Squared NJ Pizza
246 Market Street Elmwood Park NJ (201-300-6797) SquaredNJ.com
While I am tempted to call this and old school thick deep dish Sicilian Slice, it is really much more than that, and much, much different than what you would think.
At first sight, you would think you got the medium or small pizza when you see the size. However, this is filling for at least 2-3 people. I did not measure it, but it looks like it is about 2″ thick (5cm), possibly more. But it is not a heavy dough that sits in your stomach like lead. It is very light, very airy, very crispy. As you can see from the edges, they bake some of the dough and/or cheese to the very edge of the pan to make it even crunchier.
It has the old world taste your mother or grandmother might have made, using all fresh ingredients, quality cheese, sauce, and dusted with more grated cheese and fresh basil.
This is more of a focaccia than a pizza, but it is delicious. As you can see below, it looks as though it starts out as focaccia and then it is baked again to melt all the cheese and pizza goodness.
While they do delivery, you can go pick it up in person, but it is out of only one of the Francesca Pizza’s 3 locations in Elmwood Park NJ.
As much pizza as I’ve eaten over the last half century, it is really hard to categorize this one, it is very pizza and hard to compare it to anything else I’ve ever had. You can call it thick crust, deep dish, Sicilian, but it is not like any that I’ve ever had, and that is a good thing, in most cases because it is super light and crunch, not soft, doughy and heavy.