The New York-style pizza landscape was vastly different from what it is today when CSNY Pizza opened in 2017 on the Rockville Pike. CSNY owners, Brooklyn-born Ankur Rajpara and Jonathan Allen, filled an immense hole, bringing NY-style pizza to Rockville. In case anyone else was wondering, CS stands for “come sempre,” or like always, in Italian.
Today, the Montgomery County NY-style field is more crowded, with Andy’s, No Regrets, Mamma Lucia, and AP Pizza on the scene. Regardless, CSNY Pizza, a tiny takeout/delivery joint, has found its niche, slinging Sicilian and NY-style pizzas to positive reviews.
DishingPizza visited at lunchtime for a couple of slices. Even by DishingPizza’s undiscerning standards, the joint is dingy, with a small ledge for eating with a few stools. A couple of picnic tables sit outside on the sidewalk in front of the shop. CSNY Pizza doesn’t even bother with napkins, offering just a lone roll of paper towels. The substandard experience is enhanced by breathing exhaust fumes from the Rockville Pike traffic. Although the ambiance at CSNY is sorely lacking, remember that it’s a takeout/delivery spot, never intended for fine dining.
Cézanne had his Still Life with Apples. Two generous, fresh pizza slices overflowing a scalloped paper plate are DishingPizza‘s equivalent tableau — a Still Life with Slices.
The CSNY Pizza crust is a standout. The large slices are perfectly baked with light char, retaining enough firmness to almost allow one-handed eating. At the same time, native New Yorkers who insist on folding their slices won’t be disappointed with this pliable crust. As it turns out, DishingPizza barely needed the paper towels, so perhaps CSNY was smart not to buy real napkins. The decent mozzarella is sparingly applied, sharing space with a flavorful canned tomato sauce1. CSNY Pizza is nearly an Andy’s Pizza doppelgänger, with the latter offering a slightly airier crust with less cheese.
In a town of bluster and braggadocio, CSNY Pizza shows enviable restraint. They serve a great product, but aren’t falling all over themselves crowing about it. Nor is CSNY Pizza attempting to expand across the Eastern seaboard or become a wine bar. In the tradition of old-school New Jersey strip mall pizza joints, CSNY Pizza serves no-frills pizza at a fair price to fortunate Rockvillians. Is CSNY Pizza worth a special trip from far away? Absolutely not. However, for locals, CSNY Pizza is an excellent takeout/delivery spot.
CSNY Pizza
1020 Rockville Pike, Rockville, MD 20852
Pizza quality: 🍕🍕🍕
Overall experience: ⭐
Slice: $4.00
Slice price per square inch: $0.13
Slice greed factor: 🤑🤑
Pie (18″): $23.50
Pie price per square inch: $0.09
- How did eagle-eyed DishingPizza know CSNY uses canned sauce? Zoom in underneath the oven in the photo to see the well-regarded cans of 7/11 Ground Tomatoes from Stanislaus in Modesto, CA. ↩︎