Strawberry Cones
227 W. Valley Blvd.
San Gabriel, CA 91776
(626) 293-1852
If you are a regular reader of my blog, you know I'm pretty obsessed with mochi. So a few weeks ago, when Food Librarian twittered about eating mochi pizza, I knew I had to try it. You can read about her post here. After reading her post, I had to go to LA right then and there. Luckily, Boyfriend was game to go. (Though that might have been because I told him that they served ninja pizza there as well. I don't know why but he is really into ninjas. He and his friend are always calling each other "ninja.")
Strawberry Cones is a pizza chain in Japan, that has recently come to the US. There is a location in San Gabriel Valley and a location in Little Tokyo. The restaurant was actually really small. You could only seat about 20 people, so it looks like they do most of their orders to-go. The color of the logo reminded me a lot of Dominos.
The mochi pizza has rice flour mixed into the crust, but the crust isn't chewy. The crust is more like a thin pizza crust. Some of the pizzas also have pieces of mochi mixed in with the melted cheese, and these are chewy. A lot of people have asked me if the mochi is sweet. They don't use the mochi you are used to eating as a dessert, but rather the unsweetened type. There are quite a few toppings to choose from, and you can also choose to do half and half.
We ended up choosing to do a teriyaki chicken and seafood genovese.
I enjoyed the chicken teriyaki. I wasn't as much of a fan of the seafood genovese. The salmon on it was super salty, like smoked salmon. The mochi pieces blended in well with the teriyaki mochi pizza. It added some chew, but not too much to distract you. And I liked that it was covered with nori. The teriyaki one is one of their most popular flavors, and I can see why. Somehow all the ingredients just seem to work really well together.
We also ordered a ninja pizza, which derives its name from the black crust. I don't know much about it, but according to the poster on the wall, the crust is made of chikutan. The crust was less chewy, had a bit of a drier taste. We chose half and half, mochi mentai and pizza edamame.
I enjoyed the mochi mentai. There was lots of nori pieces on top and the inside had lots of cooked roe eggs. I wasn't much of a fan of the edamame. There were shrimp and edamame and lots of mayonnaise. I didn't like the taste of the mayonnaise in the pizza.
There were four of us sharing the two small pizzas. Each half had four slices, so we each got to sample one slice of each. Normally, half a small pizza wouldn't be too much food. But rice flour is quite filling, and these pizzas really sat in our stomachs. We probably should not have planned to try the mochi pizza so early on in our eating tour because it really slowed us down.
For the pizzas, you can choose either thin crust or pan crust. We chose pan crust on both our pizzas, but it was still pretty thin and not puffy and doughy like your typical pan crust. I don't know what the thin crust was like, but it seems like it couldn't get much thinner than this one.
All in all, the pizzas were interesting. I didn't love it as much as I have loved other mochi creations. But it was definitely fun to try and say I've experienced mochi pizza. If Strawberry Cones was closer to me, I would stop by sometime for pizza, but I didn't love it enough so that it would make my list of places I must stop at when visiting LA.
One of the nice things about this place was that they provided complimentary tea and coffee. Strawberry Cones also offers pasta and some appetizers.
You can read about the other places I ate at during my LA trip that I have already blogged about: Pa Pa Walk and Mama's Lu. The conclusion of my LA eating trip is coming soon!
Such creative pizzas! I saw a bunch of unusual toppings when I visited Japan, too. I love Asian style pizza but it’s hard to find around here. I do like Pizza & Chicken Love Letter (Korean pizza) though. Do you have any more pizza recommendations? 🙂
I’ve had a hard time finding asian style pizzas here too. Strawberry Cones is the only one I was aware of. I haven’t tried Pizza & Chicken Love Letter. I’m sure there may be others in LA, maybe something with the korean bbq trend? But I haven’t had a chance to visit others.
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Aw, maybe next time you can check it out? I have to say, I didn’t love it. But it was definitely interesting to try.
hi kirbie
when i saw this post, i thought the front looked familiar. turns out it’s the same complex that houses this korean bbq place my husband and i went to during spring break. in retrospect, we probably should have eaten here (mochi pizza sounds like it would taste really good and seems more interesting to me) instead of korean bbq.
I’m surprised that the crust with rice flour in it, is not chewy as I expect mochi to be chewy. Guess must be the ratio they use in the crust.
Hehee, it’s definitely not NY style thin crust pizza. It’s like “Asian style” pizza. It’s pretty interesting though. You should definitely take a food road trip. I love food road trips!
I can visualize my New York cousin, rolling his eyes, and declaring, “That’s not pizza!” Sounds really intriguing – I need to plan a food road trip!
Some of it I liked, some of it I didn’t. But it was fun just to experience and to say I’ve tried it. =) Perhaps Husband will be intrigued by ninja pizza?
Ninja pizza? Mochi? I’m fascinated. Don’t think Husband will be keen on it but I’m still dragging him, even it’s just to watch me eat. 🙂