Five New Pizza Purveyors to Check Out Ahead of the Pizza Cup
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When it comes to rounding up all the venues that might be in the running for the title of Pizza Cup champion every year, we're always surprised by how many new pizza purveyors have opened and this year is no exception. From thin and crispy pies in Liangmaqiao to sourdough pizzas from a beloved brewery to Turkish-style flatbreads, check out these five new Beijing pizza places.
Taking over the space formerly occupied by Blue Marlin in Liangmaqiao, H3 is a good option for casual American eats, including pizza. On a recent visit, we were most impressed by their thin-crust pizza options, which feature crispy edges and a soft center. Our black truffle parma ham pizza (RMB 108) had a good balance of parma ham and arugula to melty mozzarella cheese, with just a hint of black truffle flavor. The chef explained to us that they make their eye-catching black crust using a combination of black rye flour and regular wheat flour.
Jing-A's new taproom in Longfusi replicates many of the things that have made their previous locations so popular — great beers, hearty food, and industrial-chic decor, among others — but where this new venue differs is that it offers pizza, thin-crusted sourdough pizzas, to be exact. Jing-A Executive Chef Simone Thompson has designed a menu that features eight different launch pizzas, including classics like the Margherita, and more innovative styles like the "Catch of the Day," a white sauce and seafood pizza with prawns, and the Yunnan Mushroom, made with mushrooms and truffle from China's southern province.
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Globe-trotting food court Miam Miam is a recent venture from Groupe Flo, the ever-expanding Beijing F&B empire behind Maison Flo, Café Flo, F Bistronome, and Cocottine. Alongside international dishes like Vietnamese pho and Thai green curry, they also have an expansive pizza menu, featuring nearly a dozen brick oven varieties in the vicinity of RMB 100 for 12-inch pies. Most impressive of all: the eponymous Miam Miam pizza, featuring above-average burrata as well as pepperoni, ham, and basil (available only as a 12-inch pizza for RMB 138).
Oh Yeah! Brewing is not only one of Beijing's biggest and best value new breweries — they also make a mean pizza. Said pizzas are turned out by an oven that wouldn't look out of place in a top-end Italian restaurant and that leaves them crisp on the bottom and puffy and risen on the top – a great base for classic topping combinations like Parma ham and arugula. Those pizzas are especially tempting at the weekend when an all-day half-price deal puts them firmly in the RMB 30-50 range.
We are arguably stretching the scope of the term "pizza purveyor" with Turkish Feast but their stone oven-baked pide (a traditional Turkish oval-shaped flatbread) certainly has a lot in common with pizza in that it is a bread topped with cheese. Try the pide topped with spiced minced beef and stretchy mozzarella cheese or with feta and spinach for a vegetarian version. They also make lahmacun, a rounder, thinner flatbread topped with minced beef.
Have these pizzas got your mouth watering for more? Grab your tickets to the 2019 Beijing Pizza Festival at Galaxy Soho on Oct 19-20 now by scanning the QR code below.
Images courtesy of Jing-A, Robynne Tindall, Kyle Mullin
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