Daily Slice gives a quick snapshot each weekday of a different slice or pie that the folks at the Serious Eats empire have enjoyed lately.
To be clear on definitions, the "Tomato Pie" we're talking about here is very different from Trenton Tomato Pie. In the Tomato Pie Belt that runs roughly from South Philly through the western suburbs of Manayunk , Conshocken, and Norristown, it's a square pie that consists only of soft, foccocia-like dough, thick, slow-cooked sauce, herbs, and a shake of Parmesan or Romano. This variety of tomato pie is purchased at room temperature at a bakery, not a pizzeria.
Corropolese Bakery is one of the furthest "tomato pie bakeries" from the city and also touted as one of the best (and it's really, really good). The soft crust is thicker than most—including the pie from Conshohocken Bakery we featured a while back—the sauce sweeter and just somehow richer, almost as if it's fortified with meat, or maybe just love. Finished with a dusting of Romano cheese, this is what tomato pie is supposed to be.
If you're going to come to Philadelphia and give tomato pie a shot, don't just order it at a pizzeria where it's usually nothing more than a pizza with no cheese. Pick some up from one of these amazing Italian bakeries, that in my opinion are the real hidden gems of the Philly pizza world. Corropolese is definitely one of the best, not just for tomato pie but all sorts of fresh baked bread, rolls, pastries, the most incredible pepperoni stromboli bread (pictured above), as well as tomato pie sauce and uncooked dough to take home.
Corropolese Bakery
2014 Old Arch Rd # 2, Norristown, PA 19401-2048 (map)
610-275-6664; corropolesebakery.com