Sorry, Poppe.

Already, at only like 1.8 dog years of age, we’ve posted 50 reviews that span six different states; MLB Network’s Trenni Kusnierek Tweeted her love for the DoZ; I unnecessarily picked on talented and seemingly cool Milwaukee rapper JC Poppe; and I’m pretty sure one of us typed the word “cunt” at least once in a review.

But few know how far this site’s history truly spans… until now. Initial planning for Doctors of Za started when I worked for a daily newspaper in the Fox Cities. In a detailed 3-page submission destined for the Editor in Chief and our publisher, I pitched DoZ as a light-hearted blog devoted to one man’s appreciation for local pizza. It made it to a Content Manager (half a rung up the ladder), who stopped reading after a page, giving it the immediate thumbs down. Mind you, this newspaper has reader submitted pictures of dogs as the front page centerpiece three of seven days each week… so whatever.

Undaunted, I approached Ronnie and told him my idea… which he loved. I asked him to design a site any way he’d like, and he knocked it out of the park. Just look at this thing! From there, I recruited some friends, who happen to be some of the best and funniest writers in the state, to contribute to a blog where there would be no compensation, and possibly no readers. Everyone I asked accepted my invitation and has produced incredible stuff. Seriously, my dad likes Benji Mane’s reviews more than mine. 

Anyway, above this (slightly too long) letter will soon rest our 50th review: A collaborative effort between myself — the visionary and the original Doctor of Za — and Ronnie — the man who put my idea into action, and who has done a great deal of our reviews to date — to rate MaMa DeMarinis’ Pizza in Bay View. But 50 reviews merely marks the beginning. Thank you to the other writers, and mostly, to our readers. I assure you that as long as there’s pizza to eat and dick jokes to make, we’ll be there. I’m willing to even bet someone threatens to sue us before this is all over. That’d be kind of awesome.

Love,
T. Mario

Also this week:
• Reportedly, Doctors of Za can no longer be accessed at The Journal Sentinel office. Was it something I said?
• Ronnie earned his doctorate of Za with a quality review of Zayna’s Pizza.
• Ronnie and I also served up a hot slice of poetic judgement at Moct’s first annual Iron Pizza Competition. 
• Brian Butch made the best regional frozen pizza commercial I’ve ever seen (note: I’ve only seen one frozen pizza commercial in my life).

Expect a Madison review from the likes of Benji Mane and Tenderoni, a Shorewood review from Tony dan Za, and a T. Mario review of my dad’s favorite Appleton pizzeria in the near future. Hopefully, Sto Cazzo – who’s currently on tour with Red Knife Lottery – will also put up a review from the road, detailing exactly how many dicks non-Wisconsin pizza sucks. So keep reading!

Going forward, we’ll get each of our nine geographically spread writers involved in writing reviews. Slowly, we’ll develop a working statewide pizza index to help you on your travels to such unfamiliar terrains as Eau Claire or Bonduel (and still probably not Racine), while also weighing in on the best options when visiting places like Madison and Milwaukee.

Keep reading, bookmark us, tell your friends and please feel inclined to send in restaurant recommendations. We’ll try and lend our Epicurus meets Weekend at Bernie’s 2-style reviews to as many restaurants as we can. The Doctors are in.

Read on as we strive to develop a working index of pizza reviews both in and beyond Wisconsin. Please alert us to places we’ve yet to try. And if you’d like to treat one of our contributors to slice at your restaurant, we’d straight up get wood off that.