DE Pizza Review: Pie
Rating:
Final Composite Score: 5 out of 8 slices (rounded down from 5.5 slices)
[Her: 5. out of 8 slices]
[Him: 4.5 out of 8 slices]
[Goodfriend Her: 6.5 out of 8 slices]
[Goodfriend Him: 6 out of 8 slices]
Read the full "dialogue review" below these real-time pictures of your reviewers' pizzas.
Him:
This is our review of Pie in Bethany Beach. And for this adventure we were joined once again by our very good friends who live not terribly far from Bethany Beach. We're not going to tell you exactly where because we value their privacy and because that would be weird.
Her:
Also unnecessary.
Him:
So, we ordered four pizzas. We had the Classic Margherita, a meatball-and-ricotta special, the Willow, which had soppressata, sausage, and pesto, and a white mushroom pizza.
Before we get into the pizzas themselves, I want to point out one small irony about Pie. When you hear the name "Pie," you naturally think of something round. Pies are round, including pizza pies.
Her:
I honestly never thought about that.
Him:
You keep me around for these kinds of unimportant details. The oriny is that Pie actually serves long, oval flatbread-style pizzas that are almost football-shaped. They are not round pizza pies.
That's not a criticism. It's just an observation. They also describe them as grilled pizzas.
Her:
I've made grilled pizza before. This wasn't grilled pizza. A grilled pizza gets a lot more char on the bottom. These were pretty pale.
Him:
Exactly. They looked baked rather than grilled. Again, not necessarily a problem. And Pie is very clear that they are selling flatbread pizza. But what we got was not quite what I expected.
So let's talk about the food.
GoodfriendHer:
My favorite was probably the mushroom pizza.
Him:
Even though you're pretty sure the mushrooms weren't fresh?
GoodfriendHer:
Even though the mushrooms weren't fresh. I still thought the overall flavor worked really well. For a white pizza, it was probably the most successful of the four.
The Willow, though, surprised me. I usually love soppressata. It's kind of my go-to pizza topping. But this wasn't crispy enough. It felt undercooked somehow. The flavor wasn't what I expect from soppressata.
Him:
What about the Margherita?
GoodfriendHer:
The cherry tomatoes were really good. Big, flavorful, sweet tomatoes cut in half. But the rest of the pizza was pretty bland. I definitely felt like it needed salt.
Him:
Do you think all of the pizzas needed salt?
GoodfriendHer:
Most of them did. The mushroom pizza maybe less so. But there wasn't anything where I thought, "Wow, this is perfect exactly as it is."
Him:
And the meatball pizza?
GoodfriendHer:
The meatballs were great. Honestly, I would have happily eaten a bowl of those by themselves. The rest of the pizza under the meatballs was pretty bland, but the meatballs had a lot of flavor.
Him:
I want to ask you about the crust, but regular readers of DE Pizza Online know that you're famously not a crust eater.
GoodfriendHer:
That's true. I'm really there for the middle of the pizza. By the time I get to the crust, I'm usually done.
Her:
I don't understand that concept at all.
Him:
I think the idea is that the stuff in the middle of the pizza should extend all the way to the edge of the pizza, or perhaps a little over.
GoodfriendHim:
I thought the four pizzas gave us a nice variety. My overall impression was that the ingredients were fresh. At least, they tasted fresh.
I liked the mozzarella. I thought it had good flavor. I agree completely about the meatballs—they were fantastic.
The crust was crunchy on top, which I liked, but I was disappointed with the underside. The dough itself seemed right, but it just wasn't cooked enough. Not undercooked in a food-safety sense. It simply wasn't crispy enough.
The same thing happened with the soppressata. When we really enjoy a pizza, we like those toppings to crisp up a little. Here they stayed softer than I wanted.
Him:
And the mushroom pizza?
GoodfriendHim:
I'm generally not a huge white-pizza person, but I thought it worked reasonably well. The mushrooms weren't fresh mushrooms, but they weren't terrible either. My overall takeaway was that the ingredients seemed good, even if they weren't always cooked the way I would have preferred.
Her:
The mushroom pizza was my favorite too. The mushrooms definitely tasted like canned or pre-cooked mushrooms. I know that flavor from childhood pizzas.
But the cheese was really good. It had mozzarella and ricotta, and together they gave it a nice creamy, garlicky flavor. The mozzarella had that bouncy, stretchy pull that I like. I did add a little salt, but I add salt to lots of things.
The Margherita, though, was just ... meh.
Him:
Since we're doing this out loud, let me clarify. You mean "M - E - H." Meh.
Her:
Yes, meh. It was aggressively okay.
The Margherita needed more flavor. Maybe more sauce. Maybe a more flavorful sauce. Maybe fresh mozzarella by itself just wasn't enough to carry it. Whatever the reason, I don't have much to say about it because it wasn't memorable.
The Willow was actually better than I expected. I liked the saltiness from the soppressata. But the sausage was so overcooked that it was practically petrified. And I honestly don't remember the pesto.
Him:
That's not a great sign.
Her:
No. I'll take you word for it that it was there. I just don't remember tasting it.
The crust also bothered me. It was basically white bread. There were some crispy spots, but most of it was pale. The bottom never developed the char or blistering that you'd expect from either a grill or a very hot pizza oven.
Nothing tasted bad. I wasn't miserable eating it. But none of it really excited me either.
Him:
My headline doesn't have the panache of "meh." But I would say everything was pretty good. Not great. Not bad. Pretty good.
There were individual ingredients that were genuinely great. The meatballs were tasty. The cherry tomatoes were flavorful. The mozzarella was real mozzarella, and after some of the cheese adventures we've been through lately, Pie deserves recognition for that fact alone.
We've suffered through "pizza cheese." We've suffered through mysterious white-cheese blends. We've suffered through mozzarella-provolone combinations of questionable intent. This was actual mozzarella, and that mattered.
Now, I do not believe the Margherita used fresh mozzarella despite what the menu suggests. It tasted like regular mozzarella. Pretty good regular mozzarella, but regular mozzarella.
I also thought the mushroom pizza should have tasted more mushroomy. The mushrooms didn't look canned, but they certainly didn't taste freshly sliced and sautéed. Mushrooms should have an earthy flavor. These didn't.
The pesto needed more flavor. The Margherita needed more flavor. Most of the pizzas needed more salt. Even the pizza loaded with sausage and soppressata somehow wasn't salty enough.
The crust was probably the biggest issue. It wasn't soggy, for which Pie deserves credit. We've had some drippingly soggy pizzas during this project. This wasn't one of them. But it also wasn't crispy. Some edges were crunchy. Some edges were almost burnt. The middle just sort of sat there in a state of crust limbo.
And a pizza engineer such as myself notices these things.
Her:
Pizza engineer?
Him:
Okay, amateur pizza engineer. It's a highly specialized field.
I also have to mention the plates.
Her:
The plates were tiny.
Him:
Tiny little plates. Do we think that's to make the tiny little pizza slices look bigger? It wasn't deceptive exactly. Just amusing.
Her:
We should talk about the service because the service was excellent.
Him:
Absolutely.
Her:
Our server, CeCe, was wonderful. She gave recommendations, answered questions, and was genuinely enthusiastic.
GoodfriendHim:
She told us her favorite pizza changes every week because she eats one or two pizzas a day.
Him:
Which, looking at her, seems biologically impossible, unless she's a marathoner.
GoodfriendHer:
She was also very honest with her recommendations.
Him:
That's what I appreciated most. When you ask for recommendations, some servers immediately point you toward the most expensive item on the menu. She didn't do that.
GoodfriendHim:
Everything she suggested felt genuine. Very genuine.
Him:
And every recommendation was at least reasonable. We didn't feel steered wrong.
All right. Time for scores. Remember, we score on a scale from one slice to eight slices.
GoodfriendHim:
I'll start. I give it a six.
Him:
Wow. That's generous.
GoodfriendHer:
I'm at about six and a half.
Her:
I'm giving it a five.
Him:
And I'm giving it a four and one-half.
So the final verdict lands somewhere between four and one-half and six-and-a-half out of eight slides.
Pie is a place with some genuinely good ingredients, excellent service, a memorable mushroom pizza, terrific meatballs, a need for more sauce and salt, and a crust that would benefit from a new engineering plan.
And that is our review of Pie in Bethany Beach.
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