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1. 2145 Eats
The best pizza in OC: spicy salame, ricotta, green olives, pickled Fresno chilies, wood smoke. 2145 Placentia Ave., Costa Mesa, 949-873-5853, 2145eats.com
OC Register, Published September 6, 2022 By Brad Johnson
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58. 2145 Eats
A vintage auto garage was turned into a small pizzeria, which later annexed the lot next door and morphed into a rambling outdoor club with a stage for live music. The original chef is gone, but he left behind an incredible recipe for Japanese-inspired Neapolitan pizza dough. The oven is fueled by wood, and the pizzas are superb. So, too, are the hand-mixed Micheladas. Must order: Spicy Salame pizza with ricotta, green olives and pickled hot peppers
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43. A vintage auto garage has been recycled into an indoor/outdoor pizzeria with some of the finest Neapolitan-style dough around. Most of the dining room is actually outside in the backyard. The oven is fueled by wood. The marinara pizza is perfection. So, too, the pizza topped with blue cheese and honey. The wine selection is limited, so you might consider BYOB. Must order: Spicy salami pizza with ricotta, smoked mozzarella, green olives and pickled chilies.
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56. The building that houses this wood-fire pizza joint used to be an auto mechanic garage. The bay doors are rolled up most days to create a cozy indoor/outdoor ambience with tons of natural light and a comfortable breeze. Most of the dining room is actually outside in the back yard. The marinara pizza is perfection. So, too, the pizza topped with blue cheese and honey. You’re just going to have to trust me on that one.
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OC Top Doctors Reception June 2022
2145 was invited to Orange Coast Magazine’s Top Doctors Reception hosted by PIRCH for 2022. All participants donated 2 tasting dishes for 400 guests. It was a celebratory evening for the doctors and their guests to commemorate their accomplishments. 2145 offered their Margherita pizza on their signature dough. They also offered a sneak peak of their summer menu a taster of their Pork Belly with Coriander Aioli and Escabeche.
Best thing I ate: Whole new attitude, same great pizza at 2145 in Costa Mesa
The restaurant is packed, as usual, but there’s something else different. There are servers everywhere, rushing to and from the kitchen and bar, delivering hot pizzas and cold beer.
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"2145 Pizza, Built Into a Former Auto Garage in Costa Mesa, Mixes Italian + Japanese Food"
The existence of 2145 Pizza couldn't be any more head-scratching if it tried. The restaurant is built into a former car-repair garage and gas station in a nondescript part of Costa Mesa. And though the pizzaiolo there bakes pies in the familiar dome of a wood-fueled oven at 800 degrees (as the Naples-style dictates), he uses a sourdough leavened by a 12-year-old starter brought here from Japan. Why? No idea.
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The last, but certainly not least, is dinner at 2145, where the food is so good that I wish I’d be eating there 24/7. Do try the insanely delicious and unique duck carnitas pizza, where a house made chili oil crowns this savory achievement. The duck carnitas are fork-tender, to the point of unforgettable, so for sure it’ll be on your mind the next time you think about pizza. Besides that perfect pie, a robust bowl of Elote Rigatoni will have you obsessing over your next visit to Costa Mesa.
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Duck Salad
The warm spinach and duck salad at 2145 is a meal in itself. With duck confit, grapes, cashews, roasted beets, goat cheese, and balsamic vinaigrette, it’s an unexpectedly satisfying and hearty mélange ($13). Paired with a glass of wine on the cozy back patio, it’s an experience that’s hard to beat. Costa Mesa.
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There’s no room for error when making a marinara pizza. The ingredients are few, and if any one of them is flawed, the whole thing fails. To understand what perfection tastes like, take one bite of chef Eduardo Salcedo’s marinara pizza at 2145. The flavor and brightness of the sauce, the garlic, a hint of dried pepper flakes, the thinness of the dough, the heavy char and ashy crust… Masterful simplicity.
–Brad A. Johnson
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The scene: Laid-back and low-key, with live music some nights on the new outdoor stage. The backyard dining room tripled its capacity during the pandemic when the owners annexed an adjacent property.
What to order: Spicy salame pizza, street-corn rigatoni, hand-mixed micheladas.
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Soulful suckling pig. Finely crafted pizza. Dazzling Peking duck. Orange County is a great place to dine in 2018, thanks to a record number of restaurant openings. The question is, which deserve your attention? Selflessly, we combed through the tangle to narrow your search. Just for fun, we also threw in evidence that the county’s best new spots share serious DNA with some of its best old spots.
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The coolest restaurant of the year is the one that sprouted from what used to be an auto mechanic’s garage. The garage door, now all glass, is rolled up most days to create a cozy indoor/outdoor ambience with an abundance of natural light.
The garage’s old car bay is now the dining room where two large communal tables seat up to 20, plus a 10-seat bar along the wall. Most dining actually happens on the patio.
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The spicy salame pizza here is absolute perfection, blotted with ricotta cheese and generously piled with salame, green olives and pickled Fresno chilies. Also very good: the one with smoked mozzarella, pancetta and egg. Takeout: Yes. Delivery: No.
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Still descending from Wagyu dog heaven, I am next to present you with the butternut squash‘s arancini - 2145’s rendition of the traditional Italian rice ball. Made with a panko coating instead of breadcrumbs, the savory snack delivers a satisfying crunch from the first bite. But then the crispy crust is eclipsed by the gooey goodness inside: a creamy mélange of adobo ride, butternut squash, pancetta, and cheese. This plate is accented with a brown butter ricotta purée and paired with an arugula side salad topped with candied pecans, pickled shallots + chilis.
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Our wine glasses are not yet empty when the waitress arrives with the next round. “You want to chug those?” she asks, smiling, motioning toward our unfinished drinks. The table is already crowded with pizzas and wine glasses, and there’s no room left for anything more.
Instead of chugging, I lift my glass off the table to make room for the incoming refill. I’ve ordered more of the same Sangiovese, so I simply pour what’s left of the first into the second.“Oh, I guess that works just as well,” she says.