A Look at Pizza Places around the U.S.

Collegeville Italian Bakery & Pizzeria Napoletana | Collegeville, Pennsylvania

Steven and Patrizia Carcarey have continued a family legacy that is more than a bakery. Patrizia says, “My family is from Nusco, Italy in la Campagnia (mountain region), south of Rome. In 1970, my parents, Giovanni and Caterine, moved to America. 24 years later they started Collegeville Italian Bakery and have been baking fresh bread from scratch ever since. My husband, Steve, and I are happy to run our retail store and carry on all of our family traditions.” Since then, the couple has added on a dining room, full menu, catering and a thriving packaged goods business. Collegeville has captured a cross-section of the town’s community. On a recent The Hot Slice podcast with Pizza Today, Steve shares the unique interior flow system that encourages diners to purchase its packaged goods such as donuts and desserts. The menu features a variety of dishes — including wood-fired wings. Collegeville serves up multiple styles like Neapolitan and Detroit. Wow pizzas include the Detroit MVP, Detroit Burrata and the Breakfast Pizza. We love that the Carcarey’s use their customizable signage to celebrate and honor its staff and community.

Halo Pizzeria | Frisco, Texas

This northern Dallas suburban pizzeria recently opened serving New York style pizza. Pizzas are available in 14-inch, 18-inch and slices. The pizzeria has a scratch approach to its dressings and desserts. Halo offers a handful of appetizers, including Fried Cheese Puffs & Half Moons, fried cheddar cheese puffs with fried half moon mozzarella served with Pomodoro marinara sauce. Salads include The Goat with Arugula and mixed greens, cinnamon sugar pecans, strawberries, goat cheese and a red wine vinaigrette. A creative dessert is the Cannoli Cream Dip, which is cannoli cream with chocolate chips, strawberries and blueberries, pizzelle Italian waffle cookies and Nutella. Pizzas include The Scott with garlic butter base, mozzarella, bacon, sauteed spinach, mushrooms and caramelized onions. The Fernando White Pie features an Alfredo cheese base, mozzarella and ricotta dollops.

Mucca Pizzeria | Portland, Oregon

A major player in Italian restaurants in Portland has opened a spin off pizzeria focused on a concise menu of appetizers and Neapolitan pizza. The appetizer menu highlights a unique bruschetta with a choice of house-made ricotta and Calabrian chili; honey meatball, burrata and confit or mushrooms. The pizza menu offers delicious flavor pairings like Spicy Calabrese with homemade meatballs, nduja Calabrese, roasted eggplant, tomato sauce, mozzarella and Parmigiano. The North and South is topped with Prosciutto di Parma, burrata, tomato sauce, rucola, mozzarella, shaved Parmigiano and balsamic flaky sea salt. There is also the Alpina with smoked speck ham, taleggio fondue and mozzarella.