Jeff Varasano, a New York pizza chef in Atlanta, shares his love of pizza and pizza making. In this extensive page, he breaks down every ingredient and procedure to explain why each step is important. Then he displays different pies and critiques them.
Varasano even praises and ranks other pizzerias and gives directions to them! Link -via reddit
The quality of the ingredients is very important. I have scoured the lands, trying every brand of flour, tomato and cheese I could find. I've had cheese flown in, paying $75 for enough cheese for just one round of pies, I've even made my own cheese from scratch, starting with just milk. I've tasted every brand of tomato I could find and peeled and blanched my own from local tomato growers. And theses things do make a difference. But there's just no getting around the simple truth of 'the big three' - High heat, good natural yeast, and mixing technique. Getting these right will cover a lot of sins and getting these wrong will screw up the best ingredients.
Varasano even praises and ranks other pizzerias and gives directions to them! Link -via reddit
i followed up with some reading and bought myself a 450° mini-oven for pizza (85€), hope it will be worth it!
pizzzzza!
Now now, no need to be a pizza snob.
I have no doubt the pizza in Italy is better than you'll find here- and that the farther south you go, the better it gets :-) But not-the-best can still be pretty great, and the main things this guy is saying still hold true even in Naples.