by Jesse Haley

The Paddock Restaurant, located on the corner of Pearl and Marshall Streets, has been voted Somerville’s Best Pizza by the readers of The Somerville News.

       “It has been a family owned restaurant for a long time,” said David Wakely, who owns and operates The Paddock along with his father Jimmy, his sister Donna, and his uncle Danny. “We just had our 25^th anniversary,” said Wakely.

     In its early years, The Paddock was a saloon that offered live Irish music a couple of nights a week and barroom brawls almost as frequently. A small grill and fry-o-lator behind the bar enabled the bartender to dole out steak tips and fries along with the obligatory whiskey and beer.     

     “When I was 14 my father used to let me come in on Sunday mornings and wash dishes,” said Wakely.

       Soon after, the Wakely family acquired the small convenience store next door and increased the restaurant’s space by more than half. The walls were decorated with everything equestrian, from painted depictions of horse races to actual saddles.

       One day, with plans to expand the menu as well as the space, Jimmy Wakely asked his son, “Why don’t you try to learn how to make pizzas?”

       With that, the teen-aged David set off to sample as much pizza in the Boston area as he could. “I went everywhere,” he said, “I was a kid just thinking ‘pizza, pizza, pizza.’”

       In addition to trolling the pizzerias of Boston, David also logged long hours at The Paddock.

       “I worked from 10 o’clock in the morning to 12 o’clock at night, seven days a week, for over three years,” he said.

       The hard work paid off, and The Paddock’s pizza business began to grow. They started selling so many pies that a separate pizza kitchen had to be built. Next, a take-out station was constructed to handle the delivery calls coming in from Somerville, Medford, Cambridge and Charlestown.

       “On a great day, I’d say we sell about 300 pizzas,” Wakely said. “And delivery is probably more than half of that business.”

       For Wakely, with success came the freedom to step away from the day-to-day operations. That option arose also due to his stellar staff. They expanded the menu to include steaks, fresh seafood, even barbecue.

       But it seems to be the pizza that everyone likes the most about The Paddock.

Wakely said Gilvan Souza, the pizza maker, is in charge of everything pizza related. If he thinks the sauce is too watery, or the dough a little off, he has the authority to change it. “He’s the boss,” said Wakely, “if he says ‘do it this way,’ that’s how it gets done.”

       Working in the kitchen on a pizza, Souza stretched out the dough and ladled large circles of sauce onto the pie. This particular pizza was the Paddock Special, the restaurant’s number one seller, topped with mushrooms, onions, peppers, olives, sausage, meatballs, salami and pepperoni.

       Once completed, Souza slid the thin yet packed pizza into the oven, and ten minutes later the kitchen was filled with a mouth watering aroma.

       But despite all the delicious toppings, Wakely believes it is his sauce that keeps the Paddock’s patrons coming back for more.

       “You know how when you get certain pizza, and you can taste the tin of the can?” asked Wakely. “That’s bitterness in the tomatoes. We get Italian crushed tomatoes, straight from Italy. They are sweeter.”

       Wakely has shown a willingness to pay a higher price for quality ingredients, and you can taste the result in The Paddock’s delicious pizza.

       “It is a big, big difference,” said Wakely. That difference certainly is appreciated by the readers of The Somerville News.