Artichoke Basille Pizza taking Frankie's site under Ditmars station

[JeffE93]

Artichoke was temporarily closed by the Health Department.  Live mice on the premises, among other violations
Astoria Post

[moose]

CLOSED by health dept

[aldo]

http://astoriapost.com/artichoke-pizza-on-31st-street-closed-temporarily-by-health-dept#comments

[angela1969]

March 20, Staff Report

A trendy Astoria pizza joint was temporarily shut down for health code violations last week.
The Astoria location of citywide chain Artichoke Basille’s Pizza was shut down at the end of last week for racking up 33 health code violation points during a routine inspection, according to the Department of Health website.
The chain has nine locations throughout the city, and the Astoria branch located at 22-56 31st Street opened in March 2015. The pizzeria is best known for its creamy artichoke dip topped slice.
According to the report, the Astoria branch had several violations leading to its shutdown. The report listed one critical violation for the presence of live mice on the premises, and it was also penalized for not being properly vermin-proofed.
The Health Department doles out letter grades based on a point system, with more points equaling more serious sanitation issues. Any restaurant that receives between zero and 13 points receives an A grade, any receiving between 14 and 27 points gets a B grade, and any with 28 or more points gets a C grade. Each point value is assigned based on the size and scale of the violation.
However, if certain violations are considered especially problematic, the Health Department can shut down the restaurant. Once a restaurant is shut down by the Health Department, it will be re-inspected once per month until it scores below 28 points, or the Department will close it for serious and persistent violations.   THIS WAS IN THE ASTORIA POST 3/20/17 -

[wannabehippie]

The fruit stand next store was shut down as well.

[braun]

They got 33 violations from the health department and were closed down. They had live mice running around. I hope they dont reopen

[BoredTemp]

sign was off the door this morning and gate was up. I guess they're back.

[beansiegal]

The problem with Artichoke, beyond their more recent violations, is that this location (and frankly all of them not on 14th Street in the city) is the quality is just not the same.  I went a couple of times and the pizza tastes old and the ingredients aren't as tasty.  Really a shame because the one on 14th Street is superb. 

[angela1969]

I had bought two (2) groupons for them and got my money back --

[TJT]

I agree that something isn't right here.  And yes - the location is unfortunate right at the stairs since it's very dark and dreary there.  The food never impressed me the few times I tried it.  The place is never very clean inside.  Last week I walked by and the windows were filthy.  Like someone tried to clean them with a dirty rag.  Yet despite it all, they seem to always have a good number of people inside.  It's too bad because this part of town lacks "specialty pizza" (as if we need that).  Via Vai and Tuffino also have problems, IMO.  None of them come close to Basil Brick Oven or Milkflower. 

[braun]

The problem with Artichoke, beyond their more recent violations, is that this location (and frankly all of them not on 14th Street in the city) is the quality is just not the same.  I went a couple of times and the pizza tastes old and the ingredients aren't as tasty.  Really a shame because the one on 14th Street is superb.

It was a good location for Frankie's Pizza