What Makes A Traditional Pizza?

About 13% of Americans eat pizza daily.

However, fast food pizzas can't compare to the flavors of a traditional pie. When you eat a carefully cooked pizza with high-end ingredients, it's a party for your mouth.

Instead of rushing to get to the crust, you'll savor each cheesy bite! If you'd like to make a mouth-watering pizza, then this article is for you! We will tell you the top ingredients to use, as well as a few of the best pizza cooking tips.

What does it take to cook a traditional pizza? Read on to find out!

Pairing Authentic Pizza Ingredients

Did you know that authentic pizzas are sometimes called Neapolitan pizza? The reason has to do with the history of modern pizza. It was in Naples that the Margherita and Neapolitan pizzas came to be.

What Is Italian Pizza Like?

What is Italian pizza like? Whenever you're dealing with the truly authentic Neapolitan pizza, you'll notice that it doesn't have as many toppings as other pies. When it comes to traditional pizzas, less is always more in the toppings department. Instead, chefs at places like civico by the park pinsa pizza carefully choose a few select ingredients that will pair wonderfully together to create the ultimate flavor experience.

Italian Pizza Recipe

For a traditional pizza, all you'll need is tomato sauce, mozzarella cheese, parmesan cheese, and Olive oil. You can also add black pepper to taste and a little bit of basil. When you're buying the ingredients, choose to purchase the high-end options. By investing in high-quality ingredients, the result will be a lot tastier.

You might think that a Margherita pizza is going to be boring, but you'd be wrong! The ingredients blend to create a creamy yet salty and sharp flavor. The olive oil gives the pizza a sensuous texture, and the black pepper will put a little pep in your step. Working together, all of the ingredients create the perfect pizza balance.

Preparing Your Dough

After buying the ingredients, the next step is to start preparing your dough. You'll need to get your dough to the perfect temperature before you can begin stretching it. We suggest getting a thermometer and waiting until the dough reaches 77 degrees Fahrenheit. Using warm dough is always preferable to using cold dough.

When it comes to stretching the dough, you can begin by pushing out all of the bubbles towards the edges. As you push the gas bubbles towards the edges, slightly pull the dough into a disc shape. You can aim for a diameter of about 9 to 10 in. Next, use a lot of flour, but not too much, to coat the bottom of the pizza. To keep the crust from having a bland flavor, add a sprinkle of salt and pepper to the dough.

After seasoning, you can begin to add the sauce of your choice. For a traditional pizza, you'll need tomato sauce. Instead of using tomato sauce for my can or jar, you can always make your own. Buy whole tomatoes and then mash them up to create a soft spread.

Creating your tomato sauce will help provide your pizza with a more authentic flavor. You can grab the smashed-up pieces of tomato and spread them along the base of your pie.

Divide and Rest

Did you get all of the bubbles out of the dough? Now it's time to split the dough up. Go ahead and divide the dough directly down the middle, and then let it lay still for 3 to 5 minutes.

After allowing the door to rest, you can start to create your pizza disc again. If you want a thin crust pizza, stretch the disc until it's a little bit thinner than you think you want it to be. Once you start to cook the pizza, the crust is going to thicken as it puffs up.

Adding in Cheese

Next, you can begin to add on a layer of cheese. Again, you'll want to get high-quality cheeses for the best results. Think specialty cheeses that cost two times or more than your typical store-brand cheese. For instance, buy your mozzarella from a high-end supplier that leans towards gourmet taste. You can use pre-shredded cheese or chunks of cheese that you tear up yourself. You don't have to worry about using perfectly even layers of cheese.

Instead, both thick chunks of cheese and random shredded piles will work just fine. Be sure to spread the cheese out so that all of the dough is covered. Why doesn't the cheese need to be uniformly spread?

As the pizza cooks, the cheese will melt and fall into place. You don't have to stress creating perfect layers since the lack of perfection makes traditional pizza so good. You never know what slice will be extra cheesy or when the sauce will shine on a slice with less mozzarella.

Basil and Baking

Once you're done setting up your cheese, you can add in the basil. You can put the basil onto your pizza before placing it in the oven. However, if you're not using a wood-fired cooking method, and it'll take a while, wait to add the basil.

For longer cook times, it's best to add the basil at the end of the cooking time. Why? If you had the basil in too soon, the basil oils could evaporate.

When you're cooking the pizza, allow it to bake until the crust is entirely brown and the cheese is melted. It's always a good idea to gently lift the pizza and peer underneath before removing it from the oven. If the bottom of the pizza is is deliciously brown as a top, you should be good to go! After removing the pizza from the oven, you can add a little bit more basil on top.

Preparing to Make a Traditional Pizza

There you have it! The ins and outs of creating a traditional pizza. After reading this article, it's clear to see that making your pizza doesn't have to be complicated. Instead, as long as you're willing to use quality ingredients, you can make an incredible pizza.

Since sourcing the right ingredients is the first step, head over to your grocery store today. Check out the gourmet cheeses, and find out where they keep the fresh basil. For more tips like these, explore the rest of our catering website.