IHDP: Pizze casalinghe encore une fois

IHDP: Internationales Haus der Pizza
Pizze casalinghe encore une fois

A couple of weeks ago, we posted on some fun Lucantonius, Amata and I had with (play-)dough over the Easter holiday weekend: Pizza e pasta casalinga: Home-made pizza and pasta (link). On Easter Sunday itself we made some homemade pasta but at the start of the weekend, on Good Friday, we followed to a degree the traditions of our Italian relatives and ‘fasted’ by eating only pizza, making a “red pie” (a “pizza Margherita”) and a “green pie” (with broccoli di rape, feta and olives). To our delight, a mere fortnight later, we had the opportunity to make some pizza at home again, this time as proud hosts to the 1st Annual Meeting of the Italo-Alsatian Friendship Society (la Société pour l’Amitié Italo-Alsacienne, die Gesellschaft für Italienisch-Elsässische Freundschaft, la Società per l’Amicizia Italo-Alsaziana). In this regard, some of you perhaps may remember a piece we posted back in December concerning our own family background which, aside from the clearly dominant Prussian element, is comprised of an equal share of Alsatian and, of course, the more substantial Italian element (Italian and Alsatian Christmas Traditions (link)). In consultation with fellow officers in the Society, Marie-Josée Dingler and Frédéric-Guillaume Giannini, we decided on a simple menu which would help foster a properly relaxed and amicable atmosphere and which would also focus on one of the shared culinary traditions of Alsace and Italy, namely pizza.

***

This time we made our Neapolitan-style pizza with thinly sliced pieces of proscitto di Parma which were shielded from the heat by the uncooked tomato ‘sauce’ (roughly chopped pomodori pelati tipo San Marzano, touch of oregano, touch of garlic), slices of mozzarella di bufala, torn basil leaves, a sprinkle of parmigiano and a restrained drizzle of Sicilian olive oil. I’ve mentioned elsewhere that I rarely buy imported mozzarella di bufala but did so for this occasion, in part as a result of having had to reflect on my dissatisfaction with the mozzarella di mucca or fior di latte which I find around here in the context of the discussion of my previous recent post on homemade pizza. An additional reason I could not resist buying this particular imported cheese was that it was produced in an old satellite village of my family’s home-town in northern Campania (Provincia di Caserta), the zone that is considered by many to produce the very finest mozzarella di bufala in Campania. Of course, it was no less delicious than it was expensive, but predictably the texture was no longer as it should be. Here is our pizza col prosciutto in the precooked state:



In honour of Alsace we made flamme küche, a dish which received considerable attention back in December in the Christkindlmarktimbißbude thread (link) (see further below). There is a little bit of variation allowed in the traditional dressing of a flamme küche and we stayed squarely within the bounds of tradition: smoked bacon, onions, crême fraîche, fromage blanc, a touch of nutmeg. Before baking, the pie looked thus:



We were all very exceedingly pleased with how both the pizza col prosciutto and the flamme küche turned out. The flavour of the pizza was, I believe, about as close as one can get to what one eats in Campania with but one qualification –– the lack of the effects of the high temperature cooking one gets in a traditional pizza oven. Nonetheless, this pizza induced delirium:



Die Flammeküche war übrigens auch nicht slecht... enfin, à vrai dire, elle était très delicieuse:



For purposes of comparison, I offer MikeG’s picture of the flamme küche produced by the stand at the Christkindlmarkt (his post with this picture is at the bottom of page 1 of the thread linked above):



The version at the Christmas Market was very good indeed and I really enjoyed their seemingly not so traditional touch of using a wholewheat crust. Something which their pie had which the home cook can not achieve in the oven is the smokiness that the wood fire in the brick oven gives. But aside from the lack of smokiness from the oven (of course, the bacon had its own smokey flavour), I think the home version Amata and I made was quite a treat; note, though we hardly piled the toppings on in the usual American manner, we did use a bit more bacon than they did at the German (yes, they were not from Alsace) guys' booth at the Christmas Market and we spread the toppings around more thoroughly. In addition, we fried the onion a bit in bacon fat, whereas the lads at the market booth used raw onions; both approaches are used in Alsace. Finally, I also sprinkled some ciboulette/Schnittlauch (chives) on the pie for presentation purposes..



Italo-Alsatian Friendship: it’s a good thing.

Antonius

Antonius wrote:IHDP: Internationales Haus der Pizza
Pizze casalinghe encore une fois

Italo-Alsatian Friendship: it’s a good thing.

Antonius

Just keep the sauerkraut off the pizza (no?)

Thanks for making me hungry!

Rob

Antonius wrote:Die Flammeküche war übrigens auch nicht slecht... enfin, à vrai dire, elle était très delicieuse:

Hi Antonius,

I was wondering if it could be possible for you to post the English translation of some of the German phrases you use?? Unfortunately, German is one of the languages where I only know 2 words, and none are mentionable on the board.

Thanks!

Char

Where did you find your lovely rohmer glasses lurking in the background of the picks. I have a mismatched few picked up at various resale shops, but have not been able to find classic amber rohmers, or, even rarer, classic green-stemmed mosel glasses in quite a while.

Also, where did you find the Campanian mozz. di bufala? I have never bought it here, always assuming it was a hopeless endeavor to capture the flavor and get it here in time even if they were milking cows at the airport. But if you think it comes close, I'd be ready to give it a shot.

CrazyC wrote:

Antonius wrote:Die Flammeküche war übrigens auch nicht slecht... enfin, à vrai dire, elle était très delicieuse:

I was wondering if it could be possible for you to post the English translation of some of the German phrases you use?? Unfortunately, German is one of the languages where I only know 2 words, and none are mentionable on the board.

Thanks!

Char

Char:

"By the way, the flammeküche wasn't too bad either... in short, to tell the truth, it was very delicious."

Not especially heart-healthy but very delicious.



A

mrbarolo wrote:Where did you find your lovely rohmer glasses lurking in the background of the picks. I have a mismatched few picked up at various resale shops, but have not been able to find classic amber rohmers, or, even rarer, classic green-stemmed mosel glasses in quite a while.

The Römer seen above I got at Meyer's Delikatessen in Lincoln Square. They always have them as well as lots of nice beer glasses of various sorts on the shelves high up by the main service counter (the Römer are a little to the left, behind the cooler with the cheese). I love that style of goblet.

Also, where did you find the Campanian mozz. di bufala? I have never bought it here, always assuming it was a hopeless endeavor to capture the flavor and get it here in time even if they were milking cows at the airport. But if you think it comes close, I'd be ready to give it a shot.

I got that piece of mozzarella at Riviera on Harlem; they pretty much always have some on hand. This cheese was "Cilento" brand but according to the label the batch this particular piece was from was not produced on the Cilento peninsula, which is in southern Campania, Provincia di Salerno, a place with a structurally noteworthy and archaic dialect and some of the best Greek ruins in the world (up at the northern end of the peninsula by the town of Agropoli*). Rather, the label stated that the cheese was produced in Cellole at the opposite end of Campania, on the coastal plain below Sessa Aurunca and Monte Massico.

The flavour of the piece I got hadn't suffered much; it still had some of the milky side to balance the buffalo milk's wonderful tartness. But the texture was kind of soft. Luckily, baked on a pizza, that's not so much of a problem (though it was a bit wetter than one would want). As a treat once in a while it's worth it.

A

(* Cara Angela, si tu ci stai, mi manchi! Ti scrivo presto!)

IHDP: Internationales Haus der Pizza II
Pizze casalinghe otra vez
con nuestras verduras del huerto

Secondo la buona tradizione dell' «Internationales Haus der Pizza» abbiamo fatto un piatto tipico della cucina fusion, specificamente un calzone alla napoletana che prende ispirazione dalle 'quesadillas mexicanas', in quanto riguarda il ripieno. Questo calzone, non so come lo vorrei chiamare, perchè ci sono varie buone possibilità:
Following the tradition of the 'International House of Pizza' we made a dish that belongs to the 'fusion' style of cooking, namely, a Neapolitan style 'calzone' with a filling that takes its inspiriation from Mexican quesadillas. I'm not sure what to call this, for the possibilities are many:

'o cazone 'e sciur' 'e cucuzze
la caciatella al fior di zucchine
la quesadilla de flor de calabaza, estilo Campania
il tortelluccio al forno...

Il tortelluccio al forno
Neapolitan style calzone or 'quesadilla' but twisted into ring form:


Qui si può vedere il ripieno di fiore di zucchine e dadini di zucchina, salsa di pomodoro fresco, basilico, due tipi di formaggi stagionati e grattugiati (pecorino romano e gouda), ricotta fresca e 'casö musciö' (in questo caso un formaggio fresco arabo); era molto saporito:
Here one sees the filling with zucchini flowers, finely diced zucchini, fresh tomato sauce, basil, grated romano and gouda, ricotta and fresh cheese:


Qui si può vedere una pizza che abbiamo fatta. Sulla pizza ci abbiamo messo della salsa di pomodoro fresco, pezzini di piccole melanzane fritti, pepperoncini freschi, basilico, olive verdi e mozzarella affumicata. In genere preferisco molto la mozzarella fresca per una pizza ma non ce n'avevo. Ecco la pizza del pompiere (grazie al 'heat' e 'smoke'):
Here is a pizza we made, topped with fresh tomato sauce, fried slices of baby eggplant, fresh red hot chiles, basil, green olives and smoked mozzarella (I prefer fresh mozzarella for pizzas but didn't have any on hand). This I call the 'fireman's pizza', thanks to the 'heat and smoke':



Una molto buona pizza era.

'Buon profitto' a tutti quanti.

Antonius

Che bella!

Overamente, Andogne, 'a pizza 'e casa toia è 'o chiù sapurito.

Mrbarolo, Choey:

Grazie assai!

If you look closely, you can detect some problems; my odd (but perhaps innovative ) tortelluccio sprung a leak in the oven and oozed a bit onto the pizza stone. Quite a mess. That in turn inclined me to use a pan for the pizza rather than the preferred naked contact of pizza to stone; using a pan is not a bad thing, per se, but it does alter the cooking time and textural qualities of the crust a bit.

This bit of pizza-making was sort of done on the spur of the moment, inspired by the unexpected bumper crop of zucchini blossoms. The down side was that when I set to making the filling for the tortelluccio / caciatella / quesadilla, it turned out I had very little ricotta. The Arab fresh cheese which I used instead was a little on the salty side for this purpose. Still though, the final product was quite tasty. Gouda, also included in the filling, was there as homage to the good old days, when almost all my favourite places in the world were gathered together under the beneficent care of Emperor Charles V.

The smoked mozzarella on the pizza I got at Graziano's and it was made by a company, "Mozzarella Fresca", in California. For a packaged smoked mozzarella, I thought it was really quite good, perhaps the best of its ilk that I've had in a long time. It's smoked but still moist, unlike say, the packaged smoked mozzarella from the Upstate NY company, Cappiello (sp?), which one finds widely distributed here in Chicagoland; that cheese is (at least in my experience and memory) dry. Of course, it is a packaged product and so it can't match the glories of the smoked mozzarella from the local salumeria where they make there own mozzarella and then smoke it (as one finds in New Netherland). Unfortunately, there are no such places I know of here in Chicago. Anyway, the Mozzarella Fresca smoked mozzarella is pretty good (not overly smoky and the tang of the cheese is still there) and I'm looking forward to trying their ricotta.

Antonius

Pitsákia me Elliniká Systatiká
Little Pizzas with Greek Ingredients


Amata has been baking a lot of late and one night recently, with all the baking gear out and the oven stoked, I decided to use some left over bread dough with some ingredients that turned up upon inspection of the contents of the fridge. The results of the impromptu and hasty ‘pizzata’ did not perhaps come out as well formed and photogenic as they do when we set out to make pizzas (see above) but they were nonetheless damn tasty.


Pitsáki «Ewing» me féta, manoúri, ntomáta, skórdho, maïntanós, kai ladhi.
Named –contrary to popular belief – not for the famous centre of the Knicks but rather in honour of Ellinikon Pandopoleion (link). Or does perhaps the name have to do with the nature of the two cheeses used, feta and manouri?


A little passata di pomodoro, a wee bit of minced garlic, fresh parsley, dried oregano, a few kalamata olives and olive oil were the rest of the ingredients.


Pitsáki «æ oraía Souædhéza» me graviera Kritis, omó kremmúdhi, ánithos, kai ladhi.


This little pie, with its simple and very Greek dressing of graviera, dill and raw onion, was really outstanding. The graviera used was the one that can be seen in my two posts on Minos Imports (link)


Even more controversy swirls around the name of this dish. The phrase «æ oraía Souædhéza» means "the beautiful Swede" and, being marked overtly for feminine gender, the reference could of course be to a Swedish woman but also to any noun bearing feminine grammatical gender in Greek.

One theory is that the dish was invented by the late and greatly missed Panos ‘Pops’ Papadakis, owner of the amazing hot dog stand Pups-n-Pop, which back in the day stood on South Dearborn Street in the space where the small square (formerly known as Piazza Lucantonio) with the fountain now finds itself midway between Harrison and Polk. As some of you old timers may remember, Pops didn’t limit himself to ‘pups’ and pop but would daily offer one or two ‘Grecian specialties’, advertised only in Greek on the chalk board hanging precariously over the absurdly large and rather ancient cash register. Of course, it is – at least according to some --true that Pops was the inventor of the so-called ‘Chicken Vesuvio’ preparation and it might do well for me to pass along that story while you’re here.

One of Pops’ specials, particularly popular with the printing house workers when they would get off work from the dead man’s shift, was a simple dish of chicken, seasoned with some garlic and oregano and a touch of Aleppo red pepper and either lemon or wine, and roasted with potatoes and sometimes served with peas added to the mix as well. This simple but savoury concoction Pops called katópoulo ‘æphaisteiakó or ‘Chicken Hephaistos’, but with the Greek phrase meaning actually ‘Volcanic Chicken’, so named by Pops in honour of his home island, Santorini or Thera, which back in the bronze age was blown apart with one of the most powerful volcanic eruptions in European history – an eruption far greater in magnitude and more important in its historical consequences than any of the belches issuing from Naples’ vaunted little Vesuvio.

As the story goes, one Tony Cacaforte, owner of the now long gone Taylor Street restaurant Stu Cesso, stumbled into Pups-n-Pop one morning after visiting a number of the local fern bars and health clubs over night. He arrived just in time to join some of the printers in enjoying nice steaming-hot heaps of Pops’ tangy chicken and potatoes and, well, as you can guess, Cacaforte stole the idea, and brought it back to his own restaurant. Within a few years, all the old Italians in the neighbourhood who had for so long had been eating pollo arrosto con le patate (e piselli) abandoned the old dish and embraced the new one (which was, admittedly, not very distinct from the one that they had been eating). Anyway, yes, it’s properly not Chicken Vesuvio but Chicken Hephaistos!

Now, back to the pizza. Greek pizza was a fairly common offering at Pups-n-Pop and it has been claimed that one day, Pops accidentally dropped some of the peelings from a great neep or rutabaga or – aha! – ‘Swede’ onto a simple pizza that was waiting to go in the oven and, voilà!, the beautiful Swede (nota bene: pítsa is a feminine noun in Greek) was born, just so!

That’s what some experts believe but the absence of rutabagas on most versions of the dish has raised doubt in the minds of several noted victologists.

Others believe that this ‘Swedish’ pizza is a far more recent creation of a Greek restaurant in Toronto, namely the restaurant Niké, a fashionable joint not too far from the old Maple Leaf Gardens. The owner, Nikos Pagodromos, is a huge hockey fan and a passionate partisan of the Leafs; his favourite player is the captain of the boys in blue, Mats Sundin. Thus, by extension, Mr. Pagodromos is also an ardent fan of the Swedish hockey team in international competitions. When the Swedish team took the gold medal at Turin, Nikos allegedly celebrated by coming up with this pizza, in which the dill stands symbolically for the ties between Sweden and Greece and the unexpressed feminine noun in the name of the pizza is the Greek word níkæ (pronounced now as níki), that is, ‘victory’. The beautiful Swedish victory.

I myself have a different theory. Indeed, I claim to have invented this pizza myself and to have named it in honour of my wife, who fits the description well.

Antonius


Links to other recipes and cooking notes by this writer: http://lthforum.com/bb/viewtopic.php?p=55649#55649

Very entertaining, Antonius! Tusen tack!

I must also say tusen tack to Antonius, both for the delicious graviera pizza -- one of the best things I've eaten recently -- and for the very sweet post. (A wonderful (early) birthday present!)



By the way, in case anyone is wondering after seeing the pictures above, Cafe Bustelo is not a secret ingredient in Antonius's pizzas. The can holds polenta, a bit of which was sprinkled on the peel.

Bridgestone wrote:Very entertaining, Antonius! Tusen tack!

Hej Bridgestone,

Ingen orsak! Jag hoppas bara att ingen har trodd att den här berättelsen vore sann! (åtminstone vad Pops beträffar; vad jag sade över min fru är naturligtvis fullkomligt sant!!!)

Antonius