Operating out of a trailer in Newton Upper Falls, Super Dough Pizza Co. only serves 50 handcrafted pizzas a day. But it does so with an extreme attention to detail.
“I’m the only one that’s stretched any pizza here ever,” owner Ian Maschal said. “I’ve made every single pizza we’ve ever sold by myself.”
Maschal said the time and dedication he puts into his craft sets his business apart from other pizza places. The dough is slowly fermented without using any yeast.
“If we’re going to sell pizza on Friday, we have to start the process on Tuesday,” he said.
Maschal said there have even been times when he has decided to close when the temperatures the night before were too low or too high, causing the dough quality to fall below his standards.
“The dough does stand out,” Jessica Maschal, Ian Maschal’s wife, said. “Being sourdough, it has like a really nice airiness to it, but you can still get like a nice crispy bottom.”
Since it’s just him in the trailer making pizzas, Ian said he caps orders at 50. Any more than that would spread him thinner than his pizzas already are.
The restaurant’s trailer is in a rented-out area of the parking lot of Upper Falls Beverage Store.
“My goal was to find like a big parking lot somewhere in a high-traffic area,” Ian said.
Ian is originally from Long Beach Island, N.J. He said his family has a background in the food industry there.
“My mom owned an ice cream store,” he said. “My uncle had a fudge shop and a chowder shop.”
He started working at restaurants on Long Beach Island as a teen, which he said invigorated his desire to pursue a culinary career.
Ian attended culinary school at Johnson and Wales, but attributed most of his culinary skills to his time working at fine dining restaurants in Boston, like Sportello and Menton. He has also helped with the opening of other restaurants in and around Boston, such as with Bar Mezzana, Boston Chops, Eventide, and Ivory Pearl.
With all this experience, Ian was looking for a way to work for himself. He had aspirations of operating his very own restaurant—one that served food that was not necessarily fancy but high quality, accessible, and tasty.
“Ever since … I’ve been moving further and further away from fine dining,” he said. “I enjoy eating fancy meals sometimes. I think it has its place, but it’s just not the food that like relates to me or talks to me.”
Jessica spoke about how the couple wanted an affordable option for opening the business.
“Starting your own business is quite expensive,” she said. “The ability to do that without having to like get investors involved was to do something mobile like a food truck.”
Jessica has a full-time job overseeing sales and marketing at a shellfish distribution company. Still, she helps out with Super Dough’s private events and offers moral support to her husband, according to Ian.
Ian and Jessica share a love for food as well as experience in the restaurant industry. They met while working together at a seafood market in New York City 15 years ago.
“Food is a passion of ours,” she said.
Jessica spoke about what the opening of Super Dough has meant for the two of them.
“It’s something that’s been, you know, kind of a lifelong dream come to fruition,” she said.
Two of the most ordered pizzas, according to Ian, are the Sweet Tomato Pie and the O.G. Roni.
“I think the O.G. Roni is probably like our namesake. It’s a good example of what we do because it’s a pretty light pizza,” he said. “It gets cooked with no cheese on it at all and then it gets finished with stracciatella that’s at room temperature.”
Super Dough typically changes one or two pizzas weekly according to the season. For his spring pizzas, Ian recently received some fresh produce from California.
“That’s when I start to really love the pizza because it’s just bright, light, easily digestible flavors,” he said.
Super Dough also sells chocolate chip cookies with toffee and sea salt from pastry chef Brian Mercury, who Boston Magazine selected as the top pastry chef in 2022.
“They’re super good,” Ian said. “I probably eat at least a quarter of the cookies that I buy from him.”
While Ian said he enjoys his parking spot, the trailer doesn’t always stay parked outside of Upper Falls Beverage Store. Sometimes Ian takes his trailer to breweries, where the business does exceptionally well. The trailer also travels around to cater private parties, which is when Jessica is able to lend a helping hand.
“It’s very nice,” she said. “It’s a moment where you can get like a lot more personal and intimate with your clientele.”
Super Dough has at least one private event every weekend and multiple weekly. Clients receive the privilege of enjoying not only the food but the hospitality that both Ian and Jessica provide.
“It’s a business that we take very to heart,” she said. “It’s a passion project, it’s something that we really take a lot of care with, and I think that translates not only into the food but into interactions.”Super Dough Pizza Co. is located at 150 Needham St. Lot 1A. Hours change weekly and are posted at https://superdoughpizzaco.com. To place an order, call (617) 548-1098.
