Hippie Roll or Hippy Roll (Eppie Roll or Eppy Roll)

The origin or the “hippie roll” (or “hippy roll”) in uncertain, but it was served in some Italian restaurants in New York City in the 1960s-1970s. The term “hippie” is possibly a corruption of “eppie roll” (or “eppy roll”), served in many Italian restaurants in the Buffalo, New York area. The “hippie roll” or “eppie roll” is similar to a “stromboli”  or “calzone” or “panzarotti/panzerotti” or “sausage roll,” with pizza dough surrounding cheese, pepperoni, sausage, and possibly other ingredients. Unlike the stromboli, both ends of the roll are left open.
   
One Urban Dictionary entry states that “eppies” is slang for “pepperoni,” but this hasn’t been confirmed by other citations.
 
         
Pizza Factory (New York, NY)
Hippie Rolls
Served with tomato sauce.
Chicken & Mozzarella Cheese Hippie Roll $8.75
Eggplant & Mozzarella Cheese Hippie Roll $8.75
Pepperoni & Mozzarella Cheese Hippie Roll $8.75
Spinach & Mozzarella Cheese Hippie Roll $8.75
Broccoli & Mozzarella Cheese Hippie Roll $8.75
Vegetable Hippie Roll $8.75
 
Arturo’s Pizza (Bronx, NY)
Chicken & Cheese Hippie Roll $3.75
Meatball & Cheese Hippie Roll $3.75
Sausage & Cheese Hippie Roll $3.75
Sausage, Peppers & Cheese Hippie Roll $4.00
 
Pasta Cafe (Roswell, NM)
HIPPIE ROLL 5.95 5.95
Fresh pizza dough stuffed with sausage,peppers and onions, served with a side of pomodoro sauce.
 
Umberto’s Restaurant (Fort Lauderdale, FL)
Hippie Roll: With sausage, pepperoni, mushrooms, mozzarella, onions and peppers     $6.95
     
Flickr
Uploaded on February 22, 2008
by Eating In Translation
OZONE PIZZA (Queens, NY—ed.)
SICILIAN PIZZA
HEROS - HIPPY ROLLS
CALZONE- HOT DISHES
 
Flickr
Uploaded on February 27, 2008
by Eating In Translation
(Giovanni’s, at 110th and Columbus in Manhattan—ed.)
PIZZA
CALZON
HIPPIE ROLL
 
Urban Dictionary
eppies
Slang for pepperonies.
I like pizza with eppies.
by Cor Mar 5, 2005
       
Pepe’s Pizzeria (Buffalo, NY)
Calzone & EppieZone
Fresh pizza dough stuffed with Ricotta, Mozzarella, sauce and Romano Cheese.
Calzone (serves 2-3 people) $7.50 add an ingredient for $1.50
Eppiezone (serves 1 person) $5.20 Add an ingredient for $0.90
Choice of Ingredients
Mushrooms, Pepperoni, Steak, Meatballs, Green Peppers, Hot Peppers, Onions, Italian Sausage, Dandelions, Broccoli…
Popeye Eppie
Bleu Cheese, Mozzarella Cheese, Romano cheese, Spinach, seasoned with fresh mushrooms and onions.
For only $5.60
Roman Eppie
Eggplant, cappicola, topped with peppers & onions surrounded with sauce and cheese.
For only $5.75
Pepe’s Eppie Roll
Sausage or Meatball, Peppers & Onions, Cheese and Sauce. Rolled in Fresh Dough and Baked to Perfection.
For only $5.75
 
Julie’s Pizzeria & Restaurant (Springville, NY)
Eppie: Italian sausage, green and red peppers, onions, mozzarella cheese, and our delicious sauce, all rolled in our special dough and baked until golden brown. $5.50
 
San Angelo’s Restaurant (Depew, NY)
Eppie Rolls $5.29
Filled with onion, pepper, mozzarella and sauce, your choice of sausage, meatball or pepperoni
   
New Wise Guys (Scottsdale, AZ)
Eppie Roll
italian sausage, peppers, onions, mozzarella cheese & sauce
$4.25
 
Giovanni Italian Restaurant (FL)
Eppy Rolls
Sausage
Pizza dough filled with sausage, peppers, onions, and mozzarella cheese
$4.95 w/sauce $5.45
Spinach
Filled with sauted spinach and mozzarella
$4.95 w/sauce $5.45
   
11 June 1976, New York (NY) Times, “A Fill-in on What to Fill Up on at the Festas” by Mimi Sheraton, pg. C14:
Hippy rolls, envelopes of pizza dough fried around sausages and peppers, are usually fresh, savory and easy to eat, and the best pizza slice to rely on at festas is the thick, bready Sicilian variety that stands up better under such conditions.
 
BNET
Wendy’s test-markets Stromboli sandwich - Wendy’s Old Fashioned Hamburgers Inc
Nation’s Restaurant News,  May 6, 1991 by Milford Prewitt
MECHANICSBURG, Pa.—Joining the ranks of burger chains searching for a sales-boosting Italian menu item, Wendy’s has come up with the Stromboli, a kind of pizza turnover.
(...)
Should Wendy’s decide to expand the test, it may introduce millions of consumers to a new name for a product that they may know as something else. The Italian-style sandwiches are known in some regions as sausage rolls, in others as eppie rolls and in still others as calzones.
   
18 December 1992, Buffalo (NY) News, “If it’s Italian, it’s on the menu at John’s Village” by Janice Okun:
Our first course the other evening was unique—an Eppie Roll is a combination of Italian, Chinese and American cuisine ($2.25).
   
CureZone
How Ta Tawk New Yawk Jus nother Guy From Da Bronx
Written from my experience growing up in the Arthur Avenue Section of The Bronx
Date:  10/8/2007 9:30:32 PM
How Ta Tawk New Yawk
Jus nother Guy From Da Bronx
By
Donald Iarussi MFA
Jus’nother Goy Frum Da Bronx!
Copyright 1993
(...)
Hippie roll: A sandwich sold in New York.
 
28 March 1997, Buffalo (NY) News, Italian Village restaurant review by Janice Okun:
We began our meal with the Eppie Roll ($4.95), composed of green peppers, onions, cheese and fennel-scented Italian sausage wrapped—messily—in heavy ...
     
Google Groups: rec.food.cooking
Newsgroups: rec.food.cooking
From: LKS
Date: 1997/07/31
Subject: Re: artichoke hearts for the frugal
 
> The Hub calls them Hippy rolls and believes them to be of Californian
> origin. (But he’s a new yorker after all). I think they are like long
> thin stromboli. He likes his with sausage, sauteed bell peppers, onions,
> cheese and sauce.

Ah hah!! Just as I suspected. They’re called Eppie Rolls (Don’t ask me why) and you can usually buy them, as well as Calzones (baked, of course), in any pizza shop in New York. 

Google Groups: alt.guitar.amps 
Newsgroups: alt.guitar.amps
From: Jeremy Epstein <70664….@compuserve.com>

Date: 1997/08/11
Subject: Re: Caution: Hullman Post about Pizza
 
> On a similar semi-pizza-related note, this place in Fairless Hills PA
> makes a thing called… something, I forget.  It’s basically a deep-fried
> calzone.  You get this puffed up fried dough, and when you open it at the
> bottom is a steaming pool of melted cheese and sauce and toppings….
> It’s really to die for.  Well, literally—as if eating that much cheese
> wasn’t bad enough for you, they deep fry it.  Geez….

> Jas.

If I remember right, they have some kind of strange name like a “hippie roll” or suchlike. -j
 
Orlando (FL) Weekly (March 14, 2000)
Take a roll into pizza history
By Colleen Moore
In the history of New York pizza, “hippie rolls” are a footnote from the 1960s. “A lot of pizza places had them back then. Hippies mostly bought them because they were so cheap,” says Dominic Tamborra of the rolled-up pizza cylinders his dad sold in Brooklyn. Tamborra has resurrected these delicious artifacts at his own eatery, Dom’s Pizza.
 
The new versions are $3.50—about five times more expensive than during the dawning of the age of Aquarius. But they feature the same pepperoni, sausage and cheese rolled up in pizza dough that’s open on the ends (unlike strombolis, which are closed). They come in veggie and chicken versions, too. Also popular are the Philly-cheese-steak pizzas ($14.95) laden with beef, onions and extra mozzarella.
     
16 October 2000, St. Louis (MO) Post-Dispatch, “Pizzarelli’s Pizza is a hit” by Patricia Corrigan, business plus, pg. 5:
Beyond pizza, there are calzones (stuffed pizza dough) for $3.99 and Eppie rolls (Italian meat wrapped in pizza dough) for $4.99.
 
Chowhound
What Exactly Are Hippie Rolls?
How are they different from calzones? Anyone know the derivation of the name? And where can you find the best specimens?
Dave Feldman Jan 18, 2001 01:20AM
   
I don’t know what they are either, but I’ve always gotten a big kick out of that name. I’ve seen them called “eppie rolls” as well.
Chris E. Jan 18, 2001 03:07PM
 
I’ve seen them at any number of pizza places in NY and NJ, though I haven’t tried one. As I vaguely remember, they seem to be made by essentially rolling an uncooked pizza like a wrap(ugh) and then baking.
Michael Messier Jan 20, 2001 02:10PM
 
Oranges and Lemons
Sausages in Blankets
Posted by andrea on December 17, 2004 09:18 AM
...or sausage rolls, or Eppie rolls, or whatever the heck you want to call them. This is my second day of Newsday recipes. Here are the rough instructions: 
 
Chowhound - Outer Boroughs
“Speaking of Polito’s- On their sign they offer “hippie rolls.” Any ideas what these are? A flashback to another time, kinda like the “Dole/Kemp in ‘96” sign a few doors down the street?”
lol…yeah…i was laughing at that dole/kemp sign just yesterday…a hippie roll, i believe, is like a stromboli…ie. a filling like sausage & peppers or chicken parm wrapped in dough and baked…
(...)
astoriaboy Jan 18, 2005 07:16PM

Metromix Orlando Restaurants
Dom’s Pizza
By John Graham
Orlando CityBeat
March 6, 2007
Cheap thoughts: When I first heard about the “hippie roll,” I assumed it was either patchouli sushi or something involving ditchweed and Zig-Zag. Turns out that a hippie roll is sort like a baked Italian burrito and it’s on the menu at Dom’s Pizza along Edgewater Drive, just north of where it crosses Lee Road.
(...)
And now, the moment you’ve been waiting for: the hippie roll. The “house” version ($4.25) is filled with sausage, pepperoni and mozzarella and rolled in pizza dough that’s been stretched long and thin. It’s not as large as a calzone, but a tight pack of ingredients concentrates the flavors. Pepperoni slices are five or six deep and the sausage is good stuff—chopped, not pre-ground.
 
New York (NY) Post
HOLY PEPPERONI
New York Post - New York, N.Y.
Author: JUSTIN MILLER; JASMIN K. WILLIAMS
Date: May 12, 2008
Start Page: 40
TODAY’S recipe bears a striking resemblance to stromboli (a k a the hippie roll), which was popular in New York’s Italian restaurants in the 1960s and ‘70s.
 
The hippie or “eppie” is similar to the stromboli or calzone, which is pizza dough stuffed with cheese and pepperoni or sausage. But, unlike the stromboli, both ends are open. The word “eppie” is slang for pepperoni.