Best Upscale Pizza In NYC

The city's ubiquitous dollar slice is proof that pizza doesn't have to be extravagant in New York. The no-frills necessary pie is luxuriously cheap and still beloved—that's NYC-style amore. But New York also has plenty of big pizza pies that are no stranger to a little bling. We're talking pizzas worth eating with actual silverware—because a sprinkle of red pepper flakes is nothing compared to a dusting of edible gold.

Called the city's poshest pizzeria, Pasquale Jones reels in crowds with its indulgent clam pie. With freshly shucked Littleneck clams over a creamy, briny liqueur-spiked sauce, this clam pizza has caught on in the red-sauce trap of Little Italy. Spoon some of the restaurant's fermented Calabrian chili oil onto the pie, and the casual yet buttoned-up restaurant will have you loosening your collar.

Dan Kluger, the former executive chef at Jean-­Georges Vongerichten's ABC Kitchen, opened Loring Place in a vein reminiscent of the ABC empire: a veggie-rich menu, plus whole-wheat pizzas. The pies are where the money is, with dough made from a custom mix of flours (from house-milled to organic white) and enriched with farm-fresh, seasonal flavors. The fanciest, a White Truffle Grandma-Style Pizza, is sprinkled with pawlett—a buttery Italian cheese—and Parmesan cheese before it gets a heavy hand of delicately shaved white truffle. Fancy that.

At Marta, the more-than-just-pizza pizzeria tucked inside the The Redbury New York hotel, the Tartufo Nero brings contrast to a lineup of Pizze Bianche (aka, Nonna-approved, non-red-sauce pizza). Thin crust is topped with mozzarella, fontina cheese and cremini mushrooms—not to mention shavings of the world's ritziest mushroom, the Périgord black truffle. At $60 per pie, fear not: This is a no-tipping restaurant.

It's unclear whether anyone actually orders the 24K from Industry Kitchen, but if you're keen on the Donald Trump of pizza pie, this $2,000 version is topped with Stilton cheese, foie gras, platinum Ossetra caviar, truffle, and 24-karat gold leaves. And if all those accoutrements aren't enough, consider throwing down another $700 to add Almas caviar.

New to Hell's Kitchen, Bar Gonzo puts a fresh spin on a supermarket classic: frozen French bread pizza. The 70s-styled joint riffs on the childhood staple with its Latchkey Kid Pizza baked on fresh, French bread-style slices from TriBeCa's Grandaisy Bakery, and topped with grown-up ingredients—from pickled mushrooms to ghost pepper salt and black garlic butter. Cut into small slices and served at the bar, it's next-level Stouffer's.

At $38, Sofia Pizza Shoppe's pricey pie is as expensive as it is elusive. Called the DoughDici, the six-slice creation debuted over the summer, originally available a few nights per week for a limited number of guests who purchased an online ticket in advance. Now off the menu, it's even more exclusive, but equally as expensive. The pizzeria only releases a handful of tickets which it sporadically announces through Instagram. The high price accounts for precise timing: Precious dough cold-ferments for three days before it's allowed to rise over 12 hours. Once baked, it's a two-inch-high pie—the very height of luxury pizza.

Fancy-pants pizza pies aren't just served in restaurants requiring a jacket, though to be fair, Fornino's greatest pie is less fancy than it is freakin' huge. At the local chain's newest location, which opened this year on the Williamsburg waterfront, the latest crowd-pleaser is made possible by way of its massive 10-by-12-foot oven, from which the owner cranks out "Roman Pizza" up to six feet long. At $125 a pie, take note that all local deliveries require an SUV.

Keith Flanagan is a Brooklyn-based food and travel writer—he's never met a pastry he didn't eat. Follow his every meal on Instagram at @keithflanny.