Georgetown's Stella Pizza is '60s-styled legend in the making

The single most wonderful thing about Stella Pizza is revealed in its jukebox, where the likes of Iggy Pop, Dolly Parton, Sarah Vaughan, Yma Sumac and Mother Love Bone coexist in exquisite proximity. Look around and your fellow patrons reflect the same panorama: a woman shooting pool with her toddler, a couple of guys on a date, a tortured artist drinking alone, some fellas down from the warehouse up Airport Way.

Welcome to Georgetown: Home to the glorious urban spectacle and home, thank God, to Stella Pizza.

It's only been here a year and already feels like the legend every joint in Belltown wishes it could be. The lofty physical space helps to that end: a sweeping diorama of '60s appointments, naugahyde to plastic to a mod op-art mural, with pool and pinball in the back of one room and an uncommonly inviting bar holding down the other. A mysterious lack of cigarette smoke — the place forbids it — is your only clue to the decade.

You take a seat and survey the menu, a long sheet with pizzas on one side and salads, hot sandwiches and pastas on the other. You could order something off that side, but c'mon, you're in a pizza joint! And not just any pizza joint, but the sort that proffers Gorgonzola cheese, red peppers, basil pesto and cilantro among its toppings. Pies are one-size fits all — 16 inches for those who keep track of such things — and can be ordered by the whole or the half. It's not a world-class crust, but you will want a whole: Once you deliver life support to your taste buds — Stella has the spiciest red sauce west of the Rockies — you'll relish the novelty of pizza that really tastes like something.

Your waiter will likely be just as lively and authentic as the product and, if anything like the original specimen who served us, extremely accommodating. All that and a sound system alternating disco funk, Chicago blues, Seattle grunge and '60s folk. Ahhhh — does it get any better?

Check please

Three-spread plate: A toothsome array of warm breads served in variously crackling shards was the star of this platter, though we suspect the spreads were supposed to be. These — roasted garlic, white-bean rosemary and basil pesto — were perfectly adequate, just too similar in flavor, color and texture to add up to the varied assortment you want on a sampler.

Caesar salad: A thoroughly confident corker of a Caesar, copiously dressed and sharpened with about a ton of garlic.

The Beanie: Good ol' American pepperoni, standardly served with extra (terrific) cheese over a red sauce which will never need assertiveness training. Stella's crust was the sole disappointment for those of us who prefer a more flavorfully bready version. Not a deal breaker.

Corson classic: Ten points for originality to this pie starring sweet onions, Gorgonzola cheese and herbed, thin-sliced Yukon Gold potatoes. Though my palate tired quickly of the richness and intensity of the combo (they could reduce the cheese by half, at least), the flavors elbowed each other mischievously and the potatoes, whaddya know, worked!

Ellis Italian: Whoo-ya! Chunks of nicely lean, exhilaratingly peppery Italian sausage showed up with roasted red peppers and a freakish abundance of raw garlic on this fiery pie. I'll bet it killed off every cold I was going to get for the next three years.

Itemized bill, for two

Three-spread plate: $7

Caesar salad (half): $4

Corson classic (half-pie): $10

Ellis Italian (half-pie): $10

The Beanie (half-pie): $10

Tax: $3.60

Total: $44.60

Kathryn Robinson: KathAnRob@aol.com.