Cooking with Myhrvold and Migoya's Modernist Pizza

[weinoo]

8 hours ago, Robenco15 said:

82% went better this time around. Amazing what happens when you use the correct flour. Super Nuvola takes the characteristics of a higher hydration dough so at 82% it was just way too much. 
 

This is the first one out of the oven so I took a pic so I didn’t forget. Not bad. I need to keep practicing. 
 

 See (and don't take this personally), this stuff is not even pizza to me. That's just me, by the way,

 

But as far as the book is concerned, I don't need to learn how to bake something that comes out like this. When I'm attempting to perfect pizza, as I know  it.

[Robenco15]

1 hour ago, weinoo said:

 See (and don't take this personally), this stuff is not even pizza to me. That's just me, by the way,

 

But as far as the book is concerned, I don't need to learn how to bake something that comes out like this. When I'm attempting to perfect pizza, as I know  it.

Ok

[Robenco15]

2 hours ago, Chris Hennes said:

Well, at any rate, the olive oil won't affect the thickening of the xanthan gum, so you are free to add it.

I figured but didn’t feel like experimenting the first time around 

[Robenco15]

2 hours ago, Chris Hennes said:

Tokyo Marinara Pizza (KM p. 208)

 

I made this again with the high-hydration dough I used yesterday: this time it was double-aged, this was the same batch of dough. Apparently the defining characteristic of Tokyo Marinara is an enormous amount of olive oil drizzled over the pizza before baking. It's also got a bit of torn basil and dried oregano that the original lacks. And yes, it's supposed to have garlic... which is still sitting on my counter, I think, I completely spaced on adding it I was in such a hurry to prevent the dough from sticking. Doh!

 

 

That's about 2 tablespoons of olive oil on that 12" pizza: it's a lot. It's a bit "flamey" in the oven, but I didn't get a shot of any of the more exciting conflagration, there's not a lot of downtime for photography while making these!

 

The crust comes out nicely, with good pillowy edges, but truth be told I'm not sure it's really much of an improvement over their normal Neapolitan dough, which is certainly easier to work with. Maybe in a few hundred pizzas I'll have a clearer sense of it.

Looking forward to making this. How was the marinara sauce process? Reading it even seemed a bit tedious

[Chris Hennes]

1 hour ago, Robenco15 said:

Looking forward to making this. How was the marinara sauce process? Reading it even seemed a bit tedious

It seems like more work than it is -- there's still no cooking involved, so it only takes a couple of minutes, and really only the first time you make it. After that you know what texture they are going for and you don't really have to micromanage (at least, I don't).

[Robenco15]

My last 82% dough ball was great. Made this Friday and it still came out great tonight, Sunday night. This is a Bee Sting and it’s outrageously good. 

The Modernist Neapolitan tomato sauce is great. Kinda reminds me of Lunchables pizza in its consistency. 
 

 

Edited October 25, 2021 by Robenco15 (log)

[Chris Hennes]

Pizza Puttanesca (KM p. 274)

 

Sort of an obvious one, from their "Inspired by Italian Ingredients or Dishes" table. I mean, I've certainly made many pizzas with olives and capers as a topping, so it's not a great leap to actually make a puttanesca sauce and use it as pizza sauce. Here the toppings are black olives added pre-baking, and Parmigiano, fried capers, and anchovies added after. (The cheese can be put on before or after baking, so I tried one of each - I preferred the "after" option).  Delicious, of course! Served on their original Neapolitan, with the dough relaxer (I'm getting better with the peel, this is not such an ordeal as the first time I tried).

 

 

 

[FlashJack]

1 hour ago, Robenco15 said:

This is a Bee Sting and it’s outrageously good. 

That looks great. Can you explain the 'bee sting' toppings please?

[Robenco15]

19 minutes ago, FlashJack said:

That looks great. Can you explain the 'bee sting' toppings please?

It’s sauce, fior di latte, hot Sopressata pre-bake, and then finished with basil leaves and a drizzle of Mike’s Hot Honey. 
 

For the one pictured I decided to put the basil on the sauce and then the cheese over the basil and then the sopressata before baking. Then finished with the drizzle. 

[FlashJack]

2 hours ago, Robenco15 said:

a drizzle of Mike’s Hot Honey

Thank you. I need to up my toppings game.

[Chris Hennes]

Cacio e Pepe Pizza (KM p. 304)

 

@weinoo avert your eyes!

 

I've posted several times before about my attempts to make a cacio e pepe pizza (here and here) -- the Modernist Pizza variant takes a tack that would never have occurred to me. You basically just put spaghetti cacio e pepe on a pizza. Right... including the spaghetti.

 

This is an assembly recipe from their "Flavor Themes" section, based on a Neapolitan crust. The recipe has you make a cacio e pepe sauce using Wondra and xanthan gum as the starch/thickening component (since you are making it independent of the pasta, I guess). To top the pizza, you put down some large slices of fresh mozzarella, make spaghetti (I actually used bucatini, I had a fraction of a box to use up), add the premade sauce and some cream to the spaghetti and spread it out over the pizza, tuck some basil (?!?) leaves into it, and put some small mozzarella balls on top. It ends up being a lot of cheese! I suppose that's appropriate for cacio e pepe. Actually, it could have used more "pepe"!

 

All told, it wasn't bad pizza, but I'm not really sure there was much payoff to putting the actual pasta on there besides the "wow that's weird" factor. I found the basil to be a bit incongruous, so I left it off the second pizza and added more pepper, which I preferred.

 

 

[Robenco15]

19 minutes ago, Chris Hennes said:

Cacio e Pepe Pizza (KM p. 304)

 

@weinoo avert your eyes!

 

I've posted several times before about my attempts to make a cacio e pepe pizza (here and here) -- the Modernist Pizza variant takes a tack that would never have occurred to me. You basically just put spaghetti cacio e pepe on a pizza. Right... including the spaghetti.

 

This is an assembly recipe from their "Flavor Themes" section, based on a Neapolitan crust. The recipe has you make a cacio e pepe sauce using Wondra and xanthan gum as the starch/thickening component (since you are making it independent of the pasta, I guess). To top the pizza, you put down some large slices of fresh mozzarella, make spaghetti (I actually used bucatini, I had a fraction of a box to use up), add the premade sauce and some cream to the spaghetti and spread it out over the pizza, tuck some basil (?!?) leaves into it, and put some small mozzarella balls on top. It ends up being a lot of cheese! I suppose that's appropriate for cacio e pepe. Actually, it could have used more "pepe"!

 

All told, it wasn't bad pizza, but I'm not really sure there was much payoff to putting the actual pasta on there besides the "wow that's weird" factor. I found the basil to be a bit incongruous, so I left it off the second pizza and added more pepper, which I preferred.

 

 

So the recipe this pizza is inspired by is actually pretty doable and less involved. Not sure there is a written recipe online but it’s been on a few pizza shows and it’s pretty easy to follow along. YouTube probably has clips of it. 

[Chris Hennes]

22 hours ago, Robenco15 said:

So the recipe this pizza is inspired by is actually pretty doable and less involved.

Do you mean the one with the ice? I've tried it, it did not go well for me! Have you had better results?

[Chris Hennes]

Brazilian Thin-Crust Calabresa Pizza (KM p. 195)

 

Apparently one of the defining characteristics of Brazilian pizza is that they put a lot of cheese on them. In this case, 190g of pizza cheese for a 12" pizza. Not my favorite, to be honest. On the plus side, though, the super-thin cracker-like crust turned out well, I liked that quite a lot! And I'd never had Brazilian Calabresa sausage (it's not at all like the Italian Calabrese) -- it wasn't bad. Pretty plain, but overall fine as a pizza topping.

 

 

[Robenco15]

9 minutes ago, Chris Hennes said:

Do you mean the one with the ice? I've tried it, it did not go well for me! Have you had better results?

Haven’t tried it yet but will have to soon!

[weinoo]

On 10/25/2021 at 9:17 PM, Chris Hennes said:

@weinoo avert your eyes!

 

Oh jeez - help us all!!  By the way, that Brazilian pizza looks almost Roman in its cracker-thin crust.

 

This guy's pretty famous in Rome for making the cacio e pepe pizza...

 

 

 

[rotuts]

@weinoo 

 

thank you so much for that video

 

I need a slice . right now.

 

But , again thank you

\

Ill look into it

 

after all 

 

a slice , right the3re !

 

see 

[Chris Hennes]

4 hours ago, weinoo said:

that Brazilian pizza looks almost Roman in its cracker-thin crust.

Their argument is that "Roman" pizza isn't a thing -- that there isn't a single definable Roman style, just a whole bunch of different styles in Rome that all say they are the true "Roman" pizza (and of course they're right, technically!). Having never been to Rome, I can't really argue the point either way. But apparently in Brazil, this is a predominant style of pizza. I can live without the crazy amount of cheese, but I definitely like the crust. We'll see about tomorrow's pizza, it's another sort of strange one.

[Chris Hennes]

Brazilian Thin-Crust Margherita Pizza (KM p. 197)

 

This is really only sort of the recipe from Modernist Pizza: they call for whole slices of beefsteak tomato, but tomato season is over here, and I had some little grape tomatoes at the end of their useful lives. So I made that substitution, and I cut the amount of cheese called for in half. So more "inspired by" Modernist Pizza and/or Brazil:

 

 

[weinoo]

1 hour ago, Chris Hennes said:

Their argument is that "Roman" pizza isn't a thing -- that there isn't a single definable Roman style, just a whole bunch of different styles in Rome that all say they are the true "Roman" pizza (and of course they're right, technically!). Having never been to Rome, I can't really argue the point either way.

 

Some of their arguments are annoying. Classically, before Bonci, there was certainly a style of pizza made in Rome that was identifiable.

This was one of the seminal places doing "Roman" sytle...

 

 

Deliciously, I might add.

 

 

Porcini pie.

 

 

Sausage, Note the thin crust in both.

 

 

See through, almost. Along came Bonci...

 

 

and focaccia pizza al taglio.  One more classic Roman...

 

 

Note the crust.

 

 

Edited October 28, 2021 by weinoo (log)

[Chris Hennes]

58 minutes ago, weinoo said:

This was one of the seminal places doing "Roman" sytle...

 

When you say "one of" though... how many are we talking? When we say there's a definable New York style, it's because there are dozens if not hundreds of places offering a stylistically similar pizza. How many places in Rome were doing that cracker crust, compared to something else (Neapolitan, New York, Focaccia with stuff on it, whatever)?

[weinoo]

10 minutes ago, Chris Hennes said:

 

When you say "one of" though... how many are we talking? When we say there's a definable New York style, it's because there are dozens if not hundreds of places offering a stylistically similar pizza. How many places in Rome were doing that cracker crust, compared to something else (Neapolitan, New York, Focaccia with stuff on it, whatever)?

I think most all of them.  Back when we first started visiting Rome, you could rarely get pizza by the slice or even during the day. You could get pizza bianca or one of its variations (pizza Rosa), sold by weight, almost all day.  But for the classic pie as well know it, round, topped with sauce and/or cheese (not, thank god, one of Nathan’s abhorrent toppings), you had to go to a place focusing on pizza for dinner.  That’s when they fired up the pizza ovens. 

 

 

[weinoo]

Per Elizabeth Minchilli, who may know more about pizza in Rome than the moderns...

 

FYI: In case you don’t know, when talking pizza in Rome there are basically three kinds:

 

Pizza a taglio: This is sheet pizza, sold mostly in small store fronts that specialize in this type, but also sold in some bakeries. It is sold by the weight and has various toppings. You can either buy it to take away, or (usually) eat it standing up at a counter.

 

Pizza: When most people say ‘pizza’ in Rome they mean small, round single serving pizzas. These are made to order at pizzerias, usually in a wood burning oven. Almost always pizzerias are only open at night, so this is a dinner kind of thing (there are some notable and recent exceptions)

 

Pizza Bianca: This is white pizza dough that has been baked in a sheet. It is sold in bakeries and is a true ‘street food’ in that it is meant to be eaten while hot, right away.

Roman Pizza vs Neopolitan Pizza: Roman pizza is made with a very thin crust, and barely any rim around the edge. Neopolitan pizza is thicker, doughier, and has a thick puffy crust along the edge. There are also variations that are some where between the two.

 

By the way, Katie says the same about classic Roman pizza...

 

Pizzeria Ostiense is the quintessential Roman pizzeria: bright lights, jocular service, and super thin-crusted pizzas with a slightly chewy, barely raised rim. Its trio of owners previously worked at Da Remo in Testaccio, a beloved venue serving the classic local pizza style,

Edited October 28, 2021 by weinoo (log)

[Robenco15]

Just made a pan pizza (Kenji’s recipe) but also made a 95% Biga 75% hydration dough for this weekend with Caputo Super Nuvola. It is ABSOLUTELY absurd they didn’t include Biga in the book but that’s not stopping me. I’m posting here because I did use their technique of making a pregelatanized flour, called a Tangzhong I believe (that’s also why it’s a 95% Biga dough). Came together well in the mixer. Looking forward to this weekend to see how this comes out. 

[Chris Hennes]

Chicken and Catupiry Brazilian Thin-Crust Pizza (KM p. 199)

 

I've never heard of nor eaten Catupiry cheese, which is apparently a very popular brand in Brazil: Modernist Pizza says it's a "soft, spreadable cheese that we liken to a combination of mayonnaise and cream cheese. [...] we're not the biggest fans of it." And yet here's a recipe that calls for it anyway . I couldn't bring myself to buy $25 worth of cheese (eG-friendly Amazon.com link) with that kind of lukewarm endorsement. So I scrounged around the internet for substitutes, and ended up making a blend of cream cheese and brie. On its own it tasted reasonably respectable, anyway. I have no idea how close I am to the real deal. The rest of the pizza is not that crazy: shredded chicken, sweated onions, and whole green olives. I ended up cutting basically all of the quantities in half: Brazilians really seem to like their pizzas heavily topped, and I just can't bring myself to do it. Maybe if it were just the olives. But the chicken? No thanks. So anyway, here's my take on that pizza: