I have a pretty complicated hierarchy of tastes and preferences. Sometimes, a 99c slice hits the spot. Othertimes, all I want is Naples style which I will gladly drive hours and pay $20 or more for.
Along the same lines, I have palate issues with certain Japanese interpretations of western cuisine, specifically French desserts and Italian food. The desserts I will get into in a future post. As for Italian food, it's practically inedible for me. Really puffy and doughy pizza dough, overly sweet and syrupy tomato sauce... and this is from a few different experiences - not a one time thing.
I do understand that some of the best and authentic Italian cuisine can indeed be found in Japan. There's something about the meticulousness of Japanese hands that can recreate the intricacies of Italian pasta... and Italian nonnas. But we're not talking about that here. We're talking about fast food.
Strawberry Cones is a Japanese chain that specializes in pizza and pasta. They opened their first Canadian shop at the Aberdeen Centre food court in Richmond, following a string of other Japanese companies such as Beard Papa's and Daiso. I've passed by quite a few times with no intention whatsoever of trying what looked like gummy and practically plastic pizzas sitting under the heat lamp.
Which leads us to last Monday.
I was attending a wedding reception at Aberdeen and needed something quick to tide me over before the feasting began. I wasn't in the mood for Shanghai pork buns, or deep fried bean curd since I'd be having plenty of Chinese food in 2 hours - so I thought, in the interest of science - let's give them a shot.
Each slice is under $3 and is a decent size. They do have a rather interesting repertoire - check out the full menu here. There's some wacky toppings almost out of a cartoon - mochi? egg salad? tuna? Wow.
I decided to go with the Hokkaido Potato Tuna pizza. It was the most unique slice there, and was also the freshest. There's a lot of cheese coating this thing. You can't even tell it isn't a cheese pizza from sight. This is practically heretical and could start a war between Italy and Japan!
But it always comes down to taste -- and I will admit, this was... unusual. It wasn't unpleasant by any means. The combination of the canned tuna, mayo/potato/cheese white sauce was tasty, and I certainly couldn't complain that it was lacking in toppings. The dough was crispy though doughy. Essentially this fit my standards for a $3 pie so I'm fine with it.
I do have an overall issue though. This is a the picture I pulled off Strawberry Cones' website.
Do you see something wrong here? That's just straight up false advertising... even the Big Mac shows up on your tray with lettuce and tomatoes. This... this is like asking a kid to draw what the pizza looks like, then selling the kid's drawing as the original.
Does it affect what I think of the pizza? Not really... it does affect what I think of the company. Alright - I'm going to cut off the rant here because I could go on forever.
Strawberry Cones at Aberdeen Centre is located on 4151 Hazelbridge Way in Richmond.
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