Pursuit of the Perfect Pizza - Pegasus Pizza (Review) - Lane Today

"I have one other fondness, maybe actually a weakness, that’s too tempting not to tackle. Pizza!

Much like the nachos, I’d imagine that when it comes to pizza, folks around town are going to want to know where to get a good slice or two. In fact, I’m sure that there will be no lack of opinions when it comes to what constitutes a good… no, make that GREAT slice of pizza.

So this has become my self-appointed mission; to sacrifice myself to the cause of finding the best slice of pizza in Lane County!

The quest begins naturally in this case with a local pizza establishment known as Pegasus Pizza. Pegasus began with their first restaurant on the University of Oregon campus in 1989. It is a family owned business and has since expanded to include two other locations at Oakway Center and now in South Eugene at the Woodfield Station shopping center near Market of Choice."

Click the link above to read the full article.

Pies are high art at Pegasus Pizza

Appeared in print: Thursday, May 10, 2012, page E17, The Register Guard ®

As owners of Pegasus Pizza, Lori and Paul Reader appreciate that today’s pizza is a far cry from what it was in the days when the entire family would go out for a pepperoni pizza on a Friday night because it was convenient, cheap and filling.

Nowadays, many folks choose to dine on hand-tossed, artisan-crafted pizza and sip a nice glass of wine or locally brewed beer.

“We make our pizza absolutely the Italian way,” Paul Reader touts.

The Readers, like other purists in the gourmet pizza business, acknowledge that not everyone can master the art of making fine pizza. But when they do, he says, “we call them artists.”

As general manager, Kalen Willis helps the Readers with day-to-day operations for the Pegasus location at Oakway Center and the original restaurant near the University of Oregon campus, which they purchased in 1999. The two restaurants combined have 30 employees.

But first and foremost, Willis says he is a pizza artist.

Willis describes his raw crusts as the canvas, to which he adds color — perhaps fresh spinach and feta cheese — and texture — kalamata olives and fresh garlic. He arranges the ingredients in a visually appealing way and then slides the edible canvas into a brick oven, where it bakes to golden perfection.

Naturally, Willis takes pride in such work. That said, he encourages people who want to test the quality of a pizza to eat a slice of plain cheese pizza.

Willis, who helps develop the menus at Pegasus, says his personal favorite is the Little Italy pizza, with Italian sausage, mozzarella, roasted red pepper, fresh basil and gorgonzola, embedded in a garlic and olive oil base that’s brushed over a thin crust.

Buying locally whenever possible, and using the freshest ingredients as Pegasus does, can mean higher prices for the customer. Sometimes they “can’t connect to the cost of good ingredients,” Willis admits.

Although pizza is the centerpiece here, Willis says, “A lot of people come in just for the salads,” which include Caesar, Greek, Pear and Gorgonzola.

In Eugene, “the microbrew is something people come to expect,” Willis adds. Pegasus at Oakway offers four microbrews from Oregon and Washington. The establishment changes its brews periodically and tries to offer customers brands they wouldn’t be able to find in typical grocery stores.

The Readers opened Pegasus Pizza at Oakway Center in 2010. Bene Pizza, another upscale pizza restaurant, formerly occupied the Oakway space. It’s much smaller and decidedly more upscale than the Pegasus Pizza on campus.

Pegasus at Oakway is sophisticated enough for adult dining, but casual enough for well-behaved kids, too. The overall feeling is intimate, with seating for approximately 30 diners, who can peer across the open kitchen and watch the pizza artists toss dough with finesse. Out front are a few bistro tables for alfresco dining.

On a recent sunny day, a number of customers opted for the grab-and-go slice, perhaps to take back to the office or accompany them on a walk.

Of course, compared to the campus restaurant, there’s plenty of parking here at Oakway.

The Readers moved to Eugene from the San Fernando Valley in Southern California in 1993. As others have done, they were seeking a slower pace of life for themselves and their young children.

Down south, Lori Reader had made a career in sales; Paul worked in business. In Paul’s younger years, he got a peek into the restaurant industry by working as a waiter. These days, Lori says, her husband is the one “who has the big vision” about the business.

Lori Reader had never worked in the restaurant industry, but has a definite knack for working with customers and employees while managing accounts payable and other nuts-and-bolts tasks at the restaurant.

Being in business with a spouse “amplifies” one’s commitment to the business, she professes. “It doesn’t leave you,” she says, and invariably dinnertime conversation reverts back to their restaurants.

Although business is good, Lori Reader says the restaurant had about 20 percent more foot traffic when Oakway’s Borders store was their next-door neighbor. The couple hopes the as-yet-unnamed new corner tenant (or tenants) will help attract more customers.

She says if they find another location on par with Oakway Center, they would certainly open a third restaurant, where, of course, the making of pizza would carry on as a high art form, one pie at a time.