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At PizzArte, a sleek, high-gloss shrine to Neapolitan food and art (the paintings are all for sale), a slightly different montanara eventually made its way onto the menu: Puffier than Forcella’s, with no discernible cornicione and considerably less char, this one rises high, like the mountains evoked by the name of the dish. Here, it gets a sprinkle of caciocavallo cheese, which adds a welcome sharp tang to the mildly sweet dough. It can be had in miniature form as well, in the frittura all’italiana appetizer, where it appears simply fried, not baked, in the company of crunchy potato croquettes and rice balls, less-crisp matchsticks of zucchini, and unadorned lumps of fried dough called pizza fritters, which might be taking the whole deep-fried enterprise a little too far. Even if you’ve made the trek to this polished space simply for the featured attraction, you might consider supplementing your fried-dough quota with the verdure, a very nice plate of marinated zucchini, chile-flecked broccoli rabe, and a luscious heap of soft-cooked eggplant and tomatoes. The menu is rounded out by perfectly fine salads and pastas, including a smoky penne alla Ferdinando and a paccheri festooned with nubbins of salt cod, but most clientele, especially the ebullient clusters of Italian expats, are there for the pizzas, and they’re worth the trip. The flavor of the dough is noticeably salty and complex, and the pies characterized by a modest cornicione and a light speckling of char. Service is attentive and well meaning, and although we must steer you away from a bafflingly bad Negroni, there is a Gragnano, Campania’s famous “pizza wine,” available by the bottle and the glass.

Should you desire dessert, the kitchen offers an off-the-menu pizza Nutella, split and then slathered with the stuff, and showered with cocoa and powdered sugar. It is not, as far as we know, deep-fried, but it doesn’t seem to suffer for the lapse. — Rob Patronite and Robin Raisfeld

Verdure trio, montanara pizza, Nutella pizza.

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New York Magazine Reviews

• Robin Raisfeld and Rob Patronite's Full Review (12/5/11)