Since it’s summer, we’ve been taking a few weekend trips here and there, including one recent visit to Maryland.  You probably think of crabs and other seafood when you think of Maryland’s cuisine, but in fact there are some really highly rated pizza places in the state – and of course we had to go check them out.  Today we’ll show you where those spots are and what we got at each one, but we do just want to warn you that there some images of meat here in our photos.

Baltimore is the home of two of the pizza places we visited – which makes sense, since it’s Maryland’s largest city and has its own history of Italian immigration.  The first place we tried was Joe Squared, which was only a few blocks from the train station where our Amtrak dropped us off.  We decided to get two pizzas while we were there:  on the right is the bacon and clam pizza, which is also made with a garlic cream sauce, onions, and three cheeses.  On the right is the flag pizza, which comes in three sections:  a plain cheese pizza, a pesto and fresh mozzarella pizza, and in the middle a white pizza with garlic cream sauce, ricotta, mozzarella and cheddar.

We also went over to went over to the Federal Hill area, where Pizza di Joey is located inside the Cross Street Market.  What Pizza di Joey is most known for is their monster slices, which are a foot long each, so we tried two.  Miriam got the cold cheese pizza, with unmelted shredded mozzarella sprinkled on a cheese slice, while Cyril had a buffalo chicken slice, topped with blue cheese dressing.

But there’s one other well-regarded pizza place in Maryland that’s outside of Baltimore – Inferno Pizzeria, in Darnestown.  We had to rent a Zipcar to get out there, and it was about an hour’s drive west from Baltimore.  Inferno is most well-known for their Neopolitan pizzas, so we got two:  first, a margherita pizza, which we added Calabrian chiles to …

… and also white potato and onion pizza, made with smoked mozzarella and roasted potato chunks, all topped with rosemary.

We enjoyed trying all these different places on our visit to Maryland – Joe Squared was very easy to get to and had a wealth of vegetarian pizzas to choose from (as well as a seafood pizza that nods to Maryland’s foodways).  Pizza di Joey had some fun, huge slices, and Inferno Pizzeria served up excellent Neopolitan pies.  Of course there’s tons of different and delicious foods to try in Baltimore and its suburbs, but if it’s interesting pizza you’re looking for, we think our suggestions are a good place to start.