Pizza is a continuum. The act of topping flattened dough with sauce (or not), cheese (or not), and a variety of toppings (or not) greets us in childhood, and ushers us through our lives with a hedonist’s gloved and greased-stained hand. Think about almost every birthday party you went to as a child. Think about your favorite school lunch, the one you’d go to even if you were a brown-bagger. Think about casual office parties, going away celebrations, what dad used to order when mom was out of town. Think about Tuesday nights at my gym: Pizza night. Hell, think about lunch yesterday. You had a slice, didn’t you? You did. I saw you at Portland Pie.

You can’t think of another food that is so widely despised and so universally embraced by the American masses. Pizza is reality television: tiresome, addictive, blamed for destroying the health of our population, but indulged in by all. Most of us are powerless against its sly promise of comfort even while sober; after a night of drinking, the cheesy snake-oil tonic is a near requirement. "Eat me," the temptress taunts Alice, half-finished High Life in one hand, drooping slice in the other. "In the morning, you won’t even feel the booze!" Sometimes she’s lying. Sometimes she’s not.

Everybody loves pizza. Omnivores, vegetarians, even those vegan folks have their bastardized version. Even if you say you don’t, it’s because you’ve eaten too much of it lately, right? It’s okay. It’s not your fault. It’s . . . not . . . your . . . fault!

The solution? Well, don’t get all uppity and renounce pizza; that would be crazy-talk. The best thing is to just make sure you’re eating the good stuff. A good friend of mine once promised me pizza heaven when he ordered a pie from a big-chain joint in Saco, saying the accompanying dipping sauce was the shiznit. What arrived with the flattened, lukewarm disc of plasticized cheese and gummy crust was — and I’m not joking — a small plastic dipping container of butter. Or butter substitute, which is even nastier. Sit-down pizzerias near the Mall offer crusts that are pre-packaged and taste like they’re made with shortening and sugar, further addicting those families that dine there daily. If you find yourself nodding in delight to those last two examples, you might want to get yourself a little help. Everyone else knows where the best pies in town are.

So back to you, real pizza lover. I saw you at Portland Pie, sitting or choosing a slice from the spinning pizza-warmer, because I was eating at the bar. That’s the thing about the new Portland Pie that might make it the best restaurant upgrade in the past two years: It’s actually a pizzeria now, not just a take-out/delivery service. Sure, the old space had one round table, usually covered with free papers like the one you’re holding now, and a picnic table sitting in the parking lot that distanced the front door from India Street. But how many of you made use of that seating? Now, they’ve lost the parking — there was never any room anyway — but gained long, wooden benches and seats, a copper-topped bar, beers on tap, wines by the glass, and best of all, they covered up the exposed kitchen. Almost every diner would be a little shocked to look into many take-out kitchens, due to the pace, mess, or seeming chaos. Pizza joints, due the sheer volume of teeny, diced ingredients flying around, have the potential to look worse than most. It’s best to keep them under wraps.

Just from the amount of people I see in there every time I go, it’s hard to imagine that Portland Pie’s business has not gone through the roof with their new digs. The place, frankly, looks great, and being able to order one of the two things I get there — The Downeast Sammy (buffalo chicken sandwich) and the Harbormaster (BBQ chicken, onion, and bacon pizza) — with a pint or three of Shipyard has really improved Portland’s somewhat limited pizzascape. On one particular visit, what looked like an entire busload of seventh-graders arrived and dominated the restaurant; the young ladies managing for the night didn’t bat an eye, and everyone got seated and served. That would have never happened at the old place, and I was duly impressed.

Off-notes at a local pizza joint are hardly worth mentioning if the pizza’s good — and this is clearly the best in the city, with the possible exception of a tie with Flatbread, but that’s not really the same thing — but some burnt garlic on my garlic fries spoiled the whole plate. There have been reports — albeit rare ones — of servers mistakenly handing out pepperoni pizza instead of cheese (the meat is layered under the dairy), but I don’t see that as a real offense, unless the buyer is vegetarian, and then I see it as kind of funny.

But I’m still bitter about a past Not Dog incident that I won’t get into today.

Long to short, Portland Pie is just plain better than it used to be, having improved on the one thing that might have weighted down my unequivocal recommendation. I’ll just have to hit the gym a little more often. But not on Tuesday nights.

Andy King can be reached at dinnerwithandy@yahoo.com