Pie Squared’s Stromboli is the Ultimate Pizza Hot Pocket

The winner of the Beijinger’s 2021 Pizza Cup makes a mean Detroit style pizza, but while Pie Squared is best known for their square pies, they’ve got a few other tasty Italian-American eats as well. But my absolute favorite amongst these is their stromboli.

What is a Stromboli, you ask? Well, it’s a large stratavolcano located on an island to the northeast of Sicily whose last eruption occurred around 2014.

But wait, you can’t eat a volcano right? No you can’t, and no matter how spicy it might be, it’s probably best not to try – although I have seen videos of steak being cooked over lava, so volcanoes do have some use in the culinary arts.

The stromboli dish, created in Philadelphia, USA in the 1950s, didn’t get its name from the volcano, but from the film Stromboli, directed by Roberto Rossellini and starring Ingrid Bergman as a woman struggling to get used to village life after marrying a fisherman from the town of – wait for it – Stromboli (it’s under the volcano, hence the name).

While the connection between the film and what’s essentially a doughy tube filled with pizza toppings and cold cuts and cooked to a golden brown is unclear (maybe it was the first thing that popped into the inventor’s head after he served it?) anyway, the name stuck and the stromboli cemented itself in the pantheon of Italian-American eats.

And from this pantheon the stromboli found its way onto the menu at Pie Squared all the way in Beijing, where it can be enjoyed sliced into small pieces or simply cut in half.

Patrons can choose three free fillings and a choice of dipping sauce. I usually opt for as close to classic as I can get – salami, pepperoni, and extra cheese – but as for sauce I go for ranch dressing – because any pizza-like thing dipped in ranch is bomb and you can’t tell me otherwise.

The resulting dish is like the ultimate hot pocket, all that cheese and pizza toppings combined with soft doughy insides hits just the right spot. Plus, the sprinkling of extra parmesan and garlic on top adds something a little extra to Pie Squared’s rendition.

You can find the stromboli in shop or via JSS for delivery. Try it while watching Stromboli, perhaps.

Pie Squared
8 Laiguangying Dong Lu, Bldg 1, 1-5, Chaoyang District
朝阳区来广营东路8号1楼1-5

READ: Daily Delivery Tour: Pizza Day

Images: Wikipedia, Vincent R. Vinci