575° Pizzeria’s Omni Voted Best in America

An Amarillo restaurant’s Urbanspoon following helped it snag a social media title, Best Overall Pizza in America for 2014.

Urbanspoon tapped 575° Pizzeria’s The Omni as the most popular pie based on a variety of data, from app-users’ votes for the restaurant’s best dish to reviews from Urbanspoon uber users the company calls “primes.”

“We’ve done this list each year” Urbanspoon Community Manager Laura Williams said. “You would have just assumed it (best pizza location) would be Chicago or New York. But nope.”

App users posting their picks for 575°’s top dish might have “joyously sort of tilted the scales,” Williams said.

But the pizzeria’s reviews are consistent, she said.

“Hands down, all of these reviews about 575° are just top notch,” Williams said. “Not only did people love the pizza, but the service, the atmosphere. It seems like they really have a loyal local following.”

575° has an 89 percent favorable rating on Urbanspoon and nearly 300 reviews. The pizza garnered an estimated 1,325 votes, according to statistics Williams shared.

Pizzeria owner Brian Kelleher said news of the Urbanspoon mention surprised him when he heard it.

“All I can say is, ‘Wow,’ and ‘Thank you,’” he said. “This definitely puts our restaurant and that pizza, in particular, on a national level. It’s quite an honor.”

The Omni isn’t one of the eatery’s more exotic offered by 575°’s two locations, 2803 Civic Circle and 7710 Hillside Road No. 700. Basically, it is 575°’s version of a traditional supreme, boasting pepperoni, sausage, mushrooms, green peppers and black olives, Kelleher said.

Kelleher shared his thoughts on why the pizza stood out with his staff during a meeting Sunday, he said.

“The first thing I did when I heard about it was think through all the employees that have come through my business to get it to where we are,” he said. “The recipe hasn’t changed. I don’t care if you’re making the best pizza in the world, if you’re not treating somebody with respect, making sure they get a good experience, they’re not going to be inclined to write a review based just on the food alone.”

Williams said she and others at Urbanspoon have put The Omni on their Urbanspoon wish lists.

“The fun is seeing those secret gems that you might not know or seem kind of quirky and off the beaten path do well,” she said.

SOURCE: Amarillo Globe-News