a bonus, he saves money on the cost of yeast.)
From left: Chef-owner Ben Roberts with chefs de cuisine Dylan Craver and Bryan Widener
Soon after the start of the pandemic, the small crew Roberts had employed prior to Covid took other jobs or had to be let go, and he eventually converted his eatery to a mostly to-go operation with his stepbrother Chase (who still works with him), and ran Pizza Supreme Being as such until the expansion. Roberts has now rebuilt his team to its current size of seven, which includes Sacramento kitchen veterans Dylan Craver and Bryan Widener, who serve as chefs de cuisine. Craver used to work on Pizza Supreme Being pop-ups, while Widener, who has known Roberts for years through the local restaurant scene, owned the original Doughbot craft doughnut shop and the lunch spot Lo/Fi—both late, lamented favorites in the Southside Park neighborhood.
Former colleagues at Magpie, Widener and Craver collaborated on Pizza Supreme Being’s Italian beef sub, a November special that rivaled Roberts’ pizza for best in show and will likely reappear on the menu in the future. Tightly wrapped in paper, with its braised, shredded beef in perfect proportion to the Philadelphia-made Amoroso’s roll housing it, the sandwich is enlivened by a spiky jardiniere of cauliflower, peperoncini, Calabrian chilies, carrots and celery. Good on its own, the sandwich turns phenomenal once plunged into an au jus of beef stock and jardiniere juice.
The preponderance of high-level kitchen talent, ultra-casual setting and Italian beef inevitably evoke vibes of The Bear, the hit FX/Hulu series about a James Beard Award-winning chef turned sandwich shop maestro in Chicago. Indeed, Widener says, he and the Pizza Supreme Being crew have heard this comparison before.
“I keep saying we need to get—instead of a ‘swear jar’—a Bear jar,” Widener jokes. “Anytime anybody makes a Bear reference, we will [charge] them $5.”
Pizza Supreme Being cook Marc Agtina slices a “square” pie.
With the expansion, Pizza Supreme Being also added other rotating items, which have included a meatball sub, a vegan Caesar salad, and a perfectly chilled steakhouse-style wedge salad, which Roberts had discontinued early on in the pandemic. Also new is a soft serve machine for swirls of Straus organic vanilla ice cream and either the creamery’s chocolate ice cream or Dole Whip. “We have our basic small menu, and then we will make some fun things [as specials],” Roberts says, citing the dependable simplicity of In-N-Out Burger as an influence.
Roberts, a longtime Sacramento resident who grew up in Grass Valley and is an eager explorer of various cuisines, shies away from regional labels for his pizza. “I think defining your region gives folks the power to say you’re ‘not’ something,” he explains. For instance, Roberts says, when he makes square slices, “I have had people from Detroit come in and say, ‘This isn’t Detroit pizza.’ So I just call it ‘square.’ ” And although “New York style” seems the most obvious fit for his pies, New Yorkers famously reject that label for any pizza made outside the five boroughs.
But ask Widener about the pizza’s style, and he doesn’t hesitate: “Sacramento,” he answers
“Absolutely,” Craver agrees. “Sacramento.”
Pizza Supreme Being. 1425 14th St. 916-917-5559. pizzasupremebeing.com
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