A Pie in the Sky
by Sarah Bragaw & Peter Cassell(page 2)
(His favorite model is Christie Brinkley and the only autograph he's asked for is Rusty Staubs' "He's a real gentleman. One of my son's first words was "Mets," so I had to get it for him.")
SB: Can you spin a pizza? (blank look from Ciro) Like a basketball, up in the air like in that Spike Lee movie?
CV: Yes. That's done to remove the extra flour from the dough - causes the flour to burn. I use the middle and index flngers. A good pizza man doesn't flour his peel (the paddle used to take pizzas to and from the ovens.) He doesn't need to because the dough has been properly stressed.
SB: Stressed?
CV: Stressed means the process of adding flour when kneading the dough.
SB: I've recently seen a machine that spits out pizza crusts. perfectly formed and ready to top.
CV: Its important not to work the dough too much. The machines work the dough too much - it becomes more of a matzoth texture than the soft yet crispy texture of a handmade crust.
SB: What's your secret to making pizza.
CV: Fresh ingredients and a thin crust. Age the dough. I let it rise slowly over two days in the fridge. Age intensifies the flavors.
SB:I don't see you using oil as you make the pizzas.
CV: Olive oil should only be used after baking. Pizzas cooked with oil are greasy. Here we offer spiced olive oil as the pizza is served.
SB: When I get slices on the street the oil seeps through the paper plates, the napkins, the paper bags...
CV: The pizzas are made with cheap ingredients and the oil comes from the cheap, domestic, mozzarella breaking down.
SB: Do you have a current favorite topping?
CV: Wild mushroom. Every region of Italy has different names for pizzas popular in their area. Napoli has plain pizza - plain pizza is tomato and cheese - with anchovies on top. Sicily has no cheese, capers, black olives, anchovies and fresh garlic. The Pizza Margherita here (at Le Madri) is named after the 17th century Queen Margherita of Savoy--plain pizza with fresh basil.
SB: Name a pizza you've created.
CV: Pino introduced me to Robiola Cheese and I created the Pizza
Robiola. It's Robiola between layers of focaccia drizzled with truffled olive
oil.
SB: What does Robiola taste like?
CV: Cream cheese texture with the taste of a goat cheese but it's a cows milk cheese aged with garlic and salt.
SB: The Sicilian style or Chicago style pizza that's popular now. Is that from Sicily?
CV: In lialy the pizza is like my pizza, a thin crust. The thick pizza is foccaccia bread with toppings, a deep-dish pizza made in a pan. There is a "Pizzeria al Tagilio" made in pans and sold by weight. Schiacciata is a skinny, flattened foccacia associated with northern Italy. Every region of Italy has a different name for pizzas and foccaccias.
SB: What about the frozen pizzas available?
CV: I won't comment on frozen pizzas because I'm coming out with my own line. It will have a fresh taste, no commercialization, no pasteurization, and all natural products. What Haagen-Daz is to ice cream, I want to be to pizza. Premium.
Want a slice? Check 'em out:
