Yesterday was hot and humid like a sauna. My hair got wet just walking my son to the subway at 7:45 in the morning. Beads of sweat formed above my lip as I trudged to my office; even my sunglasses fogged up.

At dinnertime,  all I could think about were frozen Margaritas. So husband, daughter, and I walked s-l-o-w-l-y to Two Boots, dreaming of icy air and cold drinks. Son was with friends at the Pavillion seeing Charlie and the Chocolate Factory for the second time.

As usual,  we asked not to sit too close to the pizza window as there’s always the risk of getting hit by a flying ball of pizza dough. Been there, done that. The restaurant was Monday-night-quiet and there were almost no children running around. Amazing for a place that can feel like a day camp for hyperactive children on a busy night.

We missed the super friendly waitress with the red pony tail and nerdy glasses: she’s working at Brooklyn Fish Camp now after five years at Two Boots (news flash).

Once we ordered my peach Margarita, my daughter’s Shirley Temple, and my husband’s Guiness, we decided on a Pizza Face and our old favorite: craw-fish, andouille and goat cheese pizza.

My daughter drew with the waitress-supplied crayons on the white paper tablecloth, as my husband and I reminisced about all the years we’ve been coming to Two Boots. Before we were married, we used to enjoy Two Boots on Avenue A. In fact, my husband proposed to me there using an empty white coffee cup as a ring. The East Village establishment wasn’t really a kid’s place in the 1980’s; it was more of a groovy place for 20-somethings like us, who lived on the Lower East Side.

Once we moved to Brooklyn, we discovered that Two Boots was a children’s paradise. From early on, our children loved to stand on the steps at the pizza window and get pizza dough from the pizza man. They’d spend most of the meal pounding the dough, making imaginary pizzas, asking the pizza man for more. And they liked the food, too.

The Pizza Face is probably the centerpiece of the Two Boots experience. A small pizza with a mild, kid-friendly sauce, it has eyes made of tomato slices, black olives for eyeballs, a sprig of broccoli for a nose, and a sliver of red pepper for a mouth (or some variation on that theme).

Last night, my daughter spent at least five minutes removing the offending vegetables from her Pizza Face. We had forgotten to order the pizza face sans face. She grimaced as she used her fingers to delicately extricate the tomato slices (ugh), the broccoli, the dreaded black olives, and then very, very carefully, the slivers of red pepper.

"Why don’t they put kid food on the Pizza Face? " my daughter asked.
"Because vegetables are good for you. That’s why they’re there," I said.
"Oh yeah," she said.

Once the veggie removal was complete, she ate one slice finding the pizza a little too cheesy and un-Pino’s like. The waitress packed up her left-over Pizza Face (sans veggies) and one slice of our delicious combination. We noticed that one of the owners of Two Boots and his family were eating at a booth not far from us: it’s always a good sign to see the owner eating the food. "This place must be a goldmine," I said to my husband. And he agreed. It’s been around for ever. And it’s still going strong.

Future generations of Brooklyn children will be delicately removing the vegetables from the Pizza face and pounding pizza dough at the pizza window.

Tradition. Tradition.