by pierino
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A&M's Testing Notes:
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3 cups (450 grams) high gluten flour
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1 tsp active dry yeast
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¼ cup warm water
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¾ cup cold water
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1 tablespoon olive oil
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1
28 oz can San Marzano tomatoes (or substitute Muir Glen)
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1
clove garlic
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¼ cup chopped onion
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A good handful of basil (holding some leaves back to finish).
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2 really good anchovy filets, salted or jar, just be sure they’re quality good
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1 1/2 teaspoon
Sea salt
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3-4 ounces buffala mozzarella, sliced
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Godfather Part 1: Make your pizza dough. In the bowl of your heavyweight stand mixer proof the yeast with that little bit of warm water. You know it’s going to work, right? Of major importance (I don’t make this stuff up), use a pastry scale to properly tare the flour weight---it does matter.
Ask the hotline about this step!Gradually add the cold water and then the flour and salt and mix and dribble in that olive oil. It should be a bit sticky at the end.
Ask the hotline about this step!Bench it. Make sure your hands have access to bench flour. Massage (knead) the dough to the protypical baby bottom feel. Bowl it. Cover it with cling wrap. Let it rest for 45 minutes. Yank it out and massage it further on a well floured board. THIS IS ALL DONE BY FEEL AND THE LOVE OF YOUR HANDS. Get it into a big old, tender ball. Divide with a knife or pastry cutter into two parts. Cuddle them and then wrap them in cling wrap. Stick em’ in the fridge overnight. The dough, I’ve discovered, only improves if you let it hang out in cold air.
Ask the hotline about this step!Godfather Part 2, Dawn of the Corleones: Make the sauce. Chop your cool-io anchovies into bits. Likewise with your garlic clove.
Ask the hotline about this step!Simmer the above (and onions) in 2 tablespoons hot but good olive oil, shimmering but not smoking. Carefully add the tomatoes. You can squish them by hand if you want to help the process move forward.
Ask the hotline about this step!Season with salt and pepper to your ownself taste.
Ask the hotline about this step!Keep it loose. Push it through the medium plate of a food mill and hold/refrigerate until ready to use.
Ask the hotline about this step!Godfather Part 3.01 (Beta): Wake up. Now the good part. Crank up your indoor/outdoor cooking platform to its maximum. Can you handle 600? I can. We mean smoking hot!
Ask the hotline about this step!Roll out your pizza dough into round discs (a pastry ring can help you here) that will actually fit on your peel. Give 'em a bit of hand toss to stretch the dough out. Make sure that your pizzas do in fact fit your peel and your cooking stone/lpan. Shape em. You don't have to fling them in the air but sending some centrifugal force toward the outer edges is not so bad. You will want a stretchy middle. I didn't say that this was simple. Brush the outer edges (the "cornice") with just a bit of olive oil.
Ask the hotline about this step!Now work fast, really fast; ladle sauce in a spiral pattern starting from the center outward in a circle over your soon to be pizza(s) and then apply thin slices of buffala. Slip that disc of dough upon the stone. Slam the oven door or grill shut. And then you shut up, because I don't want to hear your mouth right now.
Ask the hotline about this step!Tear up some basil leaves while you are watching and waiting. After about five minutes of intense heat your pizza is, or should be, finished. But it's okay to look in between.
Ask the hotline about this step!A flourish of basil (basilico) and you are done, and Sophia will invite you over for cocktails.
Ask the hotline about this step!Notes to cooks: the thing about real pizza and not sissy pizza is heat. I can't emphasize that enough. Get the dough right, get the heat right. Crank it!
Ask the hotline about this step!Oh.My.God. This is what pizza is supposed to taste like! And how often are the comments as fascinating and educational as the original recipe (does that make sense?) Anyway, Bravo!
What anchovy brands do you recommend? Also, I do have Tipo 00...can I simply substitute it for the high-gluten flour?
By all means substitute Tipo 00 as long as you weigh the flour and the ratio remains the same.
For anchovies the brand I most often use is Agostino Recco from Sicily. You can buy them in either of two ways: either in a small jar, or packed in salt in a 1000grm can. The latter is what restaurants prefer. You have to soak them in water to remove the salt, and they require some trimming, and the spine needs to be removed. After that cover the remaining contents of the tin with sea salt and refrigerate. They hold do hold nicely but if you only use small amounts of anchovies you are better off with the jar. FWIW both Keller, Judy Rogers and Mario refuse to use anything but the salt packed variety.
Avoid those flat little tins from Morocco where the contents seem to smell rancid from the moment you open it 'em.
This has been as entertaining as it has been educational. Thank you, Pierino! I never thought of my pizza as "sissy pizza", but I cannot wait to try yours.
Thank you Waverly. It's amazing to see how so many historical currents have interwined to produce somthing as elemental as a really good pizza.
Sorry to be the spoil-sport here, but there are several elements of this recipe and method that are in fact counter to an authentic Neapolitan pizza. I reference Maggie Glazer's wonderful (and stunning) Artisan Baking Across America, page 152, where she provides a translation of "The Pizzaiolo's Ten Commandments", rules set by the Association of Vera Pizza Napoletana.
First, there should not be any oil in the dough -- the dough must be made with only flour, natural yeast or baker's yeast, salt and water. All types of fat are absolutely forbidden from inclusion in the pizza dough.
Second, the dough needs to be punched down and shaped by hand - never use a rolling pin.
A couple of changes to the recipe will facilitate this. First, avoid using high gluten flour. King Arthur's all purpose flour is an excellent flour to use. Second, don't knead the dough as thoroughly as if it were a bread dough; stop when all the ingredients are well combined, but the dough is still shaggy, not well developed to the "baby bottom" stage. Third, a pizza dough should not be allowed a fermentation period, or first rise. It should be divided and shaped into tight balls directly after kneading, then allowed a thirty minute to one hour rise as balls of dough before refrigerating ( preferably overnight).
I had the good fortune to work for several years at a guest ranch in the Texas Hill Country where we built a wood fired, brick oven, and I made pizzas at least once a week for our guests. I used the method outlined in Maggie's book to produce my dough the night before, and I enjoyed nearly fool-proof success (unless I had trouble getting the oven hot enough due to rain or damp wood or some such) with it.
The emphasis on high heat is definitely right on, I'll give him that!
I recently started baking breads at a restaurant after a few years hiatus from baking, and there are pizzas on the menu, so I took over producing the dough for the cooks. I made a few simple changes to the method, including shaping the dough into balls right away instead of letting the dough rise twice in the bowl as was being done, and three of the cooks, independently and without solicitation, let me know how much easier the dough was to work with. Now if I could only convince them to turn the oven up higher!
Of course, even in Italy, or perhaps especially in Italy, there are countless ways to make pizza, and from the picture and the video, I think pierino's pie looks quite good. I love the idea of the anchovies in the sauce (by the way, a Neapolitan sauce is not cooked before putting it on the pizza and includes tomatoes, garlic and oregano). However, since the inference that this was an authentic Neapolitan pizza, I feel I needed to point out the inconsistencies with the true version.
Thank fyou for that thoughtful critique. There is indeed a "pizza police" in Naples which to my knowledge has officiallyapproved only two pizzerias in the USA. There's also a pasta police in Bologna. But even in Napoli there are deviations from the strictest of rules. I've done a lot of research on this in developing my recipe. One of my sources was PIZZA by Rosaria Buonassi, first published in Italy in 1997 by Mondadori. Basically I've tried to stay true to authentic Neapolitan model but adjusting it to American conditions. For example, American flours are not quite the same as Italian 00. I use high gluten to get a sturdier but still supple dough. So does Peter Reinhart. The olive oil adds a little softness to the crust. I've also tried a little white wine in it, which works as long the ratio remains the same. I've also looked at conversion tables for dry weights and a cup of flour almost always converts to 140g to 150g. A cup of water always weighs the same. European oven tempertures are considerably more inexact; as in what's the equivalent of "gas mark 4"? The reason my recipe calls for San Marzano tomatoes because it's where they are grown; under the shadow of Vesuvio. Technically speaking marinara should be a mariner's sauce, hence the anchovies. The wonderful thing about pizza dough is that it freezes really well. It's nice to find a ball of it my freezer on short notice. Anyway, I sincerely appreciate that input. It's just how cooks' minds work. I'd still like to serve this to Sophia Loren.
P.S. If there were an edit feature I would have corrected the typos and missing verbage in my reply. But I am indeed grateful.
Hi pierino--I made your pizza last night and it was wonderful. (The sauce...mmmm...so happy I have sauce leftover.) I was able to crank my non-Viking oven up to 550--so it cooked in no time. We all loved the little bites of basil in between the bites of wonderful cheese and sauce. The crust was great--crisp, crunchy, light and tasty. Very delicious.
Thanks Drbabs. I'm glad it worked for you. Doughpuncher (above) and I definitely agree on the importance of the highest heat you can maintain without setting your house on fire. BTW a week ago I was able to slip into Keith McNally's hugely popular Pulino's Pizzeria in SOHO. I'm a big fan his restaurants, but I thought his Margherita was disappointing. Crisp to the point of being almost burnt. Even the basil leaves were crisp.
In our house pizza is foremost about the crust, then about the sauce, and finally about the toppings. Your dough recipe is right on target, using high gluten flour, and then letting it rest refrigerated overnight and cooking it at a super high heat. Nice recipe.
Thanks, and I thought that A&M along with "Slice" boy did a nice job on the video. Of course they could splurge on a pizza peel. And I'm thinking that that Viking oven ought to be able to exceed 500 degrees. In Napoli it is about the crust, and if the outer crust is not right they just cut it away. It should be burnt and soft at the same time. The latter part is really tricky.
Bravo pierino. Only improvement I can suggest is to use Tipo 00 flour from Italy
I'm with you on that my friend. But 00 is sort of hard to find here. But King Arthur mills some really fine flours, some of which Italian bakers would envy. Thank you!
Thank you. In the end it's really about the ratio of flour to water (and oil). I use high gluten flour for pizza. But you still have that bit of neuroscience going on. The best pizza I've tasted in the USA was Nancy Silverton's at Mozza. She is the undisputed queen of dough. But I also worship Peter Reinhart's THE ARTISAN BREAD MAKER'S APPRENTICE for it's direct and clear instruction
As far as the sauce, I clearly brain cramped on cooking time. But really no longer than 45 minutes is necessary. You don't want to cook the sauce to death. After that to make your pie it's really high heat, as high as you can get it, and if you are lucky enough to be able to cook over a wood charcoal fire you are in for a super treat. It adds a subtle whiff of smokiness.
Variants include the piadina of Romagna (which includes lard in the dough) and the Umbrian testa (ditto on the lard).
Congratulations, pierino! It's clear that you know your pizza, and I'm looking forward to trying your recipe.
We prefer cooking pizza outdoors, however for indoors I use a stone and crank the oven to the max. I haven’t seen the piastra, thanks for sharing that info…going to go check out Mario’s collection now!
Oh,and by the way, that picture is a stunt pizza and not my own. But you get the idea, right.
No, I would really like to see a photo of your pizza...Thanks-
Sorry, I found your photo of the non-sissy pizza under #3.
*Autthentic San Marzano tomatoes come from San Marzano. However there is a domestic lable that uses the name as a brand. Not bad, but be aware of it.
**Buffala mozzarella comes from the milk of water buffalo. West of Denver you can find the Bubalus Bubalis brand/lable from a company that has actually been raising the critters down near San Diego for about ten years. It's also possible to find imported buffala at Whole Foods. I prefer the local product simply because it's fresher, and with cheese that matters.
Here in CT you can get imported buffalla mozzarella at Costco, amazingly enough. It's quite good.
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Pierino calls for 3 cups of flour (450 grams) but our 3 cups of flour weighed 395 grams. We decided to go with that weight.
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The dough begins coming together. Once it did, we let the mixer do the kneading. The dough then rests overnight in the fridge.
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Chopping anchovy.
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The aromatics: onion, garlic and anchovy.
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Now sizzling away in olive oil.
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Merrill crushed the tomatoes in her hands as she added them to the aromatics.
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Pierino's sauce is gorgeous.
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We then put the sauce through the food mill.
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Don't forget to scrape the pulpy bits into the sauce.
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The dough is very elastic -- takes a bit of elbow grease to roll it out thin. The nice part is that it's a silky dough and needs barely any flour for rolling out.
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Merrill spreads the sauce on top.
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The buffalo mozzarella.
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Painting the edge of the dough with olive oil.
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Sliding the pizza onto the baking stone.
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This is a re-submission. But as mozzarella is such a vital part...oh, well!