"Pizza is just pizza though." I hear you say! A circle of dough with some tomato and cheese on top and it's cooked in an oven and you eat it, right? Not quite!
To Italians pizza is serious business, and just like the numerous varieties of bread buns (or baps, barms, stotties, rolls etc.) there are in fact seven types of pizza commonly found. The most famous of which is Pizza Napoletana.
Created in Napoli, as the name suggests, Pizza Napoletana is the only type of pizza to have Traditional Speciality Guaranteed (TSG) status. As such it must be made to a strict set of rules laid out by the Associazione Verace Pizza Napoletana (AVPN). First, the dough must be made from ‘Doppio Zero’ Flour, Water, Yeast & Salt. No other ingredients are permitted in the dough.
It must be stretched by hand. Then it has to be cooked in a wood fired oven for no longer than 90 seconds at a temperature of 485°C. Toppings may vary but for a Pizza Margheria DOP it must be made with San Marzano tomatoes, Buffalo Mozzarella or Fior di Latter from Campagna and finished with a drizzle of extra virgin olive oil. The finished result is a very soft pizza with a fluffy rim or ‘coricione’. In the UK many people find Pizza Napoletana a little too soggy as it tends to flop in the middle. This is where our next type of Pizza comes in; Pizza Romana or Pizza Tonda Romana.
Unlike Pizza Romana, there are no strict rules here which is why we prefer to use style at Punto Italian Kitchen. We will use doppio zero flour, water, natural yeast and salt but we also add a little olive oil to the mix. Pizza Romana tends to be far more crispy and less ‘soggy’ than the Napoletana variety.
The lack of and defined rules means you can get really creative with styles, toppings, dough mixes and proving times. After all, while traditions are important, we are here to be a modern Italian kitchen.
Another favourite from the capital city is Pizza al Taglio, literally meaning ‘by the cut’. You will find these all over Rome as a typical ‘street food’. Baked in large rectangular trays it is cut into long strips which are folded over and wrapped to eat straight away. Pizza al Taglio is something of an obsession of mine when I return to Italy as it brings back childhood memories of visiting the local pizzeria bar and seeing all of the different styles lined up along the counter.
One of the more interesting types from Naples is Pizza Fritta, fried pizza. While fried dough existed to some extend before the Second World War it was normally in the form of Crespelle. Pizze Fritte on the other hand really emerged after the war when ingredients were scarce, wood was expensive and ovens had been destroyed. Filled with various ingredients from anchovies and broccoli or less favourable parts of vegetables they made a really cheap and easy meal during hard times. Now of course you can get far more refined varieties.