I am afraid to tell you Charlottesville’s best kept secret. I have known about this place for well over two years (before I even moved here). I apologize for my selfish secret, but once you try it you’ll see the need for my secrecy. Dr. Ho’s Humble Pie in North Garden is good enough to bring even the toughest pizza critic down. Their pizza rivals any pizza not just in Charlottesville, but anywhere.
If I know nothing about food, I know that hippies make some damn good pizza. I am from the other side of the country and have never failed to be amazed at the pizza you can get over there. However, every good pizza place has had the “greenest” of employees. I never thought I would be able to find that over here.
Wrong.
Dr. Ho’s has a “green” staff, just like home.
The Humble House Rules
The staff is not only talented, but knowledgeable and friendly. I ordered a pizza with all of my favorite things, one of which is fresh mozzarella cheese. So my eight million topping pizza (okay, just five) was my version of perfection.
Apparently I know nothing.
The cook in back had the server come out and explain the difficulty of using fresh mozzarella. If you use it and marinara your crust will not be crispy. I was having none of that! The guy recommended just having the sauce on the side. This was right on. The pizza was crispy and they brought me plenty of marinara.
Atmosphere
This is not your average white and red checkered table cloth set-up. Just to hang out at Dr. Ho’s is worth the trip. The soda machine touts a sign reading, “It’s 900pm. Go Home!” The bathroom is filled with colored on paper plates, the main walls are covered in old postcards, music memorabilia, and other random stuff. The chalkboard menu is a kick, I strongly advise reading it. If you are looking for a place to hang out and have a beer – this is it. The music is always good and the local patrons are as nice as can be.
Interior #1
Interior #2
Bathroom Plates
The Pie
The pie is epic. Take one bit and you will be hooked. This place may be a bit out of the way, but will keep you making the trek with their chewy and crispy crust, fresh toppings, and homemade sauces. I can’t get over the tasty marinara…just the right amount of zing and oh, so, fresh. Again, hate to beat a dead horse (insert dead horse joke here :P), but the crust is so chewy and crispy it makes my mouth water to just think about it. There are two options for crust: white or whole wheat. You can get a pepperoni and cheese with marinara or FILL-IN INTERESTING PIZZA HERE. The possibilities are endless…and yummy.
The Humble Pie (sorry for bad image quality)
The Menu
I have not tried any of their other menu items, but they do offer quite a bit. See the menu here. The place smells great and if their pizza is any indication of the quality of their food, it promises to be amazing.
Dessert
If you have enough room for dessert, try either the peanut butter pie or the crumble. They are both amazing.
The Bad Side
Hey! Nothing is perfect. This place in all its amazingness (that would be a made up word—just for Dr.Ho) is pretty far away. It’s located in a quaint little strip mall in North Garden. Is it worth the trip you ask? YES. Get your butts in the car. It’s only a 15 minute drive.
The place has a great beer and root beer selection. They bring you a cold glass with either. They will deliver…but not to Cville. As a complete and total side note John Grisham gets his pizza there. Dr Ho’s is an awesome place to spend an afternoon or evening out. They are open every day from 11:30 to 9:00 p.m.
Dr. Ho’s Website
(Their hours are NOT updated on their Website)
Popularity: 40% [?]
Tagged as: Charlottesville, Food, North Garden, Pie, Winners
Great place after all these years- I miss when Jerry Danner ran the place
The good Doctor’s calzones were my favorite thing about the city market. Nothing like a hot fresh calzone on a lazy Sunday.
This place has become my traditional end of every summer’s James River Runners drink-and-float-a-thon. They rock.
Wow! Sounds tasty and worth the drive. I’m there.
@1: Whatever happened to Jerry?
He’s still here in town. Mona Lisa, perhaps?
Does Ernestina work @ Dr. Ho’s? That last house rule looks familiar… maybe just a coincidence?
I was gonna say… why just my kids?
There’s a bar? I lub this place already.
I had one on Friday night and it was perfect. I make a pretty mean pizza, but I cant touch theirs.
great review! i’ve wanted to go there forever, but it’s “so far away.” one time we stopped on the way back from del fosse & they said it would be an hour wait so we left. i LOVE pizza.
@ 6 - I was gonna say the same thing.
Why is everyone bustin’ on b yo???
Ooh, I meant to go there a while ago and then I forgot about it…yay I’m definitely going to try and make it there this week. Thanks Lu Sid, looks like a fun place!
I dont even know where North Garden is.
/and dont say “just up from South Garden…”
It’s down 29 south, not too far..9 miles according to Ho’s website
Its 10 minutes from town down 29 south, so actually a good bit closer than Crozet Pizza, which is great too.
for me, this is truly one of cville’s best kept secrets and it’s just down the road from my house. it’s actually easier for me to drive to Ho’s than it is for me to get to downtown cville. (in this case an huge advantage for living on the southside of town). a little tip. while you can’t order 1/2 orders of their “extra special” pizzas, you can mix and match their plain “pizza specials”. might i suggest a 16″ 1/2 popeye (spinach, artichoke, onions, garlic, feta) and 1/2 don ho (pineapple, canadian bacon, mozz, and swiss). take it from a regular. you’ll thank me later.
This place is the bomb, but if I had one complaint it’s that they overload the cheese. Their crust is pretty amazing, but sometimes the cheese overpowers it.
North Garden is down 29 south on the left in a big white building called the crossroad store, I think.
It’s to the left of the main entrance. It’s where you would turn right to go to the Albemarle County Fair
@17 i don’t believe it’s possible to overload the cheese!
No cell phones (seriously)
hippies make the best fascists…
Watch out for speed traps. The friendlies run traps on 29S all the time because it’s easier than 29N, where the real danger is. Unfair!
Dr. Ho’s is the best pizza I’ve had around here, even better than Fabios *perhaps* and Crozet Pizza. Wishing they were on the Mall.
South Garden is more historic but you will never find it without a map. Most people call the place where Dr. Ho’s is “Crossroads”, since North Garden is a little to the east, and the store is called that. The modern version of the store - run by an Austrian I think - has some pretty good snax, sandwiches & milkshakes, and country tourist stuff. But for some reason, for gas & snack food, old timers bypass Crossroads and go two miles further south to the place on the right, Caul’s, before you get to Covesville.
@ 20 Obvi, oy! People always tend to think of the political spectrum as a line, with distinct end point at left and right. This construct is full of fail. I have always thought it more a circle where left at right meet at their extremes ie Hitler and Manson (who had similar agendas though varying success). But what do I know?
/at least this may draw some poli/sci lurker out of the woodwork to slay my opinions with deft application of intellect.
@17: Did you complain about too much cheese? Sacrilege!
I have to agree with Thor– I ended up giving up on their pizza because the amount of cheese made me sick.
Too much cheese?! I just don’t know what to type here.
Could you have simply asked for less cheese, or, like my family reunions, is the cheese mandatory?
Hey, I’m a fan of cheese just like anyone else. But I do like to taste everything I’m eating, and I think the cheese makes it unbalanced, as Thor pointed out.
Bah! Blasphemy!
But could you ask for less cheese?
It would go like this: “May I have a little less cheese than usual”?
I am sincerely curious.
or be self-sufficient & take it off yourself if you ended up with “too much”?
@ 22 - You are correct. It is a circle… or at least not a line. And the pudding proof is Hitler - Stalin.
Manson was nice and all but not really a politician. Now the Symbionese Liberation Front, they were true freedom fighters.
When’s Yo Fest btw?
@29, 30: Of course I could either ask for less cheese or be “self-sufficient” and take it off myself– but I don’t think it’s unreasonable to not purchase something one does not care for. I’m not sneering at anyone else’s palates, I’m just saying I don’t care for it personally.
but if you asked for less cheese then mightn’t you care for it?
/just confused.
Fair enough, and I firmly stand behind your desire for your preference as to cheese levels, but I have never been there, and having cheese level preferences myself, I was wondering if this was something that was out of the customer’s control.
ask for less cheese - and tell them to save it for Oy’s. He likes cheese. He’s cheesy.
/hankering for a hunka…
A slab a slice a chunka…
I have a preference in cheese levels.
This preference is “more”.
byo— I’m sure they would be happy to accommodate your cheese level preferences, whatever those may be.
@37: I lub you josh.
Just ask them to cut the cheese . . . or maybe not.
“less cheese” is anathema. and thank you, silmo, for making me picture hitler with a pudding mustache.
/not going to draw comparisons to a dirty sanchez
//…dammit!
Oh no! The secret is out about Dr. Ho’s.
Here’s more scoop…
Jerry sold the place last year to Michael (formerly of Ivy Inn and opening chef at Ciboulette (before the meltdown)) and his wife Nancy. They are always there working and he is a super talented chef which you can see in some of the surprisingly upscale apps like the sliced beet salad w/ candied walnuts and local Caromont goat cheese.
They have live music on Wednesday nites.
If you don’t want to wait, call in your pizza order and by the time you get there it is hot out of the oven and ready to go.
Has anybody heard what Jerry is doing next? He had a bunch of great eateries around town before moving down to crossroads and serving humble pie.
♥♥♥♥♥
Weird..but someone said “Dr Ho’s” to me tonight out of the blue. I don’t think he was making a disparaging remark and I follow the signs. No one has ever said “Dr Ho’s” to me before and I’ve been here 7 years. Jaded Northerner that I am..I may have to take a trek down that way. I come from the land of great pizza. Lynwood Cafe, Randolph Mass. The waitresses have been there since The Depression. And so have the customers, but my God. Thin crust, not too much sauce and enough oil to sustain us forever.
Taliesin you Bay Stater you
IMHO, Dr. Ho’s is possibly the 3rd best best pizza in C’ville (it’s good, but it’s not a true pie), but it doesn’t come anywhere close to a good NY pie. Sorry y’all, but this boy knows pizza, and you just can’t get it done right south of New Jersey. As for the 2 better shops in C’ville, I have to give the nod to Fabio’s on High Street (as close to a NY pie as you can find in Central VA) and Crozet Pizza.
Fabio’s and Crozet Pizza are both good pizzas but, Dr Ho’s is way better than either, IMHO.
To each his own.
fabio’s and crozet are great pizza’s, but there style is entirely different. they are going for a rigid/flat pizza with more attention to the sauce than the toppings.
I stop every time i go to or from Baltimore or Philadelphia to see the owners Father/Mother and other relatives.Its the best atmosphere and pizza I’ve had from Saigon to Rome,and any where in the US. you have to go to believe
Fabio’s crust is good, I always get the Neapolitan, I don’t know if that makes any diff. The pics on the wall are from Naples. In Hook/C-Ville Mr. Fabio explained that he never uses frozen dough.
And Dr. Ho’s closed 26 minutes ago. Daggonnit.
The Sunrise Café (formerly Sal’s—no, not the downtown folks; different folks) in Earlysville is the best area pizza I’ve had. I recommend ordering garlic as a topping. De-friggin-licious.
@52 they’re related. see last week’s c-ville/hook, i think.
i had some more wretched christian’s tonight. made me remember why i don’t go there.
If you’re gonna get pizza on the mall, go to Vita Nova.
i had a gift certificate. it almost wasn’t worth it anyway. & how was south street?
@52 they’re related. see last week’s c-ville/hook, i think.
Really? This google search whose results include a c-ville article whose link won’t seem to load for me. All I get from google is:
Dang! Mystery. Now I’m curious and lacking in google fu. Anyone know?
Sorry I went to sleep right after that. South Street was fun as usual. How was McGradys?
yeah it’s that article, the cville 2 weeks ago:
“Finazzo (owner of Sal’s on the mall) also used to own the Sal’s Pizza in Earlysville, but sold that to a friend a few years ago—the Sal’s Pizza in Crozet is owned by Finazzo’s brother.”
i’ve never had any of them.
i did too! smoky, loud, & filled with undergrads. dinner was good though.
Where was dinner? I thought you said you had “wretched christian’s”.
You ought to ask the owner Mike, to cook you up some ribs, He makes the best ribs in the U.S.!!! He made them before he owned the resturant, and was in school at the time. They probably are better now if that is possible!
@59 no, that was my after-gym snack. dinner was mas.
Good choice. What’s that, 3 times in the last month?
not my choice, there was a vote. not that i’m complaining!
I don’t know anyone who would complain about going to Mas.
I eat (a small) dinner at mas almost every monday. Mas Monday!
I just had a Christian’s pizza lunch experience at Pantops… one slice chicken/onion, one slice mushroom. I took a bite and thought I had missed because my mouth still tasted of…well mouth I guess. Looked and there was a big piece the size of my piehole missing from the slice but still NO messages of taste being received at tastebud central. I chewed… I masticated like a big black and white heifer but to no avail. It is IMHO an achievement of monumental proportions to take those ingredients… mix them up and produce a piece of utter shite like that. NASA or some agency should look into that.
Never ever again…
Floozy meet orchid. You two could be friends.
i KNOW! darn, i just realized i could have spent my gift certificate on beer instead of cardboard.
Ouch. Imagine a beer gift certificate. Does the ABC Store sell gift certificates?
yes they do! I recieve two a year. Best stocking stuffer ever!
Christains has fallen behind Vita Nova, in pizza, freshness, decor, smell, etc. BUT, Vita will try to upsell you on the table-sized wine selection, whose prices are nowhere posted as far as I can tell. The home-made desserts are another fillip that can end up padding your bill!
The Mall needs a RedBox video rental robot. Sorry, video store clerks, no one downtown rents, except maybe maybe the ersatz Country Store.
If you are reading this post just for SAT words this spring, well don’t let these gollywomp you, they’re only hifalutin irruptions of jodhpurence kittering about the place, linguistic manufacture from the nonces of oracular pedantry, recherche, senescent turpitude & unwholesome vitiated, woebegone xerxian, yenned-for zing.
If you go into Vita Nova right before they close, they will hook you up with all kinds of free pizza. Twice I’ve gone in at the end of an apparently slow night to grab 2 slices. I ended up leaving with an entire pizza of various toppings for $6.
Echo … please change your screen name to Echo said said said.
Thanks for the intro to Orchid… we certainly have similar taste… or total lack thereof in this particular case.
The real pisser is that their pizza LOOKS utterly scrummy… perhaps I’ll just become a pervy pizza voyeur and stand there chowing down a Quiznos just ogling the goods lasciviously.
hmmm - Floozy returns. Flooby returns.
Is it Floo season?
with Floobs back it is most definitely cougar season
Personally, I could care less what Yankee pizza is supposed to taste like, Hippie pizza is the way to go… and Dr. Ho’s is the best Pizza I’ve seen outside of Italy. I like how when you ask for garlic it comes with whole cloves!
The local bluegrass scene is also great, and there’s just about nothing better than a cold glass of beer, good pizza and talented local musicians. My only complaint is that on music nights the place is packed it’s hard to get in. If they just could convice the landlord to knock down a wall or something and expand the place then it would be perfect.
couldn’t care less, I think. “could care less” implies you care.
/petting my peeve again
Too much cheese or not this place has the best pizza ever created in the world
The SO and I trekked out to Blue Mountain Brewery today but it was absolutely packed (way to go BMB! no wonder; you guys rock). So we hopped back on 64 and went to Dr. Ho’s. Fucking delicious. Whole cloves of garlic on the Popeye pizza. A delicious beer. Laid-back yet attentive staff. I am definitely going back there many times.
@78 I love you. It is GREAT pizza.
someonefeedmepizza! thanks.
Mike and Nancy are talking about expanding on the north side. That would be awesome!
I love playing there because all you pizza lovers make a great and appreciative audience! Good food, good beer, good music . . . what more is there to a happy life?
One last comment (for now): Little Mermaid . . . shrimp and pesto . . . YUMMMM . . .
Me and 2 o 4 went and it was fan-fuckin’-tastic! We drank our fancy imported beers, sexually harassed the hot owner/waiter and colored on some paper plates while some couple up front sang about carpenter ants. The pizza (whole wheat margherita pimped out with some cheddar and onions) was DELICIOUS. Way better than Christian’s. My paper plate features a picture of my Hoegaarden bottle and some kick-ass psychedelic background. 2’s plate said, “C-villain brought me here and all I got was this plate.”
Uh-uh. I’m keeping this up here till ya’ll look at my pictures.
Dammit!
The pizza looks deliciously blurry.
@83 wow that pizza looks all blurry - had it been drinking?
Cameraphone y’all.
At least we looked at your pictures.
@ 88 You really should get an iPhone.
Shen I am so glad you and 2o4 liked it!
@82 I talked to them last time I was there and they seemed pretty reluctant to move. I don’t think Nancy is the biggest fan of working in Cville. It would be nice though. I think I would gain at least 20 pounds if they were closer though.
@91: I liked the owner. He can top my pizza anytime.
I have not been yet, but if it is as good as everyone says it is, then they deserve this.
Whoa! Where’d that apostrophe come from?
You keep changing your name. You’re bound to make a mistake sooner or later.
[…] Dr. Ho’s Humble Pie…Read our Review! […]
Well damn, I dont much like pizza (yea I know, not like pizza? im weird like that) -but this makes me want to try it anyway
[…] or the girl in the band is hot. Bribes also work (for example: If you buy me a pizza from this fine, local establishment in return for a Song of the Day feature, consider it a done deal). Of course I’m only […]