divergent view. i realize that arguing over pizza joints is as futile as arguing abortion. i never bring up abortion, but i must weigh in here. first, i'd like to qualify the state of pizza in the triangle - it's all "non-food". the distinction between "food" and "non-food" is often distinct, but the line can blur. food is made with fresh ingredients that can be found in nature (usually), while non-food consists of ingredients (some or all) that were invented by food scientists in a lab. obvious examples of non-food are twinkies, doritos, pop-tarts, hamburger helper, anything from fast-food restaurants, etc. an apple you grow in your back yard is likely food.
non-food can never taste fresh - it either tastes artificial or bland. food has a zing to it that non-food can never have. (by the way, i love many non-foods. i'm just trying to make a distinction.)
back to pizza. pizza usually consists of dough, tomato sauce, cheese and toppings. what is often served as pizza is usually non-food because the cheese is almost always some weird americanized version of mozzarella. fresh mozzarella is expensive and goes bad in a week. it makes sense that pizza places rarely use it. but there you have it - a major ingredient is non-food. this is so at lilly's.
sauce is just as often a contributor. all you need is good tomatoes - even some good canned tomatoes count as food. but usually what you get on your pizza is not made with good tomatoes. usually, its sauce from a can that either started with bad tomatoes or heated up to a point that the flavor is nil. red mush. i'm not sure what lilly is doing, but i can say that the sauce is low on tomato flavor. do some research on good sauce tomatoes, find them, buy them, make a sauce and compare.
and the crust . . . lilly's crust does taste somewhat bready and somewhat fresh - but it is leaden to me. to me, "leaden" is bad. a lot of people like it, so i won't argue this point any further. chalk that one up to opinion.
lastly, the service has always been kinda sad at lily's. i realize they're busy, but there's got to be a way to process orders more quickly. the line is always longer than it should be. it's funny to watch the servers calling out people's names and half the time not finding the patron during their first lap. why doesn't the manager sit down with some of his employees and think this stuff through. easy fixes. it just takes a little thinking.