By Elyse Cram

If you live in Richmond, you have most likely dined at one of Ed Vasaio’s restaurants, which top the lists of many Richmonder’s favorite locally-owned eateries. Between Mamma Zu, Edo’s Squid, Dinamo, and 8½, Vasaio’s well-acclaimed restaurants consistently draw in large crowds.

8½ is a local Italian take-out restaurant that prepares authentic Italian dishes and pizza, both at their location on Strawberry Street in The Fan and on East Marshall Street in Church Hill. On a recent weekend, I went to the location on Strawberry Street following a recommendation from a friend, and I was not disappointed.

Before considering the food, the location is worth noting. Positioned near Strawberry Street Market and a Scoop RVA, a local ice cream shop, 8½’s central location attracts many customers. While ordering online is possible, customers can also order when they arrive and spend time walking around The Fan and enjoying the city of Richmond while they wait for their food to be prepared.

When the food is ready, customers enter the small entryway where COVID-19 protocols allow one customer at a time to come inside and pick up their food. The food was ready exactly when the pickup estimation time predicted, and the pizza was clearly fresh out of the oven.

8 1/2 on Strawberry Street in The Fan. 

Personally, pizza is one thing that I often find myself getting tired of, as it seems to be many people’s go-to meal, especially when ordering for groups. After years of attending birthday parties with fare from chains such as Pizza Hut, Papa John’s, and Domino’s, I came to the conclusion that pizza was not for me. However, as I got older, my parents would occasionally order pizza for the family from local popular places like Frank’s West, Chianti, and Mellow Mushroom. As pizza slowly began to grow on me again, I discovered personal pizza and by-the-slice restaurants such as Mod, Pie Five, Bottoms Up, and Blaze. 

After ordering a pepperoni pizza from 8½, I can confidently say that 8½ distinguished itself from any other pizza place I have been to. The thin crust combined with the perfect cheese-to-sauce ratio were beautifully complemented by the addition of pepperonis. As someone who is not a consistent supporter of crust, I can attest to the fact I ate my crust from this restaurant—an important step for me, which speaks to the quality of 8½’s crust. Additionally, I sometimes struggle when there is too great of a sauce-to-cheese ratio (such as the one found at Pizza Hut), but without hesitation I can affirm that 8½ has it down to a science. The pepperonis then added another dimension to the pizza, bringing in more flavor and spice, consequently distinguishing this local restaurant further from other nearby pizza places.

Pepperoni pizza.

Grace Cornell (‘21) attests to the importance of the crust by claiming, “8½’s signature thin crust makes the whole pizza.” I agree, because crust serves as the backbone to any good pizza; without first having a foundation of good crust, there is no way of making a decent pizza. 

Part of what makes their crust stand out is the process by which it is handmade. Hayden Luckert (‘21) states, “The made-from-scratch nature of the pizza adds a level of authenticity that you don’t get from other take-out pizza experiences.” 

Luckert and Cornell are not the only members of the Collegiate community who have discovered this local restaurant. Upper School math teacher and advisor David Kehlenbeck describes it as “delicious” and claims, “It’s one of my family’s go-to Italian restaurants.”  Pender Bauhan (‘21) also enjoys their pizza, exclaiming, “Their meat lovers pizza is to die for.”

Whether you are a pizza connoisseur, enthusiast, or critic, I strongly believe a trip to 8½ would be worthwhile. Usually I would normally only eat pizza if that is what everyone else wanted, yet I would definitely choose to get take-out from here again. I hope that this encourages everyone, even those who may not be pizza enthusiasts, to branch out and try 8½.

All photos by Elyse Cram.