A Special Pizza Mania Themed Mandarin Monday with Pie Squared's Asher Gillespie

Mandarin Monday is a weekly column where – similar to our Mandarin Month series earlier this summer – we help you improve your Chinese by detailing fun and practical phrases and characters. As our Pizza Festival Approaches (October 15-16 at Wangjing Soho), we decided to combine this column with our ongoing Pizza Mania! series of restaurant profiles. Today, fluent Mandarin speaker and beloved pizza purveyor Asher Gillespie tells us about slinging right angled slices at Pie Squared, before serving up some handy 'za related Mandarin phrases. 

Years ago, when Asher Gillespie stopped by a popular pizzeria in Beijing, he was surprised to see just how many of the patrons were not expats. "I thought: 'Chinese don't like dairy,'" he recalls of that fateful day, after which the market for selling pizza to Mainlanders became all too clear. Before long he was inspired to open a pizza place of his own that specialized in the style of pies from his native Michigan.

As Gillespie describes it, these signature square Detroit style slices were invented in the Motor City by restaurateurs that cleaned and repurposed the rectangular cast-iron pans used at a local car factory (some sources credit the owners of Buddy's Pizza as the founders of this style back in the 1940s, a restaurant that has frequently been named one of the best pizzerias in America by many critics). Gillespie says the advantages of this cooking method include a crispy edge and a somewhat deep-dish thickness, though not as hefty as its Chicago counterpart. He says: "As the Detroit style rises in these pans it gets lots of air bubbles, so it's much lighter than Chicago-style deep dish."

Gillespie serves up those Motor City style slices in several varieties at his Pie Squared pizzeria in Shunyi. One of the most popular options is the pepperoni topped The Grand (priced at RMB 45 for and individual two slices measuring 6-inches by 6-inches, RMB 85 for a medium of six slices measuring 8-inches by 10-inches, RMB 115 for a large consisting of 10 slices coming in at 10-inches by 14-inches, and RMB 135 for an XL that's 12 slices and measures 12-inches by 17-inches). Better still is his signature Motown Meatball, which features homemade meatballs that combine pork, ground beef, parmesan cheese and fresh herbs (RMB 55 for an individual size, RMB 98 for a medium, RMB 128 for a large and RMB 148 for XL). The Motor City Meat Supreme, topped with pepperoni, ham, bacon, sausage, and ground beef (priced the same for each size as the Motown Meatball) is also popular, while more conscientious customers will likely opt for The Veggie, which boasts heapings of mushrooms, green peppers, onions, black olives and tomatoes (RMB 42 for an individual, RMB 78 for a medium, RMB 108 for a large, and RMB 128 for an XL).

Aside from the pies, this pizzeria also features mouthwatering appetizers like stromboli (RMB 40 for 10 pieces), which are essentially tasty dough rolls stuffed with pepperoni, ham, salami, and mozzarella cheese. Equally delicious is the mozzarella bread (or what Canadians like myself grew up calling garlic fingers), consisting of pizza dough topped with mozzarella, that is baked and then slathered with parmesan and garlic (priced at RMB 34 for six pieces or RMB 46 for 12).

Gillespie loves giving his Shunyi patrons a delicious taste of the American Midwest with these menu items. Aside from being well versed in the kitchen, he is also a dedicated Mandarin language learner, and was happy to serve up several pizza related phrases in Chinese for Mandarin Monday:

你要方形厚饼，传统圆形还是薄饼披萨呢？
Do you want deep dish square, traditional round, or thin crust pizza? 

你们店有多大的披萨？大号披萨够几个人吃呢？
What size pizzas does your store/restaurant have?  How many people does a large pizza feed? 

你要尝尝我们推荐的口味还是要自己选你要的披萨配料？
Do you want to try one of our specialty pizzas or would you like to choose your own toppings? 

能拼一半一半吗？
Can you do half and half? 

能不能（多放奶酪）／（加奶酪）？
Can you add extra cheese?

If you, dear readers, can suggest any other pizza related Mandarin phrases, feel free to let us know in the comments section below.

More stories by this author here.
Email: kylemullin@truerun.com
Twitter: @MulKyle
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Photos: Courtesy of Pie Squared, Kyle Mullin