Johnny D’s a friendly, flavorful place for pizza, Italian dishes

• By JUDY BERGERON
• Restaurant reviewer
• Published: Oct 2, 2009

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Johnny D’s may have changed locations in the last few months, but the owner took his identifying landmark with him. A mini version of the Statue of Liberty again stands near the front door of the Italian and New York-style pizza eatery.

Inside, walls are painted butterscotch with an accent wall in Tuscan gold. High ceilings are painted black, while the concrete floors have been stained a light shade of rust. Windows across the front of Johnny D’s look out on Coursey Boulevard. A gallery of large-scale paintings decorates the walls of the main and side dining rooms.

We started things off with an appetizer of cheesy garlic bread with Italian sausage ($10.95). The piping hot bread was round and looked like a pizza when it arrived at the table. The crispy bread was topped with a generous amount of fried Italian sausage pieces and loads of mozzarella cheese and seasonings, making for a gooey, but delicious starter dish. Marinara sauce for dipping accompanied the bread.

There so many choices of pizza, it’s hard to narrow down to just one. We opted for a small or personal 10-inch size pizza, half deluxe, half Hawaiian ($12). The hand-tossed crust was oh-so-fresh and not overly thick, and on the deluxe side, was piled with pepperoni, Italian sausage, bits of meatball, mushrooms, onions, black olives, bell peppers and banana peppers, along with cheese and seasonings. The Hawaii side offered thin slices of ham and chunks of pineapple with lots of mozzarella cheese. Both sides were excellent — hot, well-seasoned and with all toppings in plentiful supply.

 The Mama Frannie’s meat lasagna ($13.95) was also a winner. Tender lasagna noodles were layered with a rich, slightly sweet tomato sauce with bits of beef, and lots of cheese. Quite a large, filling dish, a guest had to take home more than half of this one.

Another guest tried the eggplant parmesan calzone ($9.99).  This may be the biggest calzone we’ve seen, its two halves covering an entire dinner plate. The “enclosed pizza,” if you will, featured more of that fresh pizza dough, slotted on top, and filled with ricotta and mozzarella cheeses and small pieces of sautéed eggplant. We would have liked more of the eggplant, as the small pieces tended to get lost in the flavors of the cheeses.

We found that the original muffuletta ($8.50, half; $14.95, whole) varied from the traditional sandwich so prevalent in New Orleans. First, the sandwich was on French bread brushed with olive oil, instead of the usual round muffuletta bread. The half-size equaled a 12-inch po-boy, and was filled with the traditional salami, mortadella, ham and provolone cheese. The olive salad was basically green and black olives and oil, lacking the extra little seasonings and such usually found in the topping mixture. A good sandwich, but missing some of what makes a muffuletta a muffuletta.

With no room for dessert, we took home cannolis ($5.95, two). The light, crispy rolled pastries were filled with sweetened cheese and drizzled with chocolate. Scrumptious.

Johnny D’s is the kind of neighborhood place where you can expect the owner to stop by the table and say hello. On a recent Sunday afternoon as he headed to the kitchen to secure more pizza for the buffet, he asked some incoming buffet customers what kind of pizza they wanted, a nice gesture. Service was indeed friendly, but a little uneven on this particular afternoon, when it seemed the restaurant was focusing on the buffet. Our appetizer arrived with our entrees and we had to ask for silverware. Minor inconveniences to an otherwise satisfying meal.