Recently I was invited to come check out some of the new pizza offering that are now available at Pieology. It was the perfect opportunity for me to finally check out Pieology since it’s one of the pizza spots that I haven’t tried yet. I took my co-worker/minion, Cris, with me to go and sample their new pies.
Pieology is one of the custom make-it-yourself pizza pie shops around town. Here’s a sign showing the “lowdown” on how this custom pie thing works.
If making your own custom pie is too overwhelming for you, you can choose one of Pieology’s favorite pies – or you can start with one of those as a base and customize it to your liking. All pies are $8.45 for a whole 11.5″ pie (unlimited toppings). The only exception is for the plain cheese pizza which is only $6.95 if you don’t want additional toppings.
In addition to pizzas, Pieology also offers custom and signature salads.
These are the new “Sizzling” Southwest pizzas. Sizzzzzzzzlin’.
I had no idea how these photos would turn out. I carefully placed the camera over the “sneeze guard” to take all of these photos but since I’m short, I only hoped for the best. These are all the toppings you can put on your pie! They also have an herb garlic butter that you can get brushed onto the crust for extra flavor.
Veggies.
And more veggies.
Meats.
And more meats.
And while I’m sure you COULD put garbanzo beans on your pizza, I suspect these toppings at the end are for custom salads.
Once you finish ordering, into the oven your pie goes! When your pie comes out, Pieology has a number of “afterbakes” (sauces) that can be drizzled over your pie. You can get pesto, bbq sauce, house red sauce, or fiery buffalo sauce.
Here’s a peek at a few of our pies.
The new Sizzling Southwest pizzas also have a special sour cream based afterbake sauce that’s drizzled all over the top. Can I also say that I love the pizzas look EXACTLY the same as the promo images?! Sometimes things don’t always live up to the promo photos, you know what I mean? These pizzas totally did!
[spicy southwest pizza]
The Spicy Southwest Pizza comes on Pieology’s housemade original crust along with olive oil, red enchilada sauce, mozzarella, cheddar cheese, roasted red peppers, jalapenos, cilantro and chicken. On top is a red sour cream afterbake. I was lucky enough to NOT eat a jalapeno off this sucker so I actually didn’t find it to be that spicy. I’m sure if I had eaten a jalapeno I would have felt differently. There’s a ton of flavor packed into this pie – so while it is spicy “hot” it is also spicy “flavor”. I really liked the red sour cream afterbake that was drizzled on top – it was cool and creamy and helped to tone down some of the spiciness. The longer I ate this pizza the more flavorful/spicy it got!
[chicken chile verde pizza]
The other new Southwest pizza is the Chicken Chile Verde which comes with olive oil, green enchilada sauce, mozzarella, roasted red peppers, diced mild green chiles, cilantro, red onion, chicken, and is topped with a green sour cream afterbake. This is the more milder-spiced pizza of the two since the green chiles are mild and not very hot. It really had a Mexican-esque taste to it with the green enchilada sauce and green chiles on top. Of the two, I actually preferred the Spicy Southwest since I liked the combination of flavors there better (I just don’t want to eat the jalapenos).
The sour cream afterbakes from both of these pizzas are also available for your custom creations.
Cris and I also made our own custom pizzas… because why not?! My pizza creation has Italian sausage, meatballs, red onions, mushrooms, and basil. I choose the normal house red sauce and regular white crust (wheat and gluten free crusts are also available).
While you are free to go crazy on the toppings at places like this, I try to be conservative and only get a few toppings. I find that more toppings tend to make the crust soggy, which is a big no-no for me.
The crust is quite thin here and there was this charred almost burnt edge to the pie. It was a nice crust and I was glad it did not taste like a cracker which might have been a little fear I had before I took my first bite. The crust had crispy edges and still had plenty of chew which I enjoyed. And also no soggy middles, YAY!
This is Cris’s creation. She likes loadin’ the toppings on. That’s the nice thing about Pieology, too. Everyone can order their own pizza pie and get it just how they like it without having to share.
[chocolate chip churro dessert pizza]
We also got a dessert pizza. You know, because we didn’t already have enough pizza. Cris and I wondered if anyone peeked over at our table and thought, “Whoa, those girls have FIVE pizzas on their table. They must be hungry hungry hippos.” Good thing I don’t care about the thoughts of others. It’s not like we ate five whole pizzas in one sitting. We had tons of leftovers to bring back to the office for our co-workers!
Anyway. Dessert Pizza. Yeahhhhh.
The dessert pizza was a “chocolate chip churro dessert pizza”. It uses their same original crust and then it’s topped with cinnamon, sweet cream sauce, and mini chocolate chips. For something that was listed as a “churro” pizza though, I thought the cinnamon flavor was way too light. It’s like a super fine dust of cinnamon was blown across the top since you can barely taste it. I want more cinnamon, please!
I liked the rest though. The mini chocolate chips gradually melted on top and the sweet cream sauce gave it a nice sweet but not over-the-top flavor on top of the chewy crust. It took awhile for us to get around to eating this so I suspect it tastes a bit better when you eat it right away. I’d suggest ordering it when you’re ready for it (or asking for it to come out later).
Jake says he doesn’t like these make-it-yourself pizza shops and he’d rather have “real pizza” but I like them! Sure, I’d also rather have a slice of a good whiteout pizza or a thicker crust, but I think the pizza is pretty good!
Pieology
Multiple Locations
5575 Balboa Avenue
San Diego, CA 92111
(858) 565-0600
Disclaimer: I was invited to dine at Pieology and our pizzas were complimentary. I was not further compensated for this post. All opinions stated here are my own.
Your overhead shots turned out nicely! Hehe I have the same problem with overhead photos, too. I have the same “don’t-overdo-the-toppings” philosophy as you – keeping it simple hard sometimes though when there are so many choices 😀
Thank you, Jinxi! Those overhead shots luckily turned out! It is hard with so many choices! I tend to order the same things though. I’m not very adventurous when it comes to pizza, haha.