A smoky, sweet crust, cooked on the grill, is the main attraction of the Argentinian pies at Pizza Zero in Bethesda. Photograph by Stacy Zarin-Goldberg.

Gonzalo Di Laudo isn’t one for accentuating the positive. The owner of the new Pizza Zero seems to relish the chance to emphasize the negative. "We started with nothing here, no kitchen, no electricity. Nothing. Everything from scratch, even the building. It was auto parts," he says, explaining the restaurant's name.

The pizzas are a big positive. Di Laudo has built Pizza Zero around the wood-grilled pizzas of his native Argentina. The crusts are more thin than thick, a little sweet and a lot crisp; they have the snap and texture of crispbreads, only they're much lighter and more delicious. The grill gives them an irresistible hint of smoke.

Diners expecting a sparsely decorated boutique pizza may be put off by the heavy blanket of cheese on the individual-sized pies. It doesn't bother me, although the best parts are the crusts and the toppings. Among them-- there are 32 in all--you'll find such palate-awakeners as chimichurri sauce, bresaola, Serrano ham, smoked tuna, and boquerones.  If you'd rather try to come up with a harmonious blend of ingredients yourself, there are 28 set combinations that use tomato sauce as their base, as well as six white pizzas.

The restaurant is open daily, but the best days to drop by are Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday. That's when the kitchen makes its empanadas. They're fabulous when fresh -- delicately fashioned, lightly crispy , and filled with, among other things, ground beef or chicken, cream of corn, or spinach with fresh mozzarella.

This review appeared in the September 2007 issue of the magazine.