Despite making pizza almost every week for the past few years, there are only a few topping combinations that I keep coming back to. Most common are the single-ingredient pies: pepperoni, which our five-year old insists on eating every pizza night (not that any of the adults are complaining), and Margherita, with just cheese, sauce […]

After a series of rainy or cold spring weekends, as of this Friday the Ooni is back in action. I’ve had the oven for five years now, and every year that goes by the season gets shorter: I am a little less gung-ho about dragging it out of the garage on marginal days in March […]

Pizza making around here follows an annual cycle. Since getting a portable, outdoor pizza oven, summers are devoted to Neapolitan-style pies. But in winter, when it’s too cold for the outdoor oven (I found that the Ooni struggles to stay hot enough when it’s below 20º out, plus who wants to walk out there?) we […]

It’s the kind of claim I’d normally dismiss out of hand: a from-scratch Neapolitan style pie in about one hour, start-to-finish. Everyone knows you need at least an overnight fermentation to get good pizza dough, and two days doesn’t hurt. If it had just been published on some foodie blog I probably wouldn’t have given […]

They say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, and it’s true. After all, why bother copying something you don’t like? Take pizza. There are the classics: margherita, marinara, pepperoni – everyone can make these. But when a pizzeria comes up with a truly novel and interesting combination of toppings, what can one do but […]

It started with an innocent question, fueled perhaps by a too strong Blue Moon cocktail: “Can you put lemon slices on a pizza?” I thought immediately of chicken piccata, a dish notable for including whole lemon slices – rind and all, in the sauce. If it works over pasta, it should work on pizza too. […]

The best thing about your father-in-law building a wood-burning oven in his backyard is the amazing pizza you can bake: its pillowy crust dotted with pinpoints of char, the right balance of chewy, soft and crisp.  The worst thing about baking in a wood-fired oven? All the other pizzas you’ve ever made seem horrible in […]

My taste in pizza runs strongly to the Neapolitan, and the pizza I make most often at home has a very thin, crisp crust. But I am by no means some kind of Neapolitan absolutist: I keep an open mind about the many styles of pizza in the world. Sometimes I even make a different […]

May in Minnesota, however mild, is not exactly a month of abundant agricultural production. Plants just haven’t had enough time to shake off the winter chill and start the reproductive cycle that brings us delicious veggies all summer. Given that fresh local produce is hard to come by in this early month, one might question […]

Ah, springtime. Its combination of tender green vegetables and temperatures often still cold enough to allow keeping the oven at 500ºF for a few hours make it almost the perfect time to cook pizza. Almost, were it not for the fact that tomatoes are still months away. But tomatoes – while crucial to many pies […]