Pizza Friends, hello! Did you miss me? I miss you. I’m popping in here quickly to share a recipe for a Caesar salad inspired by one I had at Danny’s in NYC this past week. It is a mix of classic and unusual elements, and I have been dreaming about it for days. I made it for my family last night, and while my children worked their way around the “surprises,” Ben and my in-laws loved it. I think you will, too.

To make it, you’ll need a few things: a block of Pecorino Romano or Parmigiano Reggiano, Castelvetrano Olives, Caesar Dressing, and celery root…I know, sounds wrong, but I promise you it works.

First, you’ll peel and thinly slice the celery root:

Place it in a bowl and sprinkle it with salt — this will help it soften:

Next, get going on some croutons. Danny’s uses everything bagel crisps, which are delicious, but which can be hard to find (at least where I am), so I opted to use focaccia. I found this guy in the freezer…

… and while it was a little bit past prime…

… it made exceptional croutons: olive oil, flaky sea salt, 425ºF for 10-15 minutes or until beautifully golden all around:

Next, chop up some Romaine:

Place it in a bowl with the now slightly softened celery root, olives to taste, and croutons, and toss with dressing to taste. It should be nicely dressed.

Finally, transfer it to a shallow platter and shave pecorino or parmesan over the top until it is generously blanketed:

That’s it! Hope you love it. Have a great weekend, Friends 🥗

Love pizza and salad? Find recipes, tips, and tricks in Pizza Night 🍕🍕🥗🥗

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Dearest Pizza Friends. Hello and Happy Friday.

Today will be my last Pizza Every Friday post. When I started this newsletter 18 months ago, there was no end date in mind. I created it to have a space to further explore the recipes and techniques I shared in Pizza Night: from making dough to cooking pizza to pairing pies with complementary salads to simple desserts and more.

And I’m so glad I did because I’ve loved connecting with you — such passionate pizza people! — and I’ve learned and discovered new things — new flours, new dough recipes, new condiments — thanks to your comments, suggestions, and questions.

And while I feel there is no end to the pizza-related topics we could continue to discuss and explore, it’s time for me to get back to focusing on the blog: in recent months, I’ve felt stretched a little too thin trying to manage both the blog and this newsletter.

Thank you for reading along for all of these months, and thank you for supporting Pizza Night, which somehow has been out for over a year. To all paid subscribers, as you know, your subscription $$ went to good causes:

• In January, we donated $3,000 to World Central Kitchen’s fire relief efforts

• In March, we donated $1,000 to the women-founded PIE Conference

• And today, we donated $1,000 to Slice out Hunger (founded by Scott Weiner)

All paid subscriptions have been paused indefinitely. Thank you for your support!

Before I go, two things:

1. I hope you continue to use Pizza Every Friday for pizza night inspiration, whether you are looking for a new pizza, salad, dessert, or condiment. I’ve created new pages all located in the navigation bar and populated them with relevant posts. You’ll also find all of my favorite tools and ingredients in the Resource Guide, all of the oven reviews here, and other tips and tricks in the Techniques tab:

   

2. Let’s stay in touch! Every Saturday morning I send out a newsletter (not pizza focused) with recipes, tips and tricks, etc. Sign up here: Never Miss a Recipe

Friends, once again: thank you! ✌️🍕🥗

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Love pizza and salad? Find recipes, tips, and tricks in Pizza Night 🍕🍕🥗🥗

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Pizza Friends, hello! And Happy Friday.

In early April, the team at Gozney reached out asking if I would be interested in testing out Tread, their latest and smallest oven on the market. As I always love including these sorts of things in gift guides here and on the blog, and as I am curious about pizza ovens in general, I said: Yes, I’d love to.

I had hoped to get this review out sooner, should anyone be contemplating it for a Father’s Day gift, but alas, here we are, just a little over a week away from the holiday.

Let’s start from the top: in Gozney’s words, Tread is a “hyper-portable, ultra-rugged, lightweight” oven “built to explore and carefully designed to elevate the vibe of any campsite, tailgate, and everything in between.”

This is important: Unlike many of the backyard, small-ish pizza ovens on the market, whose size theoretically makes them portable, Tread is designed specifically for this purpose — to be taken on the go. See those handles on the top of the oven…

… they make it easy to lift and move around as seen here (though I wouldn’t advise moving it while lit):

I have only used Tread in my backyard, but having set it up myself, which required very little muscle power, I’d say Gozney’s “hyper-portable” characterization is accurate — the oven is as light as advertised, and I’ve found it very easy to move on and off its stand as well as in and out of my garage. I could envision taking Tread to a park or tailgate or on a car camping trip (if I didn’t have 4 children and a large dog and a car that is never not packed to the gills on these sorts of adventures).

Also important: Tread has been “engineered to heat up as fast as 15 minutes, then cool down as quickly as 20 minutes, so you’re not waiting to pack up and go.”

This is also accurate: in 15 minutes it can get up to 900ºF, and while I don’t advise cooking at that temperature, and while I also advise preheating for a little bit longer to ensure the stone is thoroughly preheated, it has been impressive to observe the fast preheat. Neither my Gozney Dome nor my Ooni Koda 16 can heat up that quickly.

Overall getting to know Tread has been really fun — it’s SO cute — and learning to cook pizza in it has been mostly seamless, but not without a few casualties: my first few pies caught fire. The biggest adjustment thus far for me has been re-learning to cook pizza in a small space: there is very little wiggle room in Tread, which makes it less forgiving than the Dome.

Part of the reason I was drawn to the Gozney Dome after having only owned an Ooni Koda 12 was its size: its large cooking area allows for moving the pizza into cooler spots should the pizza be browning too quickly.

With Tread, the pizza essentially fills the entire cooking surface, and while you of course can rotate it with the turning peel, the pizza will easily burn if you do not act quickly. I have found I have to turn my pizza more frequently in Tread than in my Dome.

Due to the tight cooking area and the proximity of the flame to the pizza, I have found that my preferred method of making pizza in an outdoor oven works great in Tread. To review, I like to cook my pizzas in the 650ºF-750ºF range (as opposed to 900ºF) for 2.5 to 3 minutes (as opposed to 60 to 90 seconds). When using my Dome and Koda 16, I turn the flame to its lowest setting once the pizza is launched; with Tread, I do this just before I launch it. I have found using the low flame to be imperative with Tread to prevent the surface of the pizza, especially any large thin bubbles, from catching fire.

I’ve included a few final thoughts as well as a video of making a Margherita pizza in my Tread below. As always, let me know if you have any questions 🍕🍕🍕

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Video: Pizza Margherita in Gozney Tread

In this video, I use the outdoor variation of the Neapolitanish pizza dough recipe from Pizza Night, and I am using Petra 5063 flour in the dough.

Tread: The Details

Cost: $499.99

Accessories: Gozney has created a robust accessory system to work with Tread, the most important being the Venture Stand ($249), especially if you envision taking Tread on the go. The roof rack and mantel would also be useful when making pizza in the wild.

If you already have a pizza oven, you know that you need two peels, one to launch the pizza and one to turn the pizza. I prefer wooden peels, so I ordered this one ($39) as I didn’t have one that was small enough to fit Tread’s opening. If you prefer a perforated peel, Gozney offers this one ($79) as well.

While all of these pizza ovens have built-in temperature gauges, I do think an infrared thermometer is essential.

A nice-to-have for Tread, especially if you plan on traveling with it, is the Venture Bag ($99).

Tread: Final Thoughts

Pros:

Its design. I’ve always been drawn to Gozney’s design/vibe, which is part of the reason why I bought the Dome when I was ready to invest in a more serious pizza oven. Tread is like a mini Dome in that the flame behaves similarly, doming up across the arched shape of the oven. I reviewed the Gozney Dome here.

Fuel efficient. It heats up more quickly than any outdoor pizza oven I’ve worked with.

Effective. Makes great pizza in under 3 minutes.

Portability. Very mobile. If you are someone that envisions taking your pizza oven on the go, I don’t think there is a better option out there.

Versatility. While I have only used it for pizza, Gozney encourages using the oven for all sorts of things from clams to vegetables to steaks. Find lots of videos on their site.

Cons:

Tight cooking space. As noted above, there is very little wiggle room, and if you are not a skilled turner, using this oven will take a little bit of practice. Moreover, because of the tight cooking space, the flame is very close to the pizza, and on a few early bakes, my pizzas caught fire. I fully believe that there is a learning curve with all of these ovens, and it takes some time to learn their quirks and to find a method that works. But once you find your rhythm, there’s nothing to it 🍕

Love pizza and salad? Find recipes, tips, and tricks in Pizza Night 🍕🍕🥗🥗

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Pizza Friends, hello! And Happy Friday.

Last September, I wrote about a new, genius way to Romesco, which calls for roasting but not peeling the peppers. It came from Joe Yonan’s latest book, Mastering the Art of Plant-Based Cooking, and it is exceptionally tasty and fast to assemble.

Last month, I wrote (briefly) about a fast n’ fresh harissa recipe, which calls for unroasted AND unpeeled peppers. It came from Eden Grinshpan’s Tahini Baby, and it, too, is exceptionally tasty and fast to assemble.

Both of these recipes got me thinking about a roasted red pepper salad dressing I shared early last year in a bonus recipe PDF to those who pre-ordered Pizza Night. In that recipe, peppers roast for 40 minutes and rest for 20, before being peeled and puréed with the remaining ingredients.

Perhaps, I wondered recently, all that fuss is unnecessary?

Before making Joe’s romesco, I would have guessed that charred peppers would lend too much bitterness to the sauce. Before making Eden’s recipe, I would have guessed that raw, unpeeled peppers wouldn’t purée well and wouldn’t provide enough depth of flavor.

But I was wrong on both accounts! And hooray for that because I’ve recently discovered that the dressing recipe I shared early last year fares beautifully with a much shorter roast (20 minutes) and without any peeling.

Having the dressing on hand inspired me to make an Ops-style salad. Ops, if you are unfamiliar, is a pizza restaurant in Brooklyn. I’ve eaten there only once, but on that evening, the sole salad on the menu was as memorable as the pizza, emerging from the kitchen looking like a rose in bloom, an artful arrangement of Little Gems and radicchio, drizzled with roasted red pepper dressing.

Having used this dressing in both a more traditional application, where bite-sized pieces of lettuce are coated evenly in the dressing, and in the Ops-style, where sturdy leaves are drizzled with dressing, I prefer the latter: it looks prettier and, as a result, is more inviting. In this article all about the Ops salad, co-owner Marie Tribouilloy says, “I want people to be able to eat the salad with their hands, like a fun snack.”

A fun snack indeed! I’ve included a video below on how to make an Ops-style salad at home. The recipe is below, too. Have a great weekend, Friends👋👋 🥗🥗

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PS: The Ops salad at Ops:

The Video: Ops-Inspired Salad How-To

The Recipe

This dressing works best with heartier greens like Little Gems, radicchio, and Romaine. Iceberg would do well here, too. In addition to the greens, you’ll need a block of parmesan, flaky sea salt, and pepper.

There’s a full how-to in the video above, but rather than chop your greens into bite-sized pieces, for this salad, you’ll simply break the heads apart into their leaves. Cut any larger leaves in half.

Arrange the leaves in a large bowl, season with salt and pepper to taste, drizzle with dressing, shave with parmesan, and repeat until your salad bouquet looks fully bloomed.

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Pizza Friends, hello! And Happy Friday.

This week I took a break from the beer dough pizza experiments and turned my attention to this lemon-blueberry crisp, a recipe that has lived on my blog for years, one that is great for summer entertaining because it is so fast to assemble, feeds a fair amount of people, and is just so festive. With scoops of vanilla ice cream plopped on top, it’s always a crowd pleaser.

But last summer, I made the crisp for a family gathering, and I found it too sweet. I channeled my inner Julia Child and did not announce this while everyone else happily tucked in, but I remember brooding about it afterward, making a mental note to revisit the recipe soon using less sugar.

Soon turned out to be last weekend, when I decided to make a few mini crisps in 5-inch gratin dishes using varying amounts of sugar. I’ll spare you the details of my experiments and share my result: I was able to cut 1/2 cup of sugar from the recipe — all of the sugar from the berry filling (which was 1/4 cup) and 1/4 cup from the crisp topping — and I found it to be perfectly sweet without any adverse effects to the texture.

In fact, using less sugar had a bonus: it helped keep the crumb topping afloat — I’ve always been bothered by how much of the crumb topping in crisps disappears into the bubbling berry filling.

Here’s one of my minis:

Satisfied with my mini crisp, I took the leap to the big gratin dish, piling 6 cups of berries inside, tossing them with the zest of a lemon, crumbling over the crisp topping, and baking it until the fruit bubbled and the topping browned evenly.

I had such high hopes upon removing that crisp from the oven, and while it was very delicious, I found two issues: the lemon flavor was nearly indiscernible and the berry filling was a little watery.

The original recipe calls for massaging the lemon zest into the sugar before tossing it with the berries. If you’ve ever employed this method, you know of its magic: rubbing citrus zest into sugar releases oils, making the citrus flavor even more pronounced.

In my updated crisp, the berries are not tossed with any sugar, and as a result, the lemon flavor gets lost. Moreover, without any sugar, the berry filling doesn’t thicken and get stewy — as mentioned, it was a little watery.

The solution? Zest the lemon into the dry ingredients of the crumb topping; toss the berries with 1 tablespoon of cornstarch.

Friends! I danced a happy jig when I tasted this updated crisp, perfectly sweet and lemony, stewy but not gelatinous, heavenly with a scoop of vanilla ice cream melting into each bite.

If you are entertaining this weekend, I can’t recommend it enough: Lemon-Blueberry Crisp 🍋🎉🫐

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PS: A Great Crowd-Pleasing Salad

PPS: A Grilled Pizza Tutorial: Charcoal & Gas

PPPS: If you’re making pizza in your outdoor pizza oven this weekend, avoid these 3 common mistakes:

The Recipe: Lemon-Blueberry Crisp

I’ve updated the recipe with new photos and notes. Get it here:

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Pizza Friends, hello! And Happy Friday.

This week I spotted ramps at my little co-op and for the first time in years, I didn’t immediately sweep them off the shelf into my cart. Their fleeting season and limited availability historically have made them a no-brainer purchase for me, but this batch looked a little tired. Moreover, ramps are pricey and kind of a pain to prep.

But I couldn’t resist, worrying if I passed them up, I might not see them again till next spring. Upon returning home, I plunged the dirt-enshrouded bundle into a bowl of cold water, where it sat for most of the day.

That evening, when I finally returned home for the night, a pungent smell greeted me. Ramps, if you are unfamiliar, are a wild allium, and their smell in their raw, unadulterated form is potent. And while it’s not bad, it’s not as welcoming as, say, onions sweating in butter or garlic roasting in the oven.

Before bed, I pulled the ramps from the water, wrapped them in a towel, then stuck them in the vegetable bin of the fridge, where again their aroma quickly began to take over.

The following day, fearing the havoc a long ramp fridge stay might wreak, I made one of my favorite pizzas from Pizza Night: Kale Pizza with Sizzling Scallions (or Ramps!) and Crème Fraîche. As I prepped the ramps, cutting away their roots, pulling away their slimy exteriors, trimming away the past-prime greens, I found myself regretting this purchase: Why must I do these things? A bundle of scallions would have worked just fine.

But as soon as those ramps began sizzling in the olive oil, softening and releasing sweeter, more inviting aromas, I felt better. And when I spooned the glistening green oil over the just-baked, charred-kale-topped pie, my hopes began to rise. And when I took one bite, all I could think was: yes, it was all worth it, the stinky house, the stinky fridge, the cleaning and prepping.

There is no substitution. There is nothing like a ramp.

Friends, if you find yourself facing this same purchasing dilemma over a bundle of ramps at the market this weekend, I say go for it. You won’t regret it. Find the recipe for the kale pizza with sizzling ramp oil below.

Finally, I had intended to update you last Friday about the results of making Scott Weiner’s beer pizza dough recipe in my stand mixer, but my experiments tripped me up. I’ve explained in more detail below.

Have a great weekend 🌱🌱🌱

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Beer Pizza Dough Update

If you are new here or need a refresher, in short: three weeks ago I posted about Scott Weiner’s beer pizza dough recipe. Two weeks ago, I wrote about what in the recipe might prevent me from making it on a regular basis — namely, having to knead in the salt after the initial mixing and having to knead it in general by hand for 10 minutes. Last week, in an effort to make the recipe feel more easily repeatable, I made the dough in my stand mixer.

The stand mixer seemed to work beautifully, effortlessly kneading the salt into the briefly rested dough, creating what felt like a strong dough in roughly 10 minutes. After a 20-minute rest, I balled up the dough, stored the dough balls in the fridge, then proceeded with making pizzas in the days that followed.

The problems arose when I went to stretch out my dough balls, which stretched out almost too easily, so easily in fact the dough tore in several places. When I took more care when stretching out another dough ball, I was able to prevent the dough from tearing, but I didn’t get as many bubbles in the dough.

Compare this stand mixer kneaded dough:

to this hand-kneaded dough:

My machine-kneaded dough balls still baked up well — great flavor, great browning. Here’s one I made with roasted mushrooms, onions, and black olives, which we all loved:

But I couldn’t get the same lightness in the crust:

Compare the above crust to this one:

The overall flavor was the same; the texture was not. I’m not giving up, but I do need to adjust my stand mixer method. From the research I’ve done, I think I’m actually over-kneading the dough in the machine, which is causing the gluten structure to weaken. A shorter machine mix, I’m hoping will do the trick. Stay tuned!

The Recipe: Spring Kale Pizza with Sizzling Ramp Oil

What you need: ramps, parmesan, kale, crème fraîche, crushed red pepper flakes, olive oil, and flaky sea salt.

I know I said there is no substitution for ramps, but… if you can’t find ramps, scallions will in fact work just fine:

Prep your ingredients: slice the ramps or scallions, grate the cheese, chop the kale.

Stretch and top your dough:

Top the just-baked pizza with the sizzling ramp or scallion oil:

Cut and serve:

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Pizza Friends, hello! And happy Friday.

This week, I made Scott Weiner’s one-hour pizza dough recipe again, twice, both times using my stand mixer, each time using a slightly different method. Why?

Oh, Friends, where to begin?

Since experimenting with this one-hour dough recipe several weeks ago, I’ve found myself thinking about recipes and what specifically in a recipe can be a page turner. For me, often it’s too many ingredients or too many sub-recipes built into the recipe.

Or it can be the process: a recipe can have just a few ingredients but require multiple steps. For instance, Scott’s recipe calls for only five 5 ingredients, but the recipe has three phases: mixing the beer, yeast, and flour together, followed by a rest; kneading in the salt and then the olive oil, followed by a rest; and finally portioning, balling, and storing.

Overall it’s not a lot of work or time — as noted, start to finish it takes an hour and most of that hour is hands off — but it still requires a little bit of thought, a little more returning to the recipe to ensure you are staying on track. Also, and maybe I’m just getting old, kneading for 10 minutes by hand is no joke.

Of course, once you’ve made the dough a few times, it will require less thought and become more of a routine, something you can do without referencing the recipe.

This is my favorite kind of recipe.

When I think about the recipes that have become routine in my life, it’s Jim Lahey’s No Knead Bread, and for many years, it was his pizza dough recipe, too. It’s also my mother’s peasant bread recipe.

All of these recipes call for mixing the flour, salt, and yeast together first; then adding the water and mixing until you have a sticky dough ball. There’s no staggering of the ingredients; there’s no resting; there’s no kneading. The dough is mixed, and then time does the work, developing gluten, developing flavor.

This is the model I used for all of the dough recipes in Pizza Night because I wanted the recipes to easily become a routine.

All of this is to say that upon first glance, Scott’s recipe had a few page turners in it for me: I’ve never loved the experience of kneading salt into a dough after the flour and water have been mixed together; I don’t love kneading in general anymore; I wondered if the tiny amount of olive oil (less than a teaspoon) was necessary.

But it had been a long time since I had tried any other dough mixing method or recipe. And, I was curious about the beer. Also, I’ve long been a fan of Scott — I’ve followed him for years on Instagram and trust his judgment, sensibilities, and advice.

And I’m so glad I did because, as noted last week, I loved the result: incredible texture and flavor created so quickly (4 hours start to finish).

But will this recipe become a routine for me? That’s why I broke out the stand mixer this week. I figured if I could eliminate the 10 minutes of hand kneading, perhaps I would be more likely to make the dough more often. Or better, could I eliminate both the hand kneading and the various mixing stages?

For one of the batches I made in the stand mixer, I followed Scott’s exact process, adding the salt after the initial mixing of the beer, yeast, and flour, and adding the olive oil after five minutes of kneading.

For the other, I whisked together the flour, salt, and yeast in the bowl of the stand mixer first, then added the beer and olive oil, and let the machine do its thing for 10 minutes.

I have six dough balls sitting in my fridge ready to go, and I will report back with the result next week. To touch, the doughs feel very similar to one another and feel very similar to the hand-kneaded versions I’ve made in previous weeks. I’ll be baking them off tonight. Stay tuned!

Friends, in the meantime, I’d love to know: What in a recipe is a page turner for you?

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PS: I have to confess, in recent years, a recipe calling for a stand mixer has become a page turner for me — can’t I just use melted butter, one bowl, and a whisk? (Often you can!) But in the pursuit of a one-hour, beer-dough pizza routine, I lugged out my Ankarsrum, the mixer I bought when my Kitchen Aid died a few years ago. Before this week, I had not used the dough hook — I’ve found the machine a little intimidating — and overall, I had used it very little, basically only to make this frosting. But I really enjoyed the process and was so pleased with how the dough hook performed. I will share the video next week:

Two More Things:

1. The lovely Katie and Meredith of What’s On Your Plate recently interviewed me for their Around the Table series, and I loved chatting with them.

2. I made a Mother’s Day Gift Guide if you are looking for ideas.

Love pizza and salad? Find recipes, tips, and tricks in Pizza Night 🍕🍕🥗🥗

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Pizza Friends, hello! And happy Friday.

A few weeks ago, one of you left a comment on this post saying:

“Came across this article and recipe and would love your thoughts. I thought the technique of using beer instead of water to get a quick fermented taste was interesting.”

The recipe sent me to Scott Wiener’s blog and to a post in which he shares a pizza dough recipe that uses beer in place of water. Scott, if you are unfamiliar, is the founder of Scott’s Pizza Tours and Slice Out Hunger (more on both below). The recipe Scott shares in his post is one he made during a Hulu pizza competition that crowned him champion and earned him a $10K award.

In his post, Scott notes that he designed the dough to fit the constraints of the show’s production schedule: one hour to make the dough one day prior to shooting the episode. In other words, he had to go from ingredients to portioned dough balls in 1 hour. He would use the dough the following day.

The challenge: how to create big-fermentation flavor in such a short period of time? The answer: beer! Scott reasoned beer would lend that characteristic rich, malty flavor typically created by a long fermentation.

In addition to using beer, Scott would tweak his process, mixing the flour, beer and yeast together first and letting it rest briefly before adding the salt, which would allow the flour to hydrate more quickly and in turn allow the dough to come together in a timely manner.

I first made Scott’s recipe a few weeks ago and was so pleased with how the dough came together, how the dough felt and handled, and how delicious and flavorful the crust tasted.

Why does it work so well?

For one, it’s high hydration — 78% — which we all know is great for the home oven (see #3 here). Second, it’s well seasoned: 12 grams of salt is 2.6% the weight of the flour, smack in the middle of that 2-3% range we want for pizza dough (see #2 here). And third, as noted, the inclusion of beer lends instant depth of flavor and promotes great browning.

Earlier this week, when I set out to make the dough again, I reached out to Scott with some questions, wanting to know three things:

1. How quickly could someone use the dough after mixing it? Could someone use it the same day and get great results?

2. Could a non-alcoholic beer work?

3. What’s Scott’s favorite pizza topping?

Scott kindly answered, and when we spoke, he said the dough could be ready to bake as quickly as 4 hours after mixing it. He also said he didn’t see why a non-alcoholic beer wouldn’t work and that, in fact, it might work even better.

And finally, he shared a few of his favorite pizza toppings, including onions and sausage, but also lemon zest added post-bake: “Even on a cheese pizza,” he said, “it adds that little something that keeps people guessing.”

Friends, in my second attempt at making this dough, I used a non-alcoholic IPA (Athletic Run Wild), I made my first pizza 3 hours after mixing the dough, and post-bake, I zested over a lemon. It was deeee-vine! The lemon zest is such a nice addition, both to a lightly cheesed white pizza and to a heavier, sausage-topped red sauce pie. We all loved it!

Find Scott’s dough recipe below as well as details about the latest Slice Out Hunger event next month in Brooklyn. Have a great weekend, Everyone 🍕🍕🍺🍺

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Scott’s Pizza Tours | Slice out Hunger

As noted above, Scott is the founder of Scott’s Pizza Tours, a New York City-based operation, and Slice Out Hunger, a nonprofit that supports hunger relief initiatives through pizza-related campaigns and events. With their administrative costs entirely covered by public donations and corporate sponsorships, 100% of the money raised by SOH goes directly to hunger relief initiatives. Their next event is next month:

Pizza on the Pier

• Sunday, May 18, 2025

• 12:00 pm - 5:00 pm

• Fornino Pier 6 (Brooklyn Bridge Park, Greenway, Brooklyn)

• Fresh wood-fired pizza made by a lineup of over 30 of NYC’s favorite pizzaioli!

Tickets

The Recipe: Scott Wiener’s Pizza Dough Recipe

For this recipe, you’ll need beer (non-alcoholic works), flour, salt, yeast, and olive oil:

First, combine the flour, beer, and yeast:

Mix until you have a sticky dough ball:

Then sprinkle the salt over the dough, cover the bowl, and let the dough rest for 10 minutes:

After the 10 minutes, knead the salt into the dough, about 5 minutes, followed by the olive oil, another 5 minutes:

Let the dough rest for 20 minutes:

Split and ball into three 270-gram dough balls:

Store the dough balls in lightly oiled containers or on a baking sheet, covered.

If you want to use the dough the same day, transfer it to a DoughMate and let the dough sit at room temperature (covered) until the dough has risen and is relaxed, about 2 hours.

When the dough has proofed sufficiently, proceed as usual:

Stretch it out:

Transfer it to a peel and top as you wish: this one has red sauce (the no-cook tomato sauce from Pizza Night), sausage, and mozzarella.

This one has crème fraîche, mozzarella, and onions:

Bake it:

Top with arugula or finish how you wish…

… this one has some shaved lemon zest added post-bake, and it is lovely 🍋🍋

Crumb shot:

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Love pizza and salad? Find recipes, tips, and tricks in Pizza Night 🍕🍕🥗🥗

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Pizza Friends, hello! And happy Friday.

A few weeks ago, Eden Grinshpan’s new cookbook, Tahini Baby, arrived at my door, and upon opening it, I felt instantly rapt. Think: roasted honey aleppo cherry tomatoes with labneh, whipped feta with crispy herbs and honey, light-as-air hummus with baharat mushrooms and preserved lemon relish.

The seasonings, the herbs, the flavors, the veg-forwardness of all of it spoke to me in the way Yotam Ottolenghi and Joshua McFadden cookbooks do. I dog-eared nearly every other recipe and made a few, too, namely the fast 'n' fresh harissa (which requires no roasting or peeling of peppers and tastes as fresh as advertised) and the above-pictured baked feta with olives and citrus, the recipe for which Eden’s publisher kindly let me share here.

It’s very simple, and if you’ve made other baked feta recipes, the process of this one will feel familiar: toss olives, fresh oregano, orange zest, fennel seeds and a sliced hot chile in a baking dish, nestle in a block of feta, drizzle with olive oil, bake until the feta and olives are soft; then finish under the broiler.

What separates this one from other baked feta recipes I’ve made is the final touch, a drizzle of honey post baking that so nicely complements the salty olives and feta. I find the honey-ed olives, which infuse with the heat of the chile during the baking, completely irrestitible and the whole ensemble especially delicious with good crusty bread*.

Friends, I’m headed to VT for Greek Easter with my family as soon as I hit publish on this post. The car is packed with loaves of bread and two skillets filled with feta and olives, ready to pop in the oven upon arrival. Wishing you all a wonderful weekend 👋

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Eden Grinshpan’s Tahini Baby, out Tuesday, April 22, available for preorder now 🎉:

*Good Crusty Bread: A few weeks ago I noted I had been making Jim Lahey’s No-Knead bread with the Petra 0102 Flour I love so much. I’m still doing it but I find when I use a mix of 50% bread flour and 50% Petra, I get the best results:

It’s especially good toasted in a skillet with olive oil:

The Recipe: Baked Feta with Olives & Citrus

First, gather your ingredients:

Toss together the olives, oregano, orange zest, fennel seeds, and chile flakes (or chopped fresh hot chile) in a baking dish:

Nestle in the feta; then drizzle with olive oil.

Bake for 20 minutes; then broil for 5. Out of the oven, drizzle with honey and sprinkle with flaky sea salt (and some more fresh or dried oregano, if you wish):

Serve with crusty bread:

And eat immediately!

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Pizza Friends, hello! And happy Friday.

A few weeks ago I attended a large banquet. Diners had the choice of either salmon or chicken, but everyone received the same first course, an arugula and fennel salad with “toasted pine nut vinaigrette,” which was pre-plated and set at each place setting.

I can never help myself from analyzing, but upon first glance, I found the choice of arugula and shaved fennel for a pre-plated salad to be bold given that both tend to tire quickly. Fennel, too, can be polarizing, and some people find arugula too spicy.

But as I ate the delicious salad and saw everyone tucking in without hesitation, I realized I had worried for naught. Dressed lightly in a citrusy vinaigrette, the greens and fennel held up beautifully, and the whole combination tasted so fresh and springy. I loved how the flavor of the toasted pine nuts permeated each bite, so much so that I wondered if the nuts were, as advertised, part of the dressing itself. When I asked the server, she told me they were not, and listed off the ingredients for a lemon vinaigrette.

In some ways this news came as a relief as recreating this salad became a relatively simple prospect: arugula + fennel + toasted pine nuts + lemon vinaigrette. I was tempted to add shaved parmesan when I made the salad at home for the first time but I’m glad I didn’t as it doesn’t need it, and its absence, I think, allows the other ingredients to shine.

This is a very simple, light salad, perfect for a pizza night or for an upcoming holiday dinner. As always, I hope you love it. Let me know if you have any questions 🥗🥗🥗🥗

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Quick Video: Shaved Fennel + Arugula Salad

The Recipe: Shaved Fennel + Arugula Salad

For this salad, you’ll need a few small fennel bulbs and some arugula:

Ideally, you’ll shave the fennel using a mandoline (this is my favorite):

Place the arugula and fennel in a bowl along with some toasted pine nuts:

Season with flaky sea salt and pepper and toss to combine. Then add some lemon vinaigrette…

… and toss one last time:

Plate and serve:

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Pizza Friends, hello! And happy Friday.

Today, I’m wrapping up Women’s Pizza Month with two things, info about a women-led pizza conference this fall and 5 women-run pizza Instagram accounts to follow.

Let’s start with the conference. On September 21st and 22nd, the Washington State University Bread Lab will host the Pizza Industry Empowers (PIE) Conference. From the founders, the conference is:

‘A multiday event geared towards uniting, educating, and uplifting the women and underrepresented people in the pizza industry. Women make up a large portion of the hospitality industry from the front of the house to the back of the house and everywhere in between. This conference is meant to advance our industry forward by empowering women with the knowledge and skills they need to succeed in their businesses or chosen professions. “We as women do not have the luxury of being great but have the burden of needing to be better.”’

PIE Conference founders:

• Laura Meyer (of Pizzeria da Laura)

• Leah Scurto (of Pizzeria Leah)

• Nicole Bean (of Pizaro’s Pizza)

• Melinda Carbajal (of Simply Pizza Trucks)

• Stephanie Swane (Publisher of Modernist Cuisine)

• Christy Alia (@realcleverfood and founder of Women’s Pizza Month).

Friends, as you know, 100% of the paid subscriptions to Pizza Every Friday go to charity or good causes. In January, we donated $3,000 to World Central Kitchen’s fire relief efforts. The next round of donations ($1,000) will be going to the PIE Conference. Thank you for your support 🙏🙏

As the conference date nears, I’ll keep you posted on the details 🍕🍕🍕

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5 Women-Run 🍕 Instagram Accounts to Follow

1. I have been introduced to so many great pizza-focused IG accounts, many women-run, by my friend Christy Alia of @RealCleverFood. Incredibly skilled at making pizza in outdoor ovens and very knowledgeable about making pizza in general, Christy shares her wisdom generously and enthusiastically. She’s also a Gozney Ambassador and the founder Women’s Pizza Month.

2. Last March, I wrote about Ines Glaser of @lupacotta and specifically her Salad Pizza Detox series in which she shares beautiful, whimsical, salad-topped pizzas, prepared entirely outdoors, from the assembly to the baking, in her sun-lit Los Angeles backyard. It’s dreamy! She also writes the pizza Substack, Pizza Tourist, where she shares both recipes and pizza-focused city guides.

3. Deep into my Pizza Night research phase, Instagram led me to Feng Chen of @leopardcrust, and I instantly fell in love with her gorgeous, perfectly blistered and poofy-crusted pizzas, often prepared on her balcony in Bangkok. She is incredibly talented and shares her recipes on her website: Leopard Crust.

4. Owner of Orange by Devoured, a pizza and tapas restaurant in Kansas City, Jhy Coulter of @devoured.pizza makes pizzas like the below-pictured Herbie Birdie, which is topped with white sauce, spinach, butternut squash purée and herb-roasted chicken (yum!) and the below-below-pictured Bam Jam, which is topped with blueberry ricotta, thinly sliced potatoes, prosciutto, and herbs (heaven!). In addition to running a restaurant, Jhy is a Gozney ambassador and shares her incredibly creative recipes on the Gozney website.

   

   

5. Born in Tehran and based in Cologne, Rosha Gholami of @pizzarosha is an Ooni Ambassador and co-host of Women’s Pizza Month. I love how she incorporates ingredients like pomegranate seeds, tahini, and date vinegar into her pizzas, and this one, topped with fig, fresh lavender, chilies, prosciutto, balsamic cream, goat Brie, and Gorgonzola dolce might be my all-time fave 👏👏👏

Who have I missed, Friends?! If you have anyone to add, please share below 🍕🍕

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Pizza Friends, hello! And happy Friday.

This week I was reminded of the joys of making pizza in an outdoor oven in March in the Northeast. Cold temps made for very long preheating times. Blustery winds continually extinguished my Gozney Dome’s pilot light. I nearly threw in the towel.

But with rounds of sourdough pizza dough made specifically for the outdoor oven proofed and ready to go, I persisted. I pulled out my Ooni Koda 16, tucked it into a corner of my backyard stoop partially protected from the wind, and said a Hail Mary.

The pizza gods answered, and roughly an hour later, a leopard-spotted golden Margherita emerged from the oven. Hallelujah!

Let’s start from the top. For Women’s Pizza Month, I wanted to honor Giorgia Caporiscio, a world-renowned pizzaiola who runs the charming Neapolitan pizzeria Don Antonio in Midtown Manhattan.

Inspired by this “golden delight” featured on her Instagram feed, I ordered some canned yellow tomatoes, made a sauce, and shared the recipe last week. This week, upon learning that Giorgia uses a naturally leavened dough for all of her pizzas, I decided to make the Sourdough Neapolitan Pizza Dough Recipe from Pizza Night and recorded the process to share here. I topped it as described in the Instagram caption with the Italian yellow tomato sauce, imported buffalo mozzarella, and fresh basil.

Friends, I don’t know if it was the satisfaction of finally eating a pizza after battling the elements for so many hours or if it was the combination of the tangy sourdough crust with the sweet golden sauce and creamy cheese but this was one of the tastiest (and simplest) pizzas I had made in a long time.

Below you’ll find a video of the entire process, from making the sourdough pizza dough to portioning, topping, and baking it. As always, I am here if you have any questions 🍕🍕

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The Video: Sourdough Neapolitan + Golden Marg

In this video I make the outdoor variation of the Sourdough Neapolitan Pizza Dough Recipe from Pizza Night. It calls for 335 grams of water as opposed to 375 grams of water, which is what is called for for the home-oven recipe. Remember: When baking pizza at high heat, you lower the hydration. When baking pizza at lower heat, you increase the hydration. Read more about that here.

The Recipe

For this recipe you’ll need a bubbly, active sourdough starter. For ease, you can buy one. If you’d like to make one from scratch, I have instructions on how to do so on my website. I also have a free email course if you’d like help with the basics of sourdough.

I love using Petra 5063, an Italian flour which behaves similarly to a Tipo 00, for my outdoor oven pizzas. (Read more about it here.) In place of Petra, you can use whatever tipo 00 flour you like. You can also simply use bread or all-purpose flour.

For the dough, you’ll need flour, water, salt, and sourdough starter. Watch the video above for a step-by-step guide on mixing the dough, which requires a few sets of stretches and folds.

By the end of the stretches and folds, your dough will be smooth and elastic.

I love letting my dough bulk ferment in a straight-sided vessel (I have four of these… so handy), which allows you to accurately see how much it has grown in volume:

Portioning this dough and balling it up is just the same as every other recipe I’ve posted/shared here, and you can watch the video above for guidance on how to do so. For this golden Margherita, you’ll need this no-cook golden tomato sauce, buffalo mozzarella, extra-virgin olive oil, flaky sea salt, and fresh basil.

Spread the sauce over the dough leaving a 1/2-inch border. Top with the cheese. Drizzle with olive oil. Sprinkle with flaky sea salt. Then…

… bake until blistered and bubbly. As noted above, it was very windy here this week, and I could not keep my Gozney Dome lit, so I used my Ooni Koda 16 instead, and it worked beautifully.

Shower with fresh basil out of the oven.

Cut and serve 🍕🍕

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Pizza Friends, hello! And happy Friday.

I have two things to share today: a can of tomatoes (plus a recipe) that will make summer feel not so far away and pizza wisdom from Giorgia Caporiscio of Don Antonio in honor of Women’s Pizza Month.

Let’s start from the top: last February, my family and I ate at Don Antonio on a frigid evening during winter break. We had just returned to Manhattan on the train from Long Island, where we had watched the Islanders (two of my daughter’s favorite team) lose to the Lightning (my son’s favorite team). With spirits low (for some of us) and appetites high (for all of us), we trudged north toward the Midtown pizzeria I had read so much about.

If you are unfamiliar, Don Antonio opened in 2012 by Roberto Caporuscio and his mentor, Antonio Starita, but is now run by Roberto’s daughter, Giorgia Caporuscio. The restaurant serves authentic Neapolitan pizza including pizza fritta (fried pizza), a popular street food of Naples.

It was prime dinner hour, and I had low hopes of getting a table without a lengthy wait, but we lucked out, snagging a table for six instantly, and ordering shortly thereafter, starting with arancini and salad, then moving on to pizza.

No surprise, it was all outstanding, particularly the pizza, the Margherita, of course, but also the salsiccia e friarielli, topped with smoked buffalo mozzarella, broccoli rabe, and sausage:

For Women’s Pizza Month, I thought it would be fun to make a pizza in honor of Giorgia, whose many accolades include Pizza Maker of the Year from the prestigious Top 50 Pizza Guide and who serves as ambassador for “Women In Pizza”, a movement that empowers women in the pizza industry.

Last weekend, while scrolling through her Instagram feed for inspiration, I found a pizza that called my name:

The caption noted that the pizza is made with 100% organic yellow Italian tomatoes. I reached out to Giorgia via Instagram and learned that she uses either canned or jarred yellow tomatoes, and after doing a little more research, I ordered a few cans of these yellow tomatoes.

As soon as they arrived, I made a very simple no-cook sauce, a purée of the tomatoes, flaky sea salt, and extra-virgin olive oil. Friends!! It was so sweet! I could taste summer! And my heart nearly exploded 💛💛💛💛💛 Find the recipe below.

Lastly, I asked Giorgia two questions, and she kindly responded:

What’s your favorite pizza?

Giorgia: My favorite pizza is one that reminds me of my grandmother. She used to make a very simple pizza with tomato sauce from her garden and dry oregano. Also I love pizza with tomato sauce, arugula, prosciutto di parma and grated pecorino.

Do you have any pizza wisdom to share?

Giorgia: The biggest thing people don’t realize is that your dough will never be exactly the same, even if you use the same recipe every time. There are so many factors that affect it— humidity, temperature, the way you handle it that day. That’s why it’s not just about following a recipe; it’s about understanding your dough. You have to feel it, know when it needs a lighter touch or a different stretch. The key is learning to work with the dough.

Amen, Giorgia, Amen! Thanks so much for sharing.

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PS: Women’s Pizza Month was founded by my friend Christy Alia (@realcleverfood) and is supported by @twocentspizza and @pizzarosha

The Recipe: No-Cook Golden Tomato Sauce

For this recipe, you’ll need either canned or jarred yellow tomatoes, extra-virgin olive oil and flaky sea salt. Note: I have not been able to find canned yellow tomatoes in my local supermarkets, and I have not had a chance to check my local Italian markets. They are pricey to buy online, and if I find a more reasonably priced source, I will share.

Puree until smooth, then taste, and adjust with salt or more olive oil if necessary.

Transfer it to a jar and store in the fridge for up to two weeks or freeze for as long as 3 months.

Coming next week…

… made in the Gozney, which I dusted off for the first time in many months:

I’ll share the recipe next week. If you’d like to make it, you’ll need: the sauce (recipe below), extra-virgin olive oil, flaky sea salt, buffalo mozzarella, and fresh basil.

No-Cook Golden Tomato Sauce

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Pizza Friends, Hello. And happy Friday.

Last week I previewed tonda-style pizza, a style of pizza I had not known about before traveling to Italy several summers ago. Unlike Neapolitan or pizza al taglio, two styles I had long anticipated experiencing in their mother country, tonda-style wasn’t on my radar.

To review, “tonda” means round, and it’s a classic Roman style, at once thin, crisp, and pliable with the sauce spread edge to edge and the toppings nearly, too. For a clearer visual, watch this video:

As you can see, these pizzas are served on dinner plates because they’re meant to be personal pizzas. Partly because we didn’t know this at the time and partly because we wanted to sample as much as we could, my husband and I ordered multiple pizzas at the two tonda-style pizzerias we visited, Ostiense and Da Remo, and we shared them. While we dined, however, we observed the locals and saw that nearly everyone ordered their own pizza, which they ate with a fork and knife.

Toppings on tonda-style pizzas range from simple and classic, like Margherita (top photo, easily my favorite), to mushroom…

to anchovies and squash blossoms…

… to mixed vegetables arranged in various quadrants.

As noted last week, this style of pizza hasn’t really taken off here in the States (please correct me if I’m wrong), and making eight of them this past week has reminded me of my love for them, not only the texture of the crust but also the ratio of toppings to crust, which I find to be ideal.

And more than that, watching videos of those rimless pizzas hanging off their plates, cheese melting at their charred edges, steam billowing from the surface, made me want to jump on a plane immediately. I loved the bustling, casual vibe of these pizzerias, the brightly lit dining rooms packed with families, friends, and what felt like neighborhood people. I long to return! Anyone else? Let’s go ✈️✈️

Friends, I can’t believe in the 1.5 years of writing this newsletter I have yet to discuss tonda-style pizza. It’s so good. Find a how-to video, photo guidance, and a recipe below. Let me know if you have any questions 🍕🍕👋👋

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The Video: How to Make Tonda-Style Pizza: Dough + Margherita

The Recipe: Tonda-Style Pizza

As noted last week, for this dough, you’ll need two types of flour Tipo 00 flour, known for creating a dough with an extensible gluten structure, and semola rimacinata, a high-protein flour made from durum wheat, like semolina, but milled twice, making it much finer in texture. In pizza dough, it helps create a crust with both a crisp and pliable texture. If you don’t have these flours, you can replace both with 100% ap flour.

In addition to the two flours, you’ll need salt, instant yeast, water, and olive oil.

The process is very simple — watch the video above for a step-by-step guide on mixing the dough. In sum: whisk together the dry ingredients, add the water and olive oil, mix, let rest, stretch and fold, let rise until it doubles, roughly 8 to 10 hours:

At this point, you’ll divide the dough into eight 120-gram portions and ball them up. (If you are making more traditional thin-crust pizza, divide the dough into four portions.)

Store the dough balls in the fridge until baking day, at which point you’ll remove the number of dough balls you need and transfer them to a DoughMate or other similar vessel (find links to everything in the Resource Guide).

Using flour as needed, roll the dough out into a 12- to 13-inch round. This video, which features the owner of Ostiense, shows how aggressive the pizza makers are while rolling out the dough. They also use small 11-inch rolling pins for the job.

This shorter video is also helpful:

For the toppings you’ll need:

Ready for the oven:

This pizza is really fun to make in an outdoor oven, where it will cook in less than 90 seconds, but I’m still in hibernation mode up here. On my preheated Baking steel at 550ºF convection roast, these pizzas cook in 3 to 4 minutes. Shower with basil out of the oven.

Cut and serve:

Undercarriage:

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Pizza Friends, Good Morning. And happy Friday.

This week I had planned to write about tonda-style pizza. I made the dough, videoed and photographed the process, and made a few pizzas, too:

Tonda-style, if you are unfamiliar, is a very thin, Roman-style pizza, and it happens to be my favorite. I experienced it while in Rome several years ago, first at Da Remo and then at Ostiense, and I haven’t experienced anything like it since:

It’s thin and crisp but not cracker-like — you can fold the slices in half; the crust is pliable. The sauce on this style of pizza is spread edge to edge, and the toppings are nearly, too. The texture of these crusts inspired the recipe for the Thin-Crust Pizza Dough in Pizza Night, and next week, I will share the process in more detail. I’m sorry I couldn’t get the materials together to share this week.

See you next Friday! 👋👋🍕🍕🥗🥗

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PS: You can make the Thin-Crust Pizza Dough recipe in Pizza Night with 100% all-purpose flour, and it will turn out just fine. If you feel like making it as suggested, however, you will need tipo 00 flour and semola rimacinata. Most recently in this dough, I used yet another Petra Flour, Petra Pizza Flour Tipo 00, which worked beautifully and which is a nice option for any of you out there who have been interested in trying Petra flours but have been deterred by the 27.5-lb bag.

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Pizza Friends, hello. And happy Friday.

Earlier this week I bought half a dozen oranges with no goal in mind apart from eating them. I returned home and placed them in my fruit bowl along with the apples and bananas, and later that day, I sliced one open.

Much to my surprise, I had purchased blood oranges! Nothing about them had indicated blood orange to me — I’ve always thought a blood orange was marked by a darker-hued ombre skin, magenta-ish fading to orange. Wrong!

After eating a few, I decided to juice the remaining, and the process made me wonder why my time with blood oranges has mostly been dedicated to carefully peeling and extracting the delicate segments to throw in a salad where they quickly fall to pieces. Juicing them is so satisfying because — wait for it — they’re so juicy! And seedless! Two oranges yielded more than a half cup of juice.

With so much freshly squeezed juice on hand, a vinaigrette was in order. Using my favorite lemon vinaigrette recipe as a guide, I replaced the lemon juice with blood orange juice and a slightly higher proportion of it. The substitution worked beautifully, as blood orange juice has a nice tartness, not unlike grapefruit juice but without the bitterness. I used the dressing on a salad tossed with a classic combination, roasted beets, goat cheese, and toasted walnuts, and the whole ensemble just tasted so fresh and bright, everything I’m craving right now — the sight of the dressing alone is enough to wash away any and all winter blues.

As I re-read the above, I’m realizing my enthusiasm for blood oranges may, for many of you, feel a decade behind the times, but I guess I’ve just never had a blood orange moment? It was time!

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The Recipe: Blood Orange Vinaigrette + Classic Beet Salad

For the dressing you’ll need blood oranges, white balsamic or other white vinegar, honey, salt, and extra-virgin olive oil.

Juice the oranges.

Whisk the juice with the vinegar, salt, and honey.

Then stream in the olive oil and whisk to combine.

A no-fail combination: beets + toasted walnuts + goat cheese

I love golden beets and always encourage beet haters to give them a try for their milder, sweeter flavor. I also am a fan of salt-roasting beets but obviously you can cook them however you like.

Toss your greens with the dressing first and season them a pinch of flaky sea salt. I love using my largest bowl for this which allows for easy tossing.

Then add the beets, goat cheese, toasted walnuts, and pepper to taste. Taste and add more dressing to taste.

Transfer to a serving bowl.

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Pizza Friends, hello. And happy Friday.

This happens to me often as a holiday approaches: I dream about all of the adventurous recipes I could make, a lofty flourless chocolate cake or a rich caramel chocolate tort or a cloudlike chocolate pavlova, something a little extra to make the occasion memorable.

But when the day arrives, and I pull out the recipe, I lose steam as soon as I read “separate the eggs” or “cream the butter and sugar” or “prepare a double boiler.”

What, I find myself asking, can I make with melted butter and one bowl?

It turns out these double chocolate espresso cookies, a long-time favorite recipe, one I have always made in the traditional two-bowl format, starting with creaming the butter and sugar in a stand mixer until light and fluffy, then adding the eggs one by one and finally the dry ingredients.

Earlier this week, when I accepted cookies would have to do for our family’s Valentine’s Day dinner, I pulled out the recipe and gave it the one-bowl, melted butter treatment, and the cookies came out as beautifully as ever.

I hadn’t made them in ages, probably because I keep my stand mixer on a shelf that requires a ladder to access, and I’m kicking myself for neglecting the recipe for so many years. These cookies are so good, truly the ideal for me: deeply chocolatey, properly salted, and perfectly textured, crisp on the exterior with a dense, fudgy center.

Should you still be on the hunt for a Valentine’s Day dessert, I can’t recommend them enough. Happy Valentine’s Day Lovebirds!! 💕💕💕

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PS: I will be making this antipasto wedge salad for our pizza night tonight. It’s one of my favorites, thanks namely to the dressing, “Creamy I,” which comes from of The Department of Salad:

And because I still have several rounds of thin crust pizza dough on hand due to all of the stromboli experiments, I’ll be making this Rubirosa-Inspired Tye Die Pie. If you are unfamiliar, it’s made with two sauces, tomato and vodka, and drizzled with basil pesto post-bake in a spiral motif. At home, I parbake this crust to ensure it’s extra crispy. Video guidance in the post 🍕🥗

PPS: How cute?!

The Recipe: Double Chocolate Espresso Cookies

This is an old recipe on my blog that I recently revisited to use melted butter and one bowl. You’ll need cocoa powder (Dutch-processed or natural), chocolate chips, and espresso powder or finely ground coffee as well as the usual players: flour, butter, brown sugar, sugar, eggs, vanilla, baking soda, and salt.

Something I am always embarrassed to admit is that I portion my cookie dough into balls using a scale so that I know each one is nearly identical, which will ensure each one bakes evenly. It’s a tedious task but with a good podcast streaming, the time passes quickly and…

… this sight makes my heart so very happy:

At this point, you can freeze the dough balls or store them in the fridge for as long as two weeks (probably longer). When ready to bake, place 6 balls on a parchment-lined sheet pan. Press down on them lightly to secure them in place.

Bake for 11 minutes at 375ºF. The cookies will be puffed upon removal and will not look fully cooked, but they will continue to cook as they cool completely on the sheet pan.

Sprinkle with flaky sea salt, if you wish, as soon as they cookies emerge from the oven.

Once cooled completely, serve.

Is there anything better?

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Pizza Friends, hello! And happy Friday.

At the end of December I posted this pepperoni stromboli recipe and vowed to make “stromboli-every-Saturday” a thing should I find another variation, perhaps one filled with spinach or broccoli, that I loved.

Friends, I found it!

To refresh, I was inspired to make stromboli around Christmas upon reminiscing about two breads ubiquitous on the holiday tables of my youth, one filled with pepperoni and the other with spinach or broccoli — I couldn’t remember. From the bit of googling that I did, both versions exist, but as I set out to make it, spinach felt easier to prep — no chopping, just wilting — and easier to incorporate into a coiled bread than broccoli.

This one follows the same basic process as the pepperoni one and uses the same cheeses — provolone and mozzarella — too, but I’ve made a few small changes/additions:

• For a flavor boost, I brush the dough with a simple garlic-pepper flake oil before layering it with the wilted spinach and cheese.

• For better browning, I brush the assembled stromboli with an egg wash instead of melted butter. I also use the egg wash on a portion of the inside of the dough to help keep it sealed.

• For visual appeal and flavor, I sprinkle the top with sesame seeds.

Personally, I like this spinach version even more than the pepperoni one — it tastes like cheesy garlic bread with the added bonus of some veggies in the mix. My children disagree.

Incidentally, I learned this week that stromboli is a Philadelphia invention. What a perfect weekend to celebrate its existence?! Go Birds!! 🦅🦅🦅

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Three Pan Pizzas to Make For Super Bowl Sunday

As you know, I love a pan pizza for entertaining for many reasons, namely because the large format is perfect for feeding a crowd, but also because so many steps can be done ahead of time. All three of the below styles of pizzas are made with the same high-hydration, focaccia-like dough recipe from Pizza Night.

For best results, make your dough in advance, ideally tonight, let it rise overnight, then stash the dough balls in the fridge until Sunday. For the Sicilian- and Detroit-style pizzas, the dough can be parbaked hours before game time. For the Grandma-style pizza, the dough is not parbaked, but the unbaked pizza can be assembled hours ahead of time. You got this, Team 💪💪

1. Grandma-Style Pizza

   

2. Sicilian Pizza

   

3. Detroit-Style Pizza

PS: A bitter greens salad feels hardly appropriate for a Super Bowl Sunday spread, but in some ways, it’s kind of ideal, the perfect balance for all of the richness: This one is very simple:

The Recipe: Spinach Stromboli

First, you’ll need a 1-lb ball of dough. This is the full batch of the Thin-Crust pizza dough recipe from Pizza Night…

… which you’ll divide in half and ball up (as opposed to fourths).

If time permits, transfer the dough balls to storage vessels (I love these) and place them in the fridge for a day or two.

An hour or so before you are ready to make your stromboli, transfer a round to a DoughMate or other lidded vessel:

When you are ready to assemble, remove it and pat it into a rectangle:

Then roll it into a 12x16-inch rectangle:

For this spinach version, you’ll need to sauté 5 ounces of baby spinach (which takes 1 minute total) and make a simple garlic-crushed red pepper flake oil.

You’ll brush the garlic oil over the dough, leaving one 1/2-inch of space along one of the long edges, which you’ll …

…brush with an egg wash. Top with the cheeses and spinach.

Then roll into a coil and press the edge to seal.

Transfer the stromboli to a parchment-lined sheet pan, seam side down; then brush with an egg wash, sprinkle with sesame seeds, if you wish, and make a few slits along the surface.

Bake for 35-40 minutes @ 375ºF or until nicely golden brown. It’s OK if it slightly explodes…

… I don’t think I’ve ever made one, in fact — see this pepperoni version — that hasn’t busted at the seams in one place or another. Once it’s sliced and plated…

… no one will notice! Serve with your favorite tomato sauce.

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Love pizza and salad? Find recipes, tips, and tricks in Pizza Night 🍕🍕🥗🥗

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Pizza Friends, hello! And happy Friday.

Earlier this week, as a pot of these chickpeas simmered on my stovetop, my son passed through the kitchen and, catching a whiff of the familiar smell, asked: Do we have any naan?

By naan, he was referring to these Stonefire packs, which I almost always have on hand, because they are tasty, so convenient, and a perfect size for both dinner portions and school lunch boxes should any chickpeas remain.

We didn’t, and I didn’t feel like running to the store, so I pulled out a ball of Neapolitanish pizza dough, rolled it out, and made it as I would when making naan from scratch: covered in a screaming hot skillet for 1 minute, uncovered for 30 seconds more, then brushed with butter out of the skillet.

The pizza dough as naan performed surprisingly well, blistering and bubbling as always and remaining soft and pliable long after it had cooked — given that the dough was not made with yogurt, the ingredient I always attributed to naan’s tenderness, I worried the texture of the faux naan might suffer with time.

But I worried for naught! It was delicious, and the kids declared it better than Stonefire — high praise! 🤣

I’ve since made the pizza dough naan a few times, and I’ve learned two things: a smaller size works better — divide your pizza dough ball into two smaller balls for best results. And should you have the time, let the dough balls rest sufficiently before rolling them out, otherwise the effort requires some serious elbow grease.

I’ve shared the process below. Have a great weekend, Everyone 👋👋

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PS: California Fire Relief Donation Update! I finally was able to connect to Stripe, and last night $2,934.37 was deposited into my account, so this morning, I donated $3,000 to World Central Kitchen on behalf of the Pizza Every Friday Community. Receipt attached:

Donation Receipt

75.9KB ∙ PDF file

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Incidentally, I am still unclear as to how Substack payments work, because as far as I can tell, that amount is roughly half of the pledged annual revenue, so I’m not sure why I received that amount all at once... I’ve emailed Substack for support. Regardless, the next time Stripe sends me dollars, I’ll keep you posted as to which charity the $$ will go next. Thank you for your support 🙏🙏🍕🍕🥗🥗

How To Make Naan-ish With Your Pizza Dough

First, you’ll need one of your pizza dough balls. I have only experimented with using a Neapolitanish pizza dough ball from Pizza Night, but I think a Thin Crust dough ball would also work well here.

Divide it in half:

Then ball up each half:

Cover the balls with a towel (or transfer to a DoughMate) and set aside for at least 20 minutes (but ideally longer):

After the 20 minutes, roll out each ball into an 8-inch circle using flour as needed. The longer you are able to let your dough balls rest, the easier this will be.

Heat a cast iron skillet over high heat and carefully lay one of the rounds into the skillet:

Cover it and cook for 1 minute:

Uncover it:

Then flip it and cook for 30 seconds:

Transfer it to a board …

… and brush with it with melted butter:

Then repeat with the second one:

Transfer it to the board and brush with butter.

I like to wrap the naan in a towel, which keeps them soft and pliable, and place the wrapped bundle in the center of the table. Serve as you wish (these chickpeas are a favorite):

Faux Naan Recipe

Love pizza and salad? Find recipes, tips, and tricks in Pizza Night 🍕🍕🥗🥗

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Pizza Friends, hello. And happy Friday.

Sometimes things don’t go as planned: You make a batch of pizza dough only to realize you have no time to tend to it, no time to make pizza for days. You enthusiastically buy a 27-lb. bag of flour, ideal for your outdoor oven pizzas, but then winter arrives, and you have no interest in making pizza in the snow. And every day as you pass that enormous bag of flour wherever it may be stored you wonder if you’ll ever make a dent in it.

Friends: you will!

I first wrote about Petra flours, specifically the 0102 and 5063, last August. As the fall progressed, I shared the results of my experiences using the flours in both my outdoor oven (see here and here) and indoor oven. When the holidays arrived, I included the flours in my gift guide because I love them so: the flavor, the texture, and the color of the pizzas they produce.

Should any of you have purchased these flours and/or should any of the above scenarios resonate, I have a few ideas:

1. With Your Pizza Dough, Make a Loaf of Toasting Bread: The photo above is simply the entire batch of the Neapolitanish pizza dough recipe from Pizza Night baked in a loaf pan. Find a how-to guide below.

2. With Your Petra 0102, Make Jim Laheys No-Knead Bread: As a reminder, the Petra 0102 flour is made from sprouted wheat flour and supports up to 80% hydration, which is the rough hydration of Jim Lahey’s No-Knead Bread. I made his famous bread recently using the Petra 0102 flour and was so pleased with the flavor and texture of the bread. See photos below.

3. With Your Petra 5063, Blend it with Bread Flour, Use it in Your Home Oven: As a reminder, the Petra 5063 is Petra’s special pizza flour and it supports up to 70% hydration. It is my preferred flour for my outdoor oven pizza dough (which I make at 68% hydration). In the late fall, when I tried to mix up a batch of the Neapolitanish dough for my home oven, which is 77% hydration, it was a soupy mess. You may have experienced this while using other similar flours, like any brand of Tipo 00, which typically create a much wetter dough. The solution? Make a dough using 50% Tipo 00 flour or the Petra 5063 and 50% bread flour. I did that this week, and it worked beautifully. Find more details below.

Friends, as noted last week, I am turning on paid subscriptions, and all of the subscription dollars will go to an organization supporting the fire relief effort in California. I’m having difficulties connecting to Stripe so that I can actually receive $$ to make a donation, but I am currently getting tech support…stay tuned! I will provide an update regarding donations next week. Have a great weekend 🍕🍕🍞🍞

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Easy Toasting Loaf (with your Neapolitanish pizza dough)

Last Thursday (the 16th), I mixed up a batch of the Neapolitanish pizza dough recipe from Pizza Night for the purpose of a video I was making. Knowing the following morning I would be leaving for three days, I immediately stuck the bowl in the fridge, where it stayed until the following Wednesday.

When I pulled the dough out of the fridge on Wednesday morning, its surface was bubbly, and its color a little grey, but it smelled fine, so I pushed on: I turned it out onto a lightly floured surface, rolled it into a coil, then stuck it into a buttered 9x5-inch loaf pan. I slicked the surface with olive oil, then let it rise until the dough nearly crowned the rim, at which point I placed it in a 375ºF for 45 minutes.

It baked beautifully, emerging with an evenly golden, slightly blistered crust. Of course, it was delicious warm with butter, which was how most of disappeared within hours of setting it on the kitchen table. I think it’s a little dense to be used as a sandwich bread, but it made great toast. Get the recipe below.

All that remained after one day:

Great toast:

Toasting Loaf Recipe

Jim Lahey’s No-Knead Bread (with Petra 0102 Flour)

It has been frigid here in Upstate New York (as it has in much of the country), and all I want to eat is soup and bread. As noted above, I recently made a loaf of Jim Lahey’s No-Knead Bread using the Petra 0102 (a sprouted wheat flour) and was so pleased with the result. As with the toasting loaf above, Jim Lahey’s bread makes great toast:

Jim Lahey's No-Knead Bread

Home Oven Neapolitanish Dough (with Petra 5063 and Bread Flour)

If you’ve ever mixed up a batch of pizza dough using Tipo 00 flour and found yourself with a soupy mess, it’s likely because the flour can’t support the hydration of the recipe. As noted above, the Petra 5063 flour, the brand’s special pizza flour, supports up to 70% hydration and works beautifully in an outdoor oven. To get it to work with my home-oven Neapolitanish pizza dough recipe (which is 77% hydration), I blend it 50/50 with bread flour. It works beautifully: the Petra 5063 lends that lovely extensibility characteristic of doughs made with Tipo 00 flours, and the bread flour provides the strength and structure to support the higher hydration. If you’ve had trouble using your Tipo 00 flour in your home oven, try the 50/50 blend.

I’ve added notes to this Brussels Sprouts Pizza recipe about using 275 grams each bread flour and Petra 5063 or your favorite Tipo 00 flour.

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Love pizza and salad? Find recipes, tips, and tricks in Pizza Night 🍕🍕🥗🥗

Amazon | Barnes and Noble | Books-a-Million | Bookshop.org | Hudson Booksellers | Walmart

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