For Great Pizza Pies in West Hartford, Look no Further Than Park Lane Pizza

Updated August 2022

 

                                                                                          

Aahh....A lovely pizza pie from Park Lane Pizza in West Hartford. 

For some people, the crust of a pizza is the most important part of the pie. Other people judge pizzas by the flavor of the sauce, while still others consider the cheese to be a pie's most crucial ingredient.

Through the decades, I've eaten a few completely excellent pizzas, many, many average pies, as well as some downright pathetic and/or perilous pizzas. For more than 40 years, I've been enjoying the great food from Park Lane, and I think their Italian-style food is just as good as the food at higher-priced, upscale eateries.

While I do appreciate the various components of pizza pies, it's the sauce that's most important to my tastebuds. The pleasing Greek-style pizza sauce at Park Lane has been making my tastebuds happy for a long time. Having tried lots of local pizza pies, I still haven't found another sauce as good as Park Lane's

The pizza in the accompanying photo is one that I picked-up at Park Lane recently.  As you can see, this pizzeria still does a "square-cut" on its larger pies.

From its familiar location at the corner of Park Road and South Quaker Lane in West Hartford, the kitchen at Park Lane Pizza regularly produces some of the finest pies you'll find in the local area.

Since the 1970s, I've tried a lot of different foods from Park Lane Pizza, and have rarely been disappointed. The interior and exterior of the pizza restaurant look essentially the same as they did in the 1970s, and each upholstered booth has its own little working jukebox.

It's almost worth visiting Park Lane just to check out the mini jukeboxes at each booth. Because I've only been picking-up to-go orders there since the health pandemic began, I haven't looked closely at the jukeboxes in quite a while. The last I knew, they operated on Quarters, but the price-per-play might have gone up.

Also since the 1970s, I've been fond of little MG automobiles, and one of Park Lane Pizza's owners also owns a forest-green MG convertible, which he's parked in front of the restaurant almost every day, for years.

Seeing that MG up-close on a fairly regular basis, was definitely a factor in my purchasing a Mazda Miata.

Driving a Miata with the top down is the closest I've found to riding a motorcycle. You're only a few inches off the ground. On a regular basis, I still stop to look up-close at the MG when I enter Park Lane Pizza. 

Park Lane serves small, medium and large-sized pizzas, and 15 types of awesome grinders, or subs. These include ham, eggplant, turkey, sausage, tuna fish, pastami and meatball. 

If you're a salad fan, Park Lane has a tossed house salad, Greek salad and Chef salad, as well as chicken and tuna salad plates. There are cheese calzones on the menu, and appetizers such as mozzarella sticks, jalapeno poppers and Buffalo wings.

The various dinners served at Park Lane Pizza are all expertly prepared and delicious. In addition to staples such as pasta with meatballs, Park Lane serves manicotti, lasgna, chicken Parmigiana,  meatballs & peppers and sausage & peppers. Dinner portions are large, and prices are competitive.

 

Thank you, Prospect Foreign Car Service in West Hartford.

One of the first things I did after purchasing my 2004 Mazda Miata several years ago was to contact AAA about obtaining member coverage. The membership benefit that I was most interested in obtaining is the car battery service that they offer.

The Miata currently has a dead battery, and that's been the case every winter since I've owned it. It has never seen snow, and I'm paying for a garage and AAA service. If AAA was really a proactive, customer-oriented company, maybe they could figure out a way to stock batteries for early-2000s Miatas. There are still plenty of them out there. '

A few years ago, AAA came out to jump-start the Miata for Spring, and the driver/technician reminded me that the battery was pretty much in need of replacement. Shortly thereafter, I had a new battery put in by the local Mazda dealer.

 It so happened that the Miata was due for the required, recurring emissions testing. Off I went to Prospect Foreign Auto Repair to see if they could do the testing. When I talked to the friendly and knowlegeable owner, Franco, he informed me that I would have to put approximately 100 miles on the car before it would be ready to go through emissione testing.

Thank God, the Miata passed emissions. After having a new battery installed, the car's computer ? had to be reset by driving it for roughly 100 miles. If the computer does not reset, the vehicle probably won't pass emissions.

 Now, in 2022, the battery that was replaced a few years ago also had to be replaced. Right away, I called Prospect Foreign Auto, and they were very helpful. Even though it can be hard to find a battery for that year Miata, they said they could get it "no problem." I was given a good estimate for the total cost of the job, and was asked when it would be convenient for me to have the work done.