Is It a Stromboli or a Calzone?

[Andy M.]

You guys are right. I didn't want to get Wiki or other definitions from you because I can do that myself. I wanted personal experience. I included it in my post for a reference point.

 

[auntdot]

Seems like a lot of agreement here.

Only have had commercially made calzones and the stromboli from my SIL.

The calzones always come out with thin pizza dough and contain cheese, usually meat, and I love it when they toss in tomato sauce. A pizza in a pocket.

The stromboli my SIL used to make was more of a bread, the crust being thicker and with holes from the yeast, which contained all of the good stuff the calzones did but less of it. And it was more of a very lovely bread than of a calzone. It was very good.

That's all I know about the stuff.

That is my only experience.

 

[suziquzie]

Holy moly look what popped up while I was making my calzboni!

*amy* this is all your fault your dinner last week made me do this.

It's not pretty (dough TOO thin in some spots) but its gonna be good!!!

 

[pacanis]

I heard if you use stock it's a stromboli, broth it's a calizone.

 

[ChefJune]

I agree with suziquzie.

I have seen recipes in cookbooks and magazines though that say a calzone dough is not the same as pizza dough. The Stromboli's that I have had seem to have a much different dough than pizzas too. I am not really sure how though.

Take it from someone who taught Pizza and Calzone classes every two months for 10 years.... the doughs are the same. I mean, if you want to get fancy, I suppose you could make different doughs for each, but basically, pizza dough is a basic bead dough..... and so is calzone dough. My Italian cooking maven gave me the recipe I've used for the past 20 years...

I've never made a Stromboli, so I won't make assumptions. but foccaccia dough is also the same. It just rises differently.

 

[suziquzie]

I heard if you use stock it's a stromboli, broth it's a calizone.

 

[GB]

Take it from someone who taught Pizza and Calzone classes every two months for 10 years.... the doughs are the same.

I am sure there are more than one way to make a calzone. Like I said, I have seen multiple recipes where the dough was most definitely different from pizza dough.

 

[VeraBlue]

A calzone is half moon shaped, filled with ricotta cheese and other fillings, and either baked or fried.

A stromboli is a large rectangle of dough, filled with mozzarella cheese and other fillings, but no ricotta ever, and is rolled up, crepe style. It's then baked and sliced.

 

[VeraBlue]

Take it from someone who taught Pizza and Calzone classes every two months for 10 years.... the doughs are the same. I mean, if you want to get fancy, I suppose you could make different doughs for each, but basically, pizza dough is a basic bead dough..... and so is calzone dough. My Italian cooking maven gave me the recipe I've used for the past 20 years...

I've never made a Stromboli, so I won't make assumptions. but foccaccia dough is also the same. It just rises differently.

It's generally the same type of dough, in our family. We've been known to add black pepper and parsley to stromboli dough.

 

[Andy M.]

A calzone is half moon shaped, filled with ricotta cheese and other fillings, and either baked or fried.

A stromboli is a large rectangle of dough, filled with mozzarella cheese and other fillings, but no ricotta ever, and is rolled up, crepe style. It's then baked and sliced.

Is ricotta a must for calzones?

By your method, does the stromboli end up with the filling in a jelly roll type of pattern if you slice it across the middle? Or is all the filling together in the center with the dough wrapped around it?

 

[VeraBlue]

Is ricotta a must for calzones?

By your method, does the stromboli end up with the filling in a jelly roll type of pattern if you slice it across the middle? Or is all the filling together in the center with the dough wrapped around it?

No, ricotta is not a must for calzones. At Christmas, especially on christmas eve, calzones are made with fish, no cheese. But, if you order one from a pizzeria, you'll always get ricotta in it. The stromboli could be either way, depending on how large your dough rectangle is. There is usually at least one swirl, and sometimes two.

 

[Andy M.]

Thanks for your perspective.

I have never had a calzone with ricotta in it. Also, some of calzones pizzarias sell around here are rectangular.

 

[blissful]

In our neck of the woods we don't have either the strudel type = stromboli, or the pocket type = calzoni.
We have the panzarotta, a half moon shaped pizza dough pocket, filled to order, then deep fried. There isn't anything quite like it. We have an ethnicly rich area with a shortage of italians!
This is the only place to get them. They are beyond words, yummmmmmmy.
Jimmy's Grotto Pizza Restaurant - Home of the Ponza Rotta
~Bliss

 

[GB]

How is that different from a calzone blissful?

 

[Andy M.]

I think it's just a different name for a calzone.

 

[blissful]

How is that different from a calzone blissful?

Like I said, we are ethnically rich, italian poor. I never, in all the time I grew up here had a calzone, never even heard of them until 10 years ago when a mall put in an italian franchise. Then I saw what a calzone was, but it's nothing like a ponzarotta. It's like the difference between a baked potato and a french fry.
~Blissful

 

[GB]

I am still confused though blissful. That does not explain how the two are different.

A calzone is a half moon shaped pizza dough pocket, filled to order, then deep fried or baked.

A ponzarotta is a half moon shaped pizza dough pocket, filled to order, then deep fried.

I am missing what is different between the two.

 

[pacanis]

Like they said, GB, it's like the difference between snails and escargot.....

 

[suziquzie]

LOL I sat down to eat the last of the leftover strombzoni and was really suprised to see this still going!
Still tasty.....

 

[Adillo303]

Possibly, the difference is that blissful said "filled to order". Maybe that means that they are filled with pizza toppings instead of more traditional calzone fillings. Maybe?

I understand regional food differences. Some places outside NYC make things they call bagels.

This from their website:

1976:

Rosie always had something good cooking, and often stopped by with something for the workers at the Grotto to try. One of those items was a pastie which consisted of tomato sauce and Ricotta cheese in a light crust. As good as they were, we had to start selling them. So, before the year was out, the first Ponza Rottas were served at Jimmy's Grotto. It wasn't much of a success at first, during the first couple months we only sold a couple a day. But it didn't take long for word of mouth to travel and within a year they became one of our best selling items.