Simple things can be the best, like what Andrea Barbato calls the "original" Neapolitan pizza (above).
It's colorful and crisp, with almost no toppings compared to pizzas loaded with meats, sausages, cheeses, vegetables and more.
Barbato, who is from Naples, is chef at Domingo's Italian Deli in Encino, where he showed recently what Neapolitan pizzaiolos (pizza makers) really do.
These are the steps he followed in making the "original" marinara pizza.
First, he placed a spoonful of tomato sauce on the crust.
Next, he spread it in smooth circles.
Then he added large pieces of garlic.
And finally dried oregano and a sprinkling of olive oil.
The pizza then baked at high heat (700 to 800 degrees F) in Domingo's stone-floored oven (above).
The dough is made with 00 flour from Italy (above) and requires two types of yeast--granular dry yeast and mother yeast, which is a piece of yesterday's dough combined with a piece of the morning's batch of dough.
The dough should age for about eight hours before use. "If you make pizza immediately, the dough breaks," Barbato said, showing how to shape the dough by pressing it round and round on a floured surface. "No real pizza maker throws the dough," he said.
You can't toss this kind of pizza together at the last minute for hungry kids. But there's a way around that. You can buy the pizza dough at Domingo's as well as house-made tomato sauce and, for serious bakers, 00 flour.
Domingo's Italian Deli, 17548 Ventura Blvd, Encino, CA 91316. Tel: (818) 981-4466.
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