I’ve stood on Route 1 some nights where the whooshing cars seem to say just one phrase as they fly by its intersection with Knox Road: “Don’t leave us, Ratsie’s.”
College Park legacy and staple Ratsie’s Pizza is known for its gigantic pizza slices and wings — meaning happy stomachs for the sober and the tipsy — but lately, I can only think of it shrouded by a cloud of nostalgia. It’s true that the eatery is shutting its doors starting this fall, making these months some of the last few we can experience the restaurant in all its glory.
The facts don’t lie: Ratsie’s is grungy. It’s known for being a rest stop on your walk home when you’ve had just one too many drinks across the street at a bar. It’s fluorescent and neon and in your face.
But all that aside, Ratsie’s is the only classic College Park pizza restaurant. Ratsie’s was there first. And that makes it College Park’s best.
Blaze Pizza and Slices Pizza Co. can’t give you the pizza offerings plus wings in one fell swoop, and Pizza Kingdom and Terrapin Pizza Mart give you Ratsie’s minus the Terps spirit. Ratsie’s is the restaurant devoted to pizza, subs and wings that has been on the downtown stretch of College Park for more than a few years, and that says something.
It says something when you know you’ve always been able to walk past the neon sign and loud colors of Ratsie’s exterior into the joint, take a whiff, order up a slice and dig into it. It says something when you know the menu will have exactly what you’re craving if you’re looking for a pizza or snacks or beer. It says something when generations of Terps have come together over the same giant pizza slices.
Ratsie’s manages to fit a whole lot of symbolism in just its title. It’s more than pizza; it’s a College Park sanctuary. It’s home.
