What: What’s the perfect liquid accompaniment to New Haven’s famous pizza and burgers? If you guessed local beer, well, we won’t fault you, but the other answer is: local soda! A family-owned company called Foxon Park has been making sodas in East Haven, Connecticut, since 1922, and somewhere along the way it’s become the default drink of choice at many of the city’s historic restaurants. Among its 18 refreshing, nostalgia-inducing flavors are cream, grape, ginger ale, root beer, orange, gassosa (Italian lemon-lime), and a particularly beloved white birch beer. Like other small soda producers, Foxon Park uses real cane sugar in its soda, not high-fructose corn syrup.
Where: Our classic white birch is from Modern Apizza (874 State St., map), one of the many excellent area pizzerias offering Foxon Park sodas. There is something about pizza and soda, isn’t there?
When: Tues-Thurs, 11am-11pm; Fri & Sat, 11am-midnight; Sun, 3pm-10pm
Order: Modern offers a selection of Foxon Park from the fountain and in generous one-liter bottles. We ordered the regular white birch from the tap, while our tablemate ordered the diet bottle. (It should go without saying that we always prefer regular over diet sodas!) The birch is a great accompaniment to the pizza: a crisp and refreshing palate cleanser.
Alternatively: You’ll also find Foxon Park at the other pizza giants in town: Frank Pepe Pizzeria Napoletana (157 Wooster St., map), its across-the-parking-lot annex, The Spot (163 Wooster St.), and Sally’s Apizza (237 Wooster St., map). Original hamburger purveyor Louis’ Lunch (261-263 Crown St., map) likewise offers a nice selection.
