Pleasant Cafe

"The neon signage is a beacon for this decidedly old-school Roslindale joint, open for over 80 years. Try broiled scallops or brick-oven pizza. Pleasant Cafe is open daily for lunch and dinner." - Rachel Leah Blumenthal

"It’s kind of a hike to get to Roslindale from other parts of the city, but the food (and, yes, the chicken parm sandwich) at Pleasant Cafe is worth the trip. It also might have the most beautiful facade in the city. Get a mushroom and onion pizza — the onions are shaved impossibly thin, which is how onions should be on a pizza — while you’re at it. Pleasant Cafe is open for takeout." - Terrence Doyle

"Get the broiled scallops at Pleasant Cafe, and get a pepper and onion pizza too. The space is mostly unchanged since opening in the 1930s." - Terrence Doyle

"Opened in 1937 by the four Iantosca brothers, Pleasant Cafe has been owned and operated by the Morgan and Lynch families since they purchased the bar and restaurant from the original owners in 1979. Pleasant Cafe’s menu is massive (try the chicken parm), but it’s perhaps best known for its pizza, which was recently voted the best in Boston in an NBC 10 Boston viewers poll, edging out well-known classics Santarpio’s and Pizzeria Regina. While Santarpio’s and Regina are making pizza much like you’d find in Brooklyn, Pleasant Cafe’s take is closer to New England bar-style pizza. The crust is thin, and the cheese — there’s a lot of cheese — is blistered and slightly burnt (this is a very good thing.) The interior has remained largely untouched since the restaurant’s opening more than eight decades ago. “The only major change is that the current back room used to be the kitchen, and the pizza room was in the cellar,” said Morgan. “When I worked here as a kid, bussing tables, the pizza used to come up to the dining room on hand-pulled dumbwaiter.” A row of gorgeous aluminum lowboys form the backdrop of the bar. Morgan said that they can be a pain to deal with because they’re so old — he’s constantly having to pay HVAC workers to come fix the compressors, and he’s had to replace more handles than he cares to recall — but he’ll never replace them if he doesn’t have to. “The HVAC guys always say, ‘Maintain these things because they don’t build ‘em like this anymore,’” said Morgan. “They’re probably not the most efficient things in the world, but they’re solid aluminum, so they hold the cold in very well.” (Indeed, the beer from the lowboys is in fact very cold.) Morgan said that George Parelli — who was friends with the Iantosca brothers and who worked at Pleasant Cafe for more than 70 years, many as a bartender — told him that the mahogany bar dates back to the early 1900s and that it used to belong to a bar in downtown Boston. Wood panels cover the walls inside Pleasant Cafe, washed monthly with Murphy’s Oil Soap — “My mother is a cleaning freak!” Morgan said — and lined with plaques from local Little League teams, like the Parkway Yankees. Pleasant Cafe is a pillar of its neighborhood, and that’s what Morgan likes best. “Seeing the different generations come in is a real pleasure,” said Morgan. “Grandparents come in and say, ‘We were engaged here. We brought our kids here, and now they bring their kids in here after Little League games.’ The people you get to meet over the years, it’s just incredible.” Pleasant Cafe has its own generational thing going on, too. Morgan’s mother, Joan — who’s in her late 70s — still manages the day-to-day operations like payroll and ordering. Morgan manages the front of the house, and his wife, Joanie, manages the restaurant’s marketing and online presence. Morgan said that he has employees — servers, bartenders, pizza makers, cooks — who’ve been with him for more than 20 years. Everything at Pleasant Cafe is familiar, which is exactly what makes Pleasant Cafe special. Head to Roslindale, eat some pizza, drink a very cold Bud Light, and support a locally owned, independent restaurant. Shiny and new is fine, but old and broken-in wins every day." - Terrence Doyle

"Marc Hurwitz checks out Pleasant Cafe in Roslindale for his latest in Dig Boston. With “classic Italian-American comfort food dishes that tend to be simple and unpretentious,” the restaurant offers substantial portions. Highlights include what Hurwitz calls a “wonderfully old-fashioned” chicken and eggplant parm combo that heavily features the restaurants house-made red sauce. The roast prime rib of beef is reasonably priced, he writes, and the thin-crust pizza is “some of the best” in Boston. Overall, the 80-year-old restaurant is “truly a destination spot for those who like a little history with their food and drink.”" - Dana Hatic