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Hi James and hi everybody,
about your question on working, yes I worked in pizzerias but not as pizzamaker but just as waiter, anyhow I spent lot of time looking in the "backroom" to try to understand some secrets.
At the end I can honestly say that there are not particular secrets, but just a great LOVE for what you do. The pizzaman said that it is like to try to do the artist, for example the painter. If you try to paint a landscape, the subject is always the same, the landscape, but someone puts more and more PASSION in it and then this paint looks better than the others.
Well, at the beginning you will think that this is just a stupid story to keep the "secret", and then you will understand that there isn't for REAL any secret, but just big PASSION and love.
Basically the idea is that the pizza is "our landscape" and then that we need to do the BEST to get it all the time at TOP LEVEL. Well, we are at 80% of the success.
About the 10% is good dough, the 5% is BEST oil, tomatoes, etc...and about 10% is cooking.
About oil we should keep in mind that Tuscany oil is quite different from southerners italian oils. Tuscany oil trees are quite small while oil tree in Apulia or Sicily is quite different. Mainly we can say that Tuscany oil is too much clean and pure and it needs the smell of southerners oils (Sicily, Apulia or Sardinia *oils). If you properly mix them you can get an excellent oil for pizzas. The southern oil gives "body" while the Tuscany oils give "motion".
About cooking, another small tip is to keep the bottom very clear. You should *keep in mind to take less flour as possible when you pick up the pizza . Wood tools are ok to pick up the pizza and put it inside the oven but the use of hands is often necessary . Temperature is another big clue and tomatoes as well...
I have been reading about flour on your pages. I agree, everything is very Ok, but at the end it is necessary to try to*REPRODUCE the same flour mix and to have always the same results, after you find that you like it. So it is necessary more concentration ( the 80% of PASSION) on the result that we need to reach. Passion means to understand the water that we are going to use, the salt (VERY VERY VERY IMPORTANT). If we cannot reach 8 times on 10 the same result, we must find where the problem is. We must consider that 20% of bad results can lead a pizza business to close or our friends to talk bad about us or our girl to change "boy" and to go with a good pizzamaker !
See ya,
Wally the italian
about your question on working, yes I worked in pizzerias but not as pizzamaker but just as waiter, anyhow I spent lot of time looking in the "backroom" to try to understand some secrets.
At the end I can honestly say that there are not particular secrets, but just a great LOVE for what you do. The pizzaman said that it is like to try to do the artist, for example the painter. If you try to paint a landscape, the subject is always the same, the landscape, but someone puts more and more PASSION in it and then this paint looks better than the others.
Well, at the beginning you will think that this is just a stupid story to keep the "secret", and then you will understand that there isn't for REAL any secret, but just big PASSION and love.
Basically the idea is that the pizza is "our landscape" and then that we need to do the BEST to get it all the time at TOP LEVEL. Well, we are at 80% of the success.
About the 10% is good dough, the 5% is BEST oil, tomatoes, etc...and about 10% is cooking.
About oil we should keep in mind that Tuscany oil is quite different from southerners italian oils. Tuscany oil trees are quite small while oil tree in Apulia or Sicily is quite different. Mainly we can say that Tuscany oil is too much clean and pure and it needs the smell of southerners oils (Sicily, Apulia or Sardinia *oils). If you properly mix them you can get an excellent oil for pizzas. The southern oil gives "body" while the Tuscany oils give "motion".
About cooking, another small tip is to keep the bottom very clear. You should *keep in mind to take less flour as possible when you pick up the pizza . Wood tools are ok to pick up the pizza and put it inside the oven but the use of hands is often necessary . Temperature is another big clue and tomatoes as well...
I have been reading about flour on your pages. I agree, everything is very Ok, but at the end it is necessary to try to*REPRODUCE the same flour mix and to have always the same results, after you find that you like it. So it is necessary more concentration ( the 80% of PASSION) on the result that we need to reach. Passion means to understand the water that we are going to use, the salt (VERY VERY VERY IMPORTANT). If we cannot reach 8 times on 10 the same result, we must find where the problem is. We must consider that 20% of bad results can lead a pizza business to close or our friends to talk bad about us or our girl to change "boy" and to go with a good pizzamaker !
See ya,
Wally the italian