It’s Friday. If you are not making or buying pizza tonight, by Sunday you may well have. American’s have a love affair with pizza. Considered the world’s most popular food, on any given day 1 in 8 Americans will consume pizza. If you are a teenage male in this country, 1 in 3 young men will have a pizza today.
Craig Priebe is a pizza maven with decades from pizza-making experience from Chicago which, as any New Yorker like me will tell you, is the second-best pizza town in the country.
Well, that statement might stir some debate.
There are a variety of pizza types, best characterized by the architecture of the crust and not merely the variety of the toppings. That’s the clever twist to this book. After two introductory chapters on Tools and Techniques and Sauces and Toppings, each of the eight chapters that follow is devoted to a specific style of crust. In these chapters, you’ll find examples from around the country, examples that Craig and his co-author Diana Jacob consider exemplars of that crust type.
Let’s twirl the pizza dough and get a quick overview of those eight chapters.
Naples-Style Pizzas is the natural starting point. After all, pizza originated in Naples [don’t ask a Greek about that]. Here tomatoes and cheese were first married to dough, dough made with that very particular doppio zero [“00”] flour that is as fine as talcum flour. Oh, tomatoes were added first. It took another hundred years for someone to have the cheese idea. Naples-style pizza was first sold in New York streets in 1903 and Gennaro Lombardi opened the first actual pizzeria here in 1905. You can still eat there, warmed by the coal oven, and, if you are buying pizza in New York City, it’s worth the wait in the line that always extends far down the block.
Naples-Style pizzas in the book include:
Spring Lamb Sausage from Caioti Pizza Café in Studio City, California
Ahi Tuna from Fratelli La Bufala in Miami Beach
White Clam from Frank Pepe in New Haven, Connecticut
White Bean Purée Pie with Asparagus from Serious Pie in Seattle
New York Style Pizzas is journey to the earliest pizza history in America. This is Naples pizza made with American flour, not the Italian “00” that was not available. American flour is higher in protein with more gluten. The pizza dough could be stretched into larger 36” rounds. Around the country, pizzerias take that New York dough and apply topping imagination:
Prosciutto Pizza from Humble Crumb in Georgetown, South Carolina
Taco Pizza from Lomato’s in Hays, Kansas
A Habanero, Chorizo and Avocado combo from Moto City Brewing Works in Detroit
Duck Prosciutto and Brussels Sprouts from Roberta’s in Brooklyn
Sicilian-Style Pizzas offers ideas that began long ago in Palermo using focaccia, which is actually older than pizza. The originals were made with squared pans, but oblong pans were available in New York so American tradition allows for both shapes. The crust is thick with crispy bottom. The more substantial crust allows for, what else, more substantial toppings. Still just 3 or 4 things, but more of them like:
Grandma Pizza with sausage, broccoli bate sauce and parmigiana from Umberto’s in New Hyde Park, New York
Crab Pizza with fresh crab, roasted zucchini and egg from Joe Squared in Baltimore
When you think of sourdough you probably imagine San Francisco. But Sourdough Pizzas are made around the country and most of the examples here are far from California:
Meatball Mania with Cincinnati Red Sauce and banana peppers from Cincinnati
Chili Pie from Streetz Pizza in Milwaukee
Salmon Delight with smoked salmon, cream cheese and fresh dill form McCaffrey’s Dolce Vita in Decorah, Iowa
Stuffed Pizzas offers today’s extension of an idea that began recently: Chicago in the 1970s. The creators there were native Italians based their offering on the thick Easter pies called scarcieddo from Turin. Here you’ll encounter:
Deep-Dish Reuben Pizza with Zucchini Pickle Relish containing corned beef, Swiss cheese and sauerkraut from Dove Vini in Portland, Oregon
Steak Stromboli from Romano’s in Essington, Pennsylvania
Corn Flour Pizzas may sound strange. Cornmeal, right? No, corn flour. Corn flour to create a light, delicate crust that is very distinct from a cornmeal crust. This dough is light and crisp. You can make thin pizzas with it or deep dish. Ideas include:
The Flying Piggie Pizza with pulled pork, onion straws, and barbecue sauce from Metro Pizza in Las Vegas
Carolina Pie with chicken, mandarin oranges, roasted red peppers from Capital Creations in Raleigh, North Carolina
Corn Pizza with smoked cheese and balsamic onion from Zeo Gourmet Crust in Arcadia, California
Of course there have to be Whole Wheat Pizzas:
Prosciutto, Gorgonzola and Fig from Pizza by Elizabeths in Greenville, Delaware
Grilled Pizza Calamari from Al Forno in Providence, Rhode Island
Baked Mac & Cheese from Jimmy the Greek’s in Old Orchard Beach, Maine
After whole wheat and corn flour, what can be left? Consider one of the Gluten-Free Pizzas:
Green Chili Pork Pizza from Beau Jo’s in Denver
Grilled Pear from Red Fox in Jackson, New Hampshire
Ham n’ Cheddar from U.S. Pizza Company in Little Rock
This is a happy book. It’s true that in Naples pizzas are regulated by law and if you opened up a shop and tried to do Mac & Cheese, you would encounter many scowling faces. And a courtroom.
Pizza in America is a platform for imagination. There is something sublime about a classic margarita. But, gee, who really could resist that Green Chili Pork Pizza or the Deep Dish Reuben. I added the locations for these pizzas because it is interesting to see how many saliva-triggering ideas come from little towns all across the country. You don’t have to be dining in New York City or Chicago to sample exceptional, inspired pizza.
And, with The United States of Pizza in your kitchen, you are prepared for dozens of pizza nights of delight. Each chapter begins with a recipe for the dough, so whether you like thin, thick, corn, whole wheat or whatever, you can create the dough and you have the topping ideas right on the page before you. Don’t feel overwhelmed by all these ideas. Just take it one slice at a time.