Somehow when a pizza comes from a mom-and-pop shop, it always seems tastier to me. Consequently, Pizza One has caught my eye having driven by on numerous occasions. Finally, one day we were too lazy to cook dinner and went there for takeout instead.

When I see a white-based chicken bruschetta pizza on a menu, I need to get it. It gives me a sense of nostalgia of the slices I used to have at Gino’s Pizza before heading to work at a call centre during high school. While working at a call centre isn’t necessarily the greatest memory, the tasty hot pizza before getting ready for hours of mundane work was such a highlight in the day.

Pizza One’s chicken bruschetta ($16 for a medium) starts with a garlic butter base that’s topped with chunks of chicken, onion, tomato, parmesan, and mozzarella with a sprinkling of Italian seasoning to provide a pop of freshness. Overall, the pie has good flavours (the parmesan adds such a nice salty finish) and the toppings are well spread out allowing each bite to incorporate all the ingredients.

While Pizza One has tons of developed recipes, my husband always goes with his custom pizza ($18.50 for a medium): pepperoni, mushroom, onions, and extra cheese. His wasn’t as impressive as the chicken bruschetta, the pepperoni were larger slices, which meant they needed to be toasted longer as the soggy centre ends up tasting like bologna. With the extra cheese, Pizza One should consider applying less marinara to ensure the crust doesn’t become doughy and soft.

They are not a thin crust pizza, but their crust is still slimmer than what’s typically found at the chains. The chicken bruschetta’s crust was nice and airy, and the bottom lightly toasted until it almost had a Pizza Hut crunch and flavour but without the greasiness and heaviness. I've never had it myself, but my husband claims it's like New Orleans’s pizza crust.

If munching on a plain crust isn’t your thing, Pizza One offers a variety of dipping sauce in regular and spicy formats for $1 with interesting sounding options like Thai pesto. And it’s all made in-house, which is something I’d expect from a mom-and-pop place. It’s all these little touches that makes a pizza taste better than the cookie cutter chains.