Fate does not always arrive with fireworks. Sometimes, it comes in a plain cardboard box. My blissful fate showed up one Thursday night in the middle of spring semester my junior year at the College of William and Mary. After a week of wrestling with midterms and essays, all I wanted was pizza and cold sparkling water. I opened my delivery app then tapped in my usual order: a Margherita pizza. By 7 p.m. that night, I was at my desk in Tribe Square, unsealing a box that smelled of something more than an ordinary late night.
The first bite was a quiet surprise. Tomato, creamy mozzarella and basil folded together in a harmony that pulled me straight out of Williamsburg. For a moment, I was in Italy. It was not just good; it was the kind of good that makes you curious about this pizza shop. Right then, I decided I needed to go to the restaurant in person.
The next weekend, I invited my closest food partners, two fellow students, to a Williamsburg restaurant hunt. We drove to the far end of Richmond Road, where Anna’s Brick House Oven Pizza sat in a modest looking building. From the outside, the restaurant was unassuming, but I could feel a certain energy — the kind that makes you expect a great meal.
The chef, I later learned, came from Carini, a small town outside Palermo of Italy. She brought with her not just skill but quiet confidence in the food she served. With excitement, we started with a shared appetizer: mozzarella caprese. The dish was simple, as it should be, and all about balance. The mozzarella was impossibly fresh and cool. The balsamic was just sharp enough to brighten each bite.
After a few minutes, the main courses arrived at our table. We ordered Margherita pizza, fettuccine Alfredo and shrimp marinara. The dine-in pizza that I ordered was just a preview for everything we were about to experience. The pizza was cooked in a brick oven and had a crust that crackled before giving way to a soft center, tomatoes at peak sweetness and mozzarella melting into gentle pools. Basil and the faint smokiness of the fire tied it all together. I cannot stress enough how delicious the pizza was. I was particularly impressed by the chefs’ pizza-making performance. Everybody who visits the place is welcome to watch the live dough making through the kitchen window. I suggest you experience visiting the actual restaurant rather than ordering delivery.
The Alfredo dish was silky without being heavy, the sauce clinging to each ribbon of pasta without drowning it. The shrimp marinara was bright and garlicky with olive oil layered into tomato sauce. The sauce tasted like it had been made from scratch, the shrimp tender and perfectly brined. The pasta they served attached a professional validity to their Italian restaurant identity.
We ended with gelato. I went for a sea salt caramel flavor that was nutty and creamy enough to make me glad I saved room. My friends chose chocolate and a mixed flavor, each one a sweet final note to the evening. I assume that their choices were good as well, seeing as they both left empty bowls.
After the meal, when I got back to my dorm that night, I thought about how some people meet their great love by accident, or stumble into a once-in-a-lifetime moment. For me, it was ordering a pizza on an ordinary Thursday and finding a small corner of Sicily, Italy, in Williamsburg, Virginia. Now, whenever I need to feel a little Italian, I know where to go. I am hoping your semester brings you a little luck too. Maybe yours will start at Anna’s Brick Oven, just like mine.
Dining and Cooking