Pizza

Verde Pizza Napoletana is open in Canton. The South Montford Avenue location was the home for years of Birches, and before that, the Wild Mushroom. The dining room and bar, which formerly had a woodsy New England appearance, have been thoroughly remodeled. The redone interior, a sleek hybrid of European brasserie fixtures and midcentury American furnishings, is ready for its shelter magazine close-up. The specialty at Verde is Neapolitan pizza, with toppings like prosciutto di Parma, imported buffalo mozzarella and wild mushrooms.

Earth Wood & Fire, a new restaurant in the Bare Hills section of Baltimore County, is testament to the wisdom of keeping things simple. The menu offers a handful of salads, a selection of small plates and a daily special or two. But the partnership at this new restaurant is serious about getting the basics down pat first. The square focus is on hamburgers and coal-fired pizzas. Earth Wood & Fire isn't trying to provide culinary adventures but to be a consistent and reliable everyday dining place.

When it comes to weeknight dinners, some of us are not big fans of planning ahead. Oh, we might take something out of the freezer in the morning, then figure out what to do with it later in the day. Not for us all the a.m. prep work, so the crock pot can do its thing all day. About 4 p.m., maybe even 5 p.m., is certainly soon enough to figure out what to do with the chicken or ground beef that's been defrosting all day. Which is why, when...

Reginald Lewis tailback Donnie Neal will buy a lot of pizza Monday. The Falcons senior plans to treat his offensive linemen after they plowed the way for him to set a school record with six rushing touchdowns in Friday's 48-0 win over Ben Franklin. “It meant a whole lot,” Neal said of the record. “For one, our school, we're not really known to be that great in sports. It felt good, but I've really got to thank my offensive line. They're great. I always congratulate them. I tell them, 'Good job' and all that and they always pick me up. In school, we always hang around and I buy them pizza.

If close proximity to a great pizza joint doesn't raise property values, it should. Good pizza makes a neighborhood eminently more livable. Fortunately for the people living in and around Govans, in northern Baltimore City, Toss is a great pizza joint. The decor is bare bones and the service is casual, as befits a pizza place, but the food is terrific. Toss's owners, Cem Ari and Murat Mercan, understand the potential that pizza, served in a welcoming space, has for a neighborhood.

Iggies , the popular purveyor of thin-crust pizzas, is moving out of Mount Vernon. The new location will be in the Riderwood Station shopping center in Towson, near Joppa Road and Bellona Avenue. The move is "95 percent" certain, said Peter Wood, a familiar presence at the BYOB restaurant owned by his wife, Lisa Henkman. Wood said there are still a few zoning issues to work out at the new location, which has never been used for a restaurant. Wood said the primary reason for the move, which could happen as soon as November, comes down to "lifestyle.

Three weeks ago we told you that The Pea Man (aka Thomas McCarthy of Woodside Greenhouse, Caroline County) said he should be bringing peas in about three weeks. Three weeks later he brought peas. By 10 a.m. all of his peas were gone. And so was he. He'll be back next week with more peas. Still, the market seemed especially crowded on Mother's Day, and the craft booths were doing brisker business than usual. Baltimore Sun contributor John Houser III checked out the market's new pizza vendor, Pizza Ruby , which has just stepped in for the departed Red Zebra.

Timothy Dean may have finally found his niche - and it's at the mall. Last month, the chef, best known in Baltimore for his string of restaurants on Eastern Avenue (and his appearance on the seventh season of "Top Chef"), opened Timothy Dean Burger in the Boulevard at the Capital Centre. The vibe is fast food, but the food - burgers, fries and gourmet pizzas - is worthy of white tablecloths. Over the past few years, the celebrity chef has weathered a string of well-publicized setbacks.

It is inexcusable for your reporter to refer to the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine as "a physicians group" ("Doctors group says no junk food for the Obamas," May 7). The article not only fails to identify PCRM for what it is - an activist group devoted to promoting a vegan lifestyle - but goes on to parrot their agenda by suggesting thatMrs. Obama's choice to eat a cheeseburger is unhealthy. Worse, it repeats PCRM's crude analogy of eating a slice of pizza to smoking a cigarette.

Domino's became the nation's largest pizza chain this week to offer a gluten-free pizza crust, a step to meet the needs of gluten-sensitive customers, Nation's Restaurant News reported. But the crust, made from rice flour, rice starch and potato starch, is not recommended for consumers with celiac disease, according to the trade journal report. Domino's said its new product, available in all of the chain's nearly 5,000 locations and made with no wheat, rye or barley, still is risky for those with celiac disease because the pizzas are made in the same kitchens as pizzas with wheat crust.