On a snowy night in February, just across from the main gates of Princeton University, Drew Pugliese stepped out to his apartment balcony every few minutes, returning each time with a fresh pizza. Wearing a full cold-weather outfit topped by an apron, Pugliese was hosting a pop-up for Hot Pies , which he launched the previous year.
Pugliese makes all his pizzas from scratch. He uses a two-day process to make the dough, which is sourdough and naturally leavened. The sauce is a simple combination of tomatoes, olive oil, and salt. Pugliese purchases cheese from Olson’s Fine Foods, a local Princeton cheese shop, and tries to get his other ingredients from farmers markets, a practice inspired by his time in New York.
Daniel Levan, a senior at UCLA who realized he wanted to open a restaurant in the future, launched pop-ups in September 2020, as a sort of trial run. “I didn't know how to start, but I knew I liked cooking, so I just started taking pictures of some ideas that I wanted in my restaurant,” he recalls. “I used my Instagram to document everything and put my thinking out there. As I was making more and more dishes, I thought, Wait, these dishes are pretty good — I should sell it.
Levan plans to be a teacher for a few years before eventually starting an Asian BBQ restaurant. He wants the restaurant to have an open kitchen so customers can see the chefs cooking. He also wants to hire aspiring, motivated chefs, and encourage them to have food battles in which each chef creates their own “crazy” dish.
During the initial quarantine period, France posted pictures on Instagram of what she was baking at home in New Hampshire and built a following. France started her Instagram in 2018, posting “random stuff, like cursed food” and just making cakes for fun. Now, France has more than 35,000 followers on the platform. “[The growth] was organic,” she says. “I was just posting what I wanted to post and people started following me.