ARDENT GOURMET: Hearth & Table, Lincoln City

By David & Susan Greenberg
David recounts, “On the day of my bar-mitzvah, my older brother ran away with a friend (for several hours) and the adults solemnly gathered to chart a course of action. One of them suggested we order several pizzas for sustenance. While I too looked solemn, I silently thanked my brother and wished he might run away more often. For, like anyone of sound mind, I loved pizza. Maybe, above all.”

Pizza is Ozempic’s enemy. And the pizza at Hearth & Stone in Lincoln City – thicker with traffic, some might say, than great restaurants – could be its archenemy.

We started with a Salad Caprese that was an elite athlete of its genre. Large chunks of heirloom tomato and shockingly sweet Sungold cherry tomatoes strewn with torn chunks of fresh mozzarella and basil leaves in a balsamic dressing. It was Salad Caprese’s Platonic form from which all others derive.

We drank a Happy Hour priced Pinot and a Perfect Pear cocktail redolent of Autumn which, for upcoming surgeries, we want loaded into our IV feeds.

The menu was divided between standard pizzas such as Pepperoni and Margherita, and unique creations like Agrodolce which is anointed with chile crisp and honey. We had a Saltimbocca (Italian, “jump in the mouth”) pizza which typically refers to a classic chicken dish. In the manner of this dish, it came with prosciutto, sage, and half a fresh lemon (roasted) to squeeze over. We were dubious about the lemon but it dazzled us. Could it be that lemon is pizza’s natural MSG? In the pizza version of the multiverse where pizzas are sentient, this pizza would be considered sexy. Its crust was slim and fetchingly blistered and could hold the vital New York fold (longitudinally foldable without drooping).

For dessert we had Olive Oil cake with Mascarpone icing. The cake was burly, and we wonder if butter might not have brought out its va va voom.

The interior, with a wood-fired oven built like Jack Reacher, had a classic, eclectic-comfortable, bistro feel. Service was warm-hearted. Good music. Good buzz. We loved this place and consider it destination-level.