Cheap Eats By L.E. Leone   Star Maps MY FRIEND KAYJAY I met through Haywire, years and years ago, and we have since driven across the country together and broken down in Colorado, as always. This was more than three years ago, on our way in fact to Haywire's wedding. Why my old ex-van Rocco, R.I.P., always broke down in Colorado is another story. In this story, I receive in the mail a little package of black-and-white pictures of that trip, from Kayjay. In one, the doors to the van are wide open and stuff is strewn everywhere, including engine parts. I'm sitting in the passenger seat, which is setting on the ground outside the van, looking glum. Bernie is sitting on the curb, opposite me, playing a little guitar.         I believe we were waiting for the arrival of some parts, in some parking lot of some car parts store somewhere outside of Denver. Nice shot, Kayjay. In another shot, a better picture with a less happy ending, there is an old, old, old-time vehicle, Model T era, buried up to its fenders in a stony field, windowless and engineless against a backdrop of stark gray desert mountains. They aren't in the picture, but I vaguely remember a skeleton with glasses sitting glumly on an old antique bucket, opposite another skeleton with long scraggly hair and a little old guitar – just killing time, carefree travelers, waiting for the arrival of some parts. Or a whole engine.         There were more pictures, but these two I pinned side by side in the most prominent place in my shack, on the wall opposite the toilet, as a constant reminder of the inescapably erosive nature of time, the precariousness of life, and the importance of car parts. Speaking of which, I had to do a little tinkering under my new old Chevy Sprint pickup truck, damn the luck, and rather than doing it here, I moved into my old garage at Crawdad's for a couple days. That way I was walking distance to parts stores when things went wrong – which things inevitably do whenever I am under a car. One of those days I went and ate dinner with Kayjay, who I hadn't seen in forever. Meaning she hadn't seen me either, with my dangly earrings, funny hat, and long, manicured fingernails ringed with grease and gunk and rust and stuff. So we had lots and lots to talk about. And a perfect place for doing so: Little Star, the new deep-dish pizza joint on Divisadero in the Western Addition. Maybe "joint" is not the right word. It's kind of classy and dark and wooden in there, like a wine bar (as Kayjay put it), or, in other words: the opposite of Zachary's. As if to not attract comparisons. Still, of the first five times I heard of Little Star, I heard four comparisons to Zachary's. Favorable ones, if you can imagine that. I couldn't. That's why I went. You're dying to know, aren't you? First let me give you Kayjay's opinion, because she gave me an articulate, intelligent one, in writing, and how often does that happen in this column? Taking advantage: "Afterthoughts about our pizza: I think the tomatoes, while tasty, overwhelmed the overall pizza experience. Only the sausage was hefty enough to stand up to them; the chicken merely made itself known through its dryness, not its flavor. And it seemed to me that it was only through seeing an occasional artichoke heart or piece of spinach that we even knew they were in there, somewhere. So, basically we had tasty Chicago-style tomato toast with extras, known in Italy as bruschetta. "The salad dressing was quite flavorful!" I agree! About the salad dressing. As for the pizza, Kayjay didn't have the advantage of eating it leftover at home the next day and the next. It kept getting better (maybe from being warmed over an apple wood fire). Yes, the chicken was dry, but what were we doing with chicken on half of our pizza instead of sausage on all of it? I love bruschetta. No, I don't think that Little Star is as good as Zachary's. But it is good. If you prefer a cornmealy crust, which I don't, then you might like it better. The sausage is great. The sauce: good. And it's here – in the city. And it's cheaper than Zachary's, Little Star's base 12-incher with cheese going for $14 to Zack's $16.70. (Little Star's toppings are $2 to Zack's $1.60, but still you'd have to get seven toppings to make up the difference.) And – and this is a big and – no lines! Not yet anyway. Happy hour 4:30 to 6 and then again 10 to 11:30, featuring Pabst Blue Ribbon for a buck. I'll see you, and Frank Booth, there.           Little Star. 846 Divisadero (at McAllister), S.F. (415) 441-1118. Sun.-Thurs., 5-10 p.m.; Fri.-Sat., 5-11 p.m. Takeout available. Beer and wine. American Express, Discover, MasterCard, Visa. Wheelchair accessible. L.E. Leone is the author of Eat This, San Francisco (Sasquatch Books), a collection of Cheap Eats restaurant reviews, and The Meaning of Lunch (Mammoth Books).   January 26, 2005

 

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