PIEd Pods At Vinnie’s Pizzeria

GREENPOINT/WILLIAMSBURG –  Vinnie’s Pizzeria is no stranger to creative twists on pizza. First, it was the edible pizza boxes. Then the Fidget dinner.

And now, a safe and delicious riff on the disastrous viral Tide pod challenge – a snack called PIEd Pods– it’s all pizza, all edible, all safe, and all delicious.

We don’t need to tell you eating Tide detergent Pods is not a good idea, whether you document it or not, but it got so bad that Procter & Gamble, the brand behind Tide, created a commercial featuring the New England Patriots football star, Rob Gronkowski to tell the kids so.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-DrC_PF_3Lg

Vinnie’s is taking it a step further by creating an edible alternative. “Some people have said to me ‘aren’t you perpetuating this?'” Sean Berthiaume who’s owned Vinnie’s for the last 11 years told BKLYNER. “But really, I’m just trying to get people not to do that.”

The edible pods contain pepperoni and are made with ricotta and mozzarella cheese, with Italian spices, and wrapped in a pizza dough. Some mozzarella cheese is then dyed and cut into the Tide pod hypnotic swirl. “It’s like a mini calzone,” Berthiaume said. Though PIEd Pods resemble the laundry soap, no one is going to confuse the two and throw the edible into the washing machine.

Vinnie’s edible pizza boxes were the talk of the town back in 2016. “A lot of times people will ask for a box for their pizza. They’ll sit down, eat the pizza,  throw away the box right away, and it secretly drives me crazy,” he said. “We’re just wasting cardboard.” And so the idea was born.

A couple of years later, pizza box is still a hit  – it was the first pizza they made to order this year, and he made one just this morning.

Social media plays a huge role in Vinnie’s success. The company has over 2,200 followers on Twitter and over 26,000 followers on Instagram – for Berthiaume, it’s free advertising.

“[Social media] gets people to come in from the city or different states, it’s how you get new people in,” he said. “They Tweet about it and Instagram eating the pizza, and it grows like that. You put something out there and people spread it out because they enjoy it.”

And people do enjoy it. If he had to guess, he’d say that Vinnie’s had sold a couple hundred PIEd Pods since it was first created last weekend.

“We had people that came in from all over the place asking ‘is this the place where you can eat PIEd Pods?'”

The question that remains is, are PIEd Pods delicious? Yes, Berthiaume said.

“That’s the whole thing with the viral stuff; sometimes you see something and it’s basically created to photograph well, and people come to try it and they say it’s not good,” he said. “The stuff I create, I work hard to make sure people want to eat and enjoy it and come back for more.”

Don’t believe him? You can try one yourself at either Vinnie’s location, at 2 PiedPods for $5 they are more of a special occasion thing. Regular slices start at $3.