Eat Iron Born Pizza, Help Make a Wish

Ever feel like a huge waste of space for eating an entire pizza in one sitting and having nothing but a bloated stomach to show for it? Well, yeah, we've all been there and there's nothing wrong with a bit of indulgence. 

But, if you want your pizza chomping to contribute to a good cause, Iron Born has you covered. Introducing the Make a Wish Pie collaboration at Iron Born pizza at Smallman Galley. The creator of this elaborate pizza Ben Kronman, a recent Fox Chapel graduate. Kronman submitted five different ideas and this Shishito pepper topped pizza was the winning combo. 

It's certainly an intriguing pizza that certainly brings some heat. Visit Iron Born down at the Smallman Galley in the Strip to try this pizza and contribute to a good cause. 

The Quintessential Rust Belt Pizza - Michigan & Trumbull's Buffalo Chicken Pizza

Pittsburgh sits in the center of the famous Rust Belt. It’s the belt buckle that keeps that whole belt together and coexisting as one. Because of the location, Pittsburgh absorbs influences from all along the belt, as well as any passing trends. Yes, Pittsburgh may be behind certain fashion trends and culture, but the city excels in bizararre amalgationa of food. The latest culinary masterpiece is Michigan and Trumbull’s Buffalo Chicken pizza. 

I’ve delivered pizzas at various spots across this great state and I’ll tell you that 90% of the pizzas I delivered in Pittsburgh were some concoction of buffalo chicken. Oddly enough, when disaster struck those numbers would increase. I had the privilege of delivering pizza when Roethlisberger had his infamous motorcycle accident. Citizens were devastated and the only thing that could fill that Roethlisberger shaped hole in their black and gold heart was buffalo chicken pizza. 

I met a lot of sad men in XL #7 jerseys that afternoon.  

Anyways, this is all to say that if you own a pizzeria in Pittsburgh and you don’t have a Buffalo chicken pizza your market cap is 50% what it could be. This pie has woven itself into the Pittsburgh food tapestry and Michigan & Trumbull has taken it to the next level.

A nice side shot of the Buffalo Chicken Pizza

Meet their Buffalo Chicken Pizza. It takes the best part of Detroit Style Pizza (the caramelized cheese, the thick crust) and adds a hefty dripping of hot sauce and chicken tucked under the cheese. The end result is one of the most delicious, comforting and flavorful pizzas on the market.  

As a bonus they provide their own ranch dressing which is full of zing. You’ll want to grab a cup of this to drizzle onto your own square or to dip leftover crust in.  

Whats special about this pizza is that the structure of the Detroit Pie begs to be encumbered. This buffalo chicken pizza is the perfect stress test for the dough. And it holds up beautifully. Maybe next time it’s available they’ll add some of their zesty waffle fries to this creation.

This Buffalo Chicken Pizza is a limited edition item that shows up on the Michigan and Trumbull menu periodically. Keep an eye on their Instagram for the latest in Detroit Style Pizza in Pittsburgh.  

Slicing it Up with Dan: Michigan & Trumbull Detroit Style Pizza

In this episode of Slicing it Up With Dan, you can watch me eat a slice of pizza from Michigan & Trumbull. This slice has sausage, fennel, and their delicious sauce and cheese. Watch me enjoy the crusty exterior and delicious innards.

Michigan & Trumbull is a delicious pizzeria that is churning out some high-tier flavors. You can read my review of Michigan & Trumbull pizza here. 

Michigan & Trumbull and Their Flavorful Pizza Labyrinth

Nestled into the corner of the newly built Federal Galley is a piece of Detroit in the form of Michigan & Trumbull. Michigan & Trumbull is helmed by Nathan and Kristin who are Detroit Natives that bake delicious Detroit Style pizza. Detroit Style pizzas has started leaking out of Detroit and into other metropolitan areas the past five years.  According to Tony Gemignani's Pizza Bible, the rise in popularity is tied to Shawn Randazzo, cofounder of Detroit Style Pizza Company, entering and winning the International Pizza Challenge in 2012. Around that time fan favorites Via 313 popped up in Austin which stoked interest in Detroit Style pizza. With Pittsburgh host to two Detroit Style places I guess you can say that it's finally a thing. 

Michigan & Trumbull creates my favorite version of Detroit Style pizza. There's a fine line pizza makers have to walk between making a thick sicilian style pizza that's filled with oil and true Detroit style that is outlined by a caramelized crust filled with flavor. A quality pie has a hint of sweetness that blends nicely with the grease of pepperonis lined up on each square.

Up close with the Packard Pepperoni.

And biting into a Packard Pepperoni is complex. It doesn't taste like any other kind of pizza. The cheese, caramelization of the crust, pepperoni, peppers, and honey blend together to create a cacophony of flavor. A new species of pizza deserving of its own classification.

It's honestly a bit overwhelming and foreign at first. But, with each bite comes another shred of enlightenment. Between chews I found myself understanding the strategic profile of the pizza.

"Ah, okay, so that drizzle of honey is causing the sweetness which blends nicely with the goopy cheese."

"Those peppers add just the right amount of heat."

"The edges of this crust somehow don't even taste like dough, but as if someone laminated it in a sweet crunchy shell."

But keep eating and you'll completely understand each individual flavor in these squares. It's a lot to take in at once, but by your third square you'll find yourself craving more and accelerating towards the finish.

Eating the Packard Pepperoni is fun, almost like solving a brain tickling puzzle. With each bite I uncovered a new flavor which kept me yearning for more. I've actually taken breaks from writing this to take small nibbles of the piece I brought home to share with my wife.  

I look forward to trying each and every pizza that Michigan & Trumbull has on their menu. I see them adding a ton to the rich Pittsburgh Pizza Tapestry and I'm so glad they chose to bring their take on Detroit Style Pizza to Pittsburgh.

Looking forward to eating my way through the Michigan & Trumbull menu.

You can find them at the newly opened Federal Galley on the North Shore.

Michigan & Trumbull Delivers Delicious Detroit Style Pizza to Pittsburgh

“What is Detroit Style pizza and why is it coming to Pittsburgh?” is a question I get a lot lately. 

Well, Pittsburgh is a culinary melting pot and it makes sense that eventually this city will play host to the largest variety of pizza in the country. As Pittsburgh sits in the midst of the Rust Belt, the city is uniquely poised to take advantage of the trends migrating to the East Coast and vice versa.

Michigan & Trumbull, run by Kristin Calverley and Nate Peck, is the latest Detroit Style pizza shop to open in Pittsburgh, the first being Iron Born in Smallman Gallery. Michigan & Trumbull is following their lead and opening up inside Federal Galley, the "sequel" to Smallman Galley, on the North Side.

I was lucky enough to visit Michigan & Trumbull during their pop-up at The Vandal. While they sold out amazingly fast and left a behind a wake of happy customers, I got a chance to sample their vegan pizza. Which, I gotta tell ya that this was a true delight to eat and I hope it is a staple on their menu. The creamy rémoulade is a fine substitute for cheese and the eggplant provided plenty of flavor. It is the perfect compliment to the cheese and red sauce that decorates a majority of pizzas.

The Michigan & Trumbull vegan pizza is not to be missed!

While Pittsburgh doesn’t have its own well-defined style of pizza, it’s strange that Detroit of all places does. Like most things in Detroit, you can thank the motor industry for that. Pans used for car manufacturing happened to perfectly double as pizza pans. So what's Detroit Style pizza? As Nate Peck says, “I think what makes Detroit style pizza is the deep blue steel pan, and the cheese pushed to the very edge before cooking. This gives you the crispy cheese edge we love so much.”

And that’s the beauty of Detroit Style pizza. In some ways it is the antithesis of New York style and a distant cousin of Chicago pizza. Instead of a floppy triangle, Detroit style pizza is traditionally served as rectangles.It’s thick, crunchy on the outside and soft on the inside. 

The outside crust supports the sauce, cheese, and just about anything you can throw onto the slice. It’s an architectural beast that soaks up greasy pepperoni or fresh tomato sauce.

Stacks of pizza dough waiting to hit the oven.

So, why aren’t we seeing more Detroit Style pizza? Why is Michigan & Trumbull getting into this business now? 

Nate Peck says:

I’m not exactly sure what has taken the rest of the world to find out about Detroit style pizza. Honestly growing up in the Detroit area I didn't even think twice about it only being a Detroit thing. I thought we just had a choice of round and square. Then we moved to Pittsburgh and were like wait, nobody has anything close to pizza like home? which is why I started playing around with the dough and ordered a few pans.

Creating the dough for Detroit Style pizza, and the cooking process, is an involved. It’s not as simple as slapping the dough into the oven, rotating it out, and placing it on a tray. There's a lot that happens to the dough before it gets stretched out.

Nate describes his dough process to me, saying:

For our dough I do a 15 hour 'poolish' taking 20% of the doughs flour and water with a pinch of yeast and fermenting at room temperature. I then mix the rest of the ingredients. I usually do about 500-525 degrees for 12-15 minutes. You have to make sure you let the dough rise halfway up each pan after portioning.

For the sauce we do a really simple, fresh sauce. Using Stanislaus tomatoes. We don’t cook it very long to ensure it keeps its fresh tomato flavor. Since we do a nice long bake on the pizza I  use a whole milk mozzarella so it doesn’t burn.

Expect Michigan & Trumbull to setup shop in the Federal Galley when it opens this year. Keep up to date with Michigan & Trumbull on Facebook. I'll keep you posted on any other Michigan & Trumbull updates here on Pizza Walk With Me.

Michigan & Trumbull Detroit Pizza Pop-Up at The Vandal

I hope you're into Detroit Style Pizza because it is slowly taking over Pittsburgh. The latest entrant in that arena is Michigan & Trumbull. They're a Detroit Style Pizza shop that was shocked to find a lack of that good, thick, crunchy pizza here in Pittsburgh. In Nate Peck's (chef/owner of Michigan & Trumbull) own words, "Then we moved to Pittsburgh and were like wait, nobody has anything close to pizza like home? which is why I started playing around with the dough and ordered a few pans."

I'll have a more thorough interview with them on the site later, but today is the day you can sample their pizza. They'll be setting up shop at The Vandal tonight in Lawrenceville from 5pm - Whenever-we-run-out-o-clock. 

Here's the menu of pizza they'll have at The Vandal this evening:

And here's a sample of what the pizza may look like right before you take a chomp!

Slicing it Up With Dan - VIA 313 Detroit Style Pizza

In this episode of Slicing it Up With Dan, I work my way through a "slice" of Detroit Style Pizza from VIA 313 in Austin, Texas. Now you may be asking yourself a couple of questions. What's Detroit Style Pizza? Is that a pineapple ring in the thumbnail of the video? How's the pizza in Austin, Texas?

A couple of pizzas ready for action.

Detroit Style pizza is famous for being cooked in square pans that are amazing at retaining heat. They push the dough into the oiled pans and heat them up. What you end up with is a sicilian-style pizza that's crunchier, a bit thinner and softer on the inside. The exterior of this pizza was my favorite part. It had a delicious, oily crunch that was very flavorful. Juicy in some ways. Like the interior crust was marinating in savory oils and cheeses all day.

VIA 313 has an eclectic menu, but they're most famous for their pepperoni pizza. There's two kids of pepperoni. One under the cheese (a shy pepperoni) and an extroverted pepperoni that sits atop the cheese. Despite the double-layer of pepperoni the pizza wasn't overly greasy. How they engineered that is beyond me.

Despite all the tacos and meats I ate during my trip to Austin (a smoke turkey too!), I immensely enjoyed VIA 313. This is the kind of pizza that pairs well with an ice cold beer. The sauce is nice and zesty, the cheese is perfectly melted and that crust is divine.  Definitely check out VIA 313 if you get a chance.