Blue Line Pizza Joins Burlingame Community

Attention Burlingame pizza lovers. In the competition for best pizza in Burlingame, a new restaurant has thrown its chef's hat into the ring.

Blue Line Pizza opened its door in mid-August and has quickly become a popular spot in town. Blue Line comes to Burlingame from the founders of Little Star Pizza in San Francisco, well loved among city-dwellers and named by 7x7 Magazine as one of the 100 things to try before you die in San Francisco.

Known best for its deep-dish pizza (it also serves thin crust), the Blue Line name plays on the train going from O’Hare Airport to downtown Chicago, home of the deep-dish style.

“[The name] is a subtle nod to our Chicago roots,” said Managing Partner Angela Pace. “Deep dish is kind of what we’re known for.”

Blue Line serves the same food as Little Star, but with the addition of a few appetizers and salads, Paninis and a full bar, open seven days a week for lunch and dinner.

The opening of Burlingame’s Blue Line comes on the heels of the first Blue Line opening in Campbell—Little Star’s first attempt at expanding outside of San Francisco.

“We’ve kind of been toying with the idea for awhile, and it just seemed it was time,” Pace said. “Some people might think it’s not the best time just because of how the economy has been, but we’ve found it was ok.”

Pace said the Campbell outpost is doing great and the Burlingame restaurant is coming along nicely.

Although Pace and her business partner plan for more Blue Line restaurants on the Peninsula, as well as one in San Jose, she emphasized the business is not a restaurant chain.

“We’re multi-unit, but we’re not a chain,” she said. “As soon as you walk in you can see it’s a Blue Line, but it’s not a cookie cutter.”

While the restaurants share the same menu and bar, the environment of each fits specifically into its town.

Pace said the atmosphere in the Burlingame restaurant has a blended, balanced vibe. While it might be a bit hipper and more upscale than the average pizza joint, it’s casual and laid back enough for a family dinner with the kids, but urban enough for business colleagues or friends to gather at the end of the day.

She said she loves the community vibe on the Avenue and in the restaurant, noting that patrons often stop and say hello to at least one of two people they know on the way to their tables.

“Everybody’s been so supportive of us,” Pace said. [Burlingame is] a great town…and we wanted to be part of the community.”

She said the restaurant plays an active role in town by hiring locally, getting to know neighboring businesses and even dropping pizzas off at local schools just to say hello.

Pace said her favorite deep-dish pizzas are the Mediterranean chicken or the Blue Line and for thin crust she favors the white pie. All of the pizzas use fresh ingredients and chefs strive for the best in what they do.

“We’re not everything to everybody; we try to do what we do and do it really well, “Pace said. “We’re selective in what we do, and we really want to do it well…It’s not rocket science, it’s pizza.”

Stop by Blue Line at 1108 Burlingame Avenue or order online at www.bluelinepizza.com.

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