Tommy's & Noch's

Harvard students are notoriously nocturnal, as attested to by the fact that I am writing this column at 4:41 in the morning. But studying (and procrastinating) is hungry work, and the hours are long between the end of dinner and the beginning of breakfast in the dining halls. Once you've depleted your store of stale Pop Tarts and Mountain Dew and sampled everything that vending machine cuisine has to offer, you may find yourself actually leaving your room in search of the perfect late night nourishment, the manna of the after-midnight crowd: pizza.

Pizza is not just a dietary choice, it's a lifestyle. But as you set off in search of mozzarella and tomato sauce, you face a dilemma. Two roads diverge, and it's hard to say which is the less traveled.

Just off JFK St. is Pinocchio's, affectionately dubbed. Noch's by its patrons. The verb form is to noch--usage: It was Chinese deli night at the dining hall so around midnight I went noching (rhymes with toking). Noch's features a variety of subs and pasta in addition to pizza, but the real attraction is the square-cut, thick-doughed Sicilian-style slices. According to Manager Adam DiCenso, Sicilian slices of pepperoni have been the most popular item for years, but the newer tomato basil topping (my personal choice) is also doing well. Plain pizza is $1.50, Sicilian is $1.85.

According to DiCenso, the attraction for students is the food. "It's good food, it's fast and it's cheap," said DiCenso. But students frequently come to socialize as well as to enjoy the cuisine, and at almost any hour until their closing time, 1:00 a.m. weeknights and 1:30 a.m. weekends, you can find students crowded around the small tables and relaxing. "After about 8 at night it's 98 percent students," said DiCenso. "We get a lot of the working people during the day."

The decor at Noch's is kind of funky Italian. As DiCenso says, "the owners are pretty proud of their heritage," and it shows in the many posters plastered around the small restaurant. Live vines are twined about the ceiling. On one wall is a rather trippy mural that shows Pinocchio eating a slice of pizza and fleeing a whale. "The story of Pinocchio originated in Italy," explained DiCenso.

The atmosphere is bright and busy but not too loud. "Knock on wood but we've had very little trouble with rowdy crowds," DiCenso said. "We know most of the students here so it never really gets out of hand."

Michael C. Fisher '99, a Noch's regular, cites the service and the food as the reasons for his allegiance. "I like the guys who work here. And they make good pizza," said Fisher. "They care about what they do and they don't care about anything else in the world."

Cheaper, louder, and open later than Noch's, Tommy's House of Pizza holds substantial sway over the Harvard late night life. To "go on a Tommy's run" means to walk down to Mt. Auburn Street any day of the week until 3 a.m. and buy a large slice of hot, greasy and (debatably) delicious pizza for $1.25. Unless otherwise requested (and why would it be?) all pizza is sold with the famous sesame seed edge. Tommy's also sells subs--the chicken parmesean is a favorite but the tuna should be avoided--and great garlic bread.

But Tommy's isn't just a pit stop. With speakers blaring Van Halen or 70s disco and video and pinball games in the corner, Tommy's is a busy hang-out spot and a favorite tool of the expert procrastinator.

"We've had people dancing on the counter a couple of nights, and dancing on the tables," reminisced Tommy's owner Mike T. McHale. "We had the whole place doing the YMCA one night. One table in the corner started it and by the second chorus it was the whole place."

McHale says the party-like ambience is intentionally aimed at college students. "It's like the whole atmosphere where people wouldn't be afraid to do something here as oppose to like a restaurant where you wouldn't stand up and do the YMCA," said McHale.

So if you're pulling yet another allnighter and run out of twizzlers and ramen, don't despair. Greasy, unhealthy, wonderful pizza is just around the corner.