Daily Slice gives a quick snapshot of a different slice or pie that the folks at the Serious Eats empire have enjoyed lately.

[Photographs: David Kover]

We had to choose the extra bedroom over proximity to good pizza, but that doesn't mean I won't miss the hell out of living across the street from Pizzeria Delfina.

We ate our goodbye-pie the day before the move. I sauntered across the street, past the line of people waiting for a table in the tiny restaurant, and then scurried home with our to-go order so the crust wouldn't have time to steam in the box. We had already packed our utensils, but that didn't matter, because Delfina's crisp-yet-chewy crust can easily be a fork-free experience.

Somehow, I don't think the pizzeria nearest our new apartment will use clean-tasting fior di latte like the stuff on the Margherita we'd ordered from Delfina. Fat chance that they'll use anything like Delfina's richly flavored tomato sauce either.

It's pizza worth a trip, and since we're not moving far, I'm sure we'll be back. Though I worry that any return visits will just make me wonder whether that extra bedroom is worth it.

If you were leaving your city, town, or neighborhood, where would you make sure to get one last pie?

Pizzeria Delfina

3611 18th Street, San Francisco, CA 94110 (map)
415-437-6800; pizzeriadelfina.com

VIEW SLIDESHOW: My Pie Monday: Baffetto, Stuffed Turtle, All-Edge Pizza and More!

There are twelve new pies to feast your eyes upon this My Pie Monday! Check out the new additions from Corni, Sam, Phunnyfarm, and foozebox! Without further ado, let's get to those gorgeous pizza pies!

If you make pizza at home, join the My Pie Monday fun, just take one snapshot of a pie you made recently, describe your cooking method (in 80 words or less), and follow these instructions to get it to us by 8pm (EST) Thursday. Be sure to let us know your Slice screen name.

Want to see more inspiring pizza made by Slice'rs? Right this way »

About the author: Meredith Smith is the Slice editor. You can follow her on Twitter: @mertsmith.

Cookie Cimineri outside Totonno's. [Photographs: Michael Berman]

Since filing our first report on the recovery effort at Totonno's, we've been checking in with owners Cookie Cimineri and Antoinette Balzano on a regular basis. While the rebuilding should start moving along at a quicker pace once the results from the 3rd round of mold tests are in (sometime this week), some grim news has come our way. Three months after Sandy, the family is now struggling to acquire the loans necessary to reopen the pizzeria.

What does this mean for the pizzeria? That Totonno's, whose cultural importance can be measured not only in Brooklyn but anywhere in this country where someone is baking pizza, is now being endangered by disinterested institutions.

After the hurricane, Antoinette applied for loans from both the federal Small Business Administration (SBA), to the tune of $150,000, and New York City Business Development Corporation's emergency relief loans. Emergency would, typically, imply a sense of urgency. But not here. While they're still waiting on an answer from the SBA, Antoinette told me that the $25,000 loan they applied for was only recently turned down by the NYCBDC.

The reason? Because of the debt from the 2009 fire that Totonno's has been paying off, the NYCBDC did not believe the family would be able to repay the emergency loan. You might question why they think a family that has been so single-mindedly and stubbornly dedicated to preserving their business would suddenly become irresponsible and unreliable.

"They have to go by the last year," Antoinette explained, speaking of financial records and the loan application process. "For the last 2 years, we've been paying off the $200,000 loan from the fire. The last [contractor], he was a con artist. My sister didn't get 3 cents for 11 months. How do you live when you have bills to pay? A family to feed? Totonno's doesn't make a lot of money. It's about passion."

Borough president Marty Markowitz, who Antoinette has described as wonderfully helpful, is doing what he can to ensure that the Totonno's legacy endures. Only a few days after NYCBDC loan was turned down, he called to inform Antoinette that it was going to be re-reviewed. There is, then, still hope they could get the $25,000 they asked for. But officials from the NYCBDC have been, according to Antoinette, less than helpful.

"I called the office around Christmas because no one was calling me," she explained. "The secretary told me they're on vacation, so I said, 'you're telling me the office is being run by 2 secretaries when people lost their lives out here? And they have the nerve to be on vacation?' A half hour later, the president calls me ... They're being unreasonable; they don't want to budge. Let me tell you, there was something that a Mrs. Long, the supervisory loan officer, told me to do. She said, take someone off the business to get the loan and add them back on--that's fraud!"

Adding fuel to the fire is that the family is still dealing with companies that are scheming to make a quick buck. A mold company, one of five that Antoinette hired, is currently holding her money hostage after charging $5,300 for mold removal only for the lab tests to still come back positive. Antoinette wants her money back. They told her they won't give up a dime until she does another round of testing.

After the publication of our initial article, a number of readers reached out about the possibility of donating to the struggling pizzeria. When I inquired about a fundraising campaign, Antoinette was skeptical. In all likelihood, it does not look like a Kickstarter or Small Knot campaign is going to happen.

"We don't want anybody to suffer to have to give to us," Antoinette told me, explaining that they would rather have the money go to families whose lives were ruined by the hurricane. "We don't want anyone to have to give something up for us. But, if they're able..."

What is clear is that something must be done.

"Look, I don't care what it is," Antoinette told me. "We'll do whatever we have to do to reopen."*

*An earlier version of this post ended with a quotation that indicated Totonno's was precariously close to closing. The statement has since been retracted and Slice apologizes for this misunderstanding.

About the author:Chris Crowley is the author of the Bronx Eats column. Follow him on Twitter, if you'd like. In person, your best bet is the window seat at Neerob, or waiting in line at the Lechonera La Piranha trailer.

Spotted on Craigslist, Scott's Pizza Tours in NYC is hiring. For all those New York pizza buffs, this may be the gig you need to make all that cheesy, saucy knowledge work for you. If you live in one of the five boroughs and you are a pizza fanatic, then you have undoubtedly heard of Scott and his highly rated tour outfit. Aside from telling folks where to get the best pizza in the city, Scott's Pizza Tours delves into pizza history, culture, and science. If all that sounds good, and you're up for getting a NYC Sightseeing Guides License, then check out the Craigslist post and shoot Scott your cover letter and resume.

About the author: Meredith Smith is the Slice editor. You can follow her on Twitter: @mertsmith.

VIEW SLIDESHOW: First Look: Handsome Pizza in Portland, OR

[Photographs: Adam Lindsley]

Early 2010: With former ironworker Ethan Welt at the helm, Pizza Depokos opens in an old garage on the corner of North Greeley and Killingsworth. Featuring a wood-fired oven and excellent pies—including a few rare Greek-themed options—the pizzeria anchors the young North Station food cart pod.

Flash-forward to 2011: Welt decides to cut his ties to Depokos, and longtime Slice reader, pizzaiolo at vegan restaurant Portobello, and certified Pizza ObsessiveWill Fain is there to pick up the reins. He spends the next year learning the idiosyncracies of Welt's oven, dialing in his dough recipe, and experiencing firsthand the ins and outs of owning and operating a business singlehandedly.

Now, with winter's grasp upon us, Fain has finally introduced the world to what those who know him say was a long time coming: Handsome Pizza. Offering wood-fired New York–Neapolitan pies, a selection of salads with seasonal vegetables, and Scoop Handmade Ice Cream, Fain's endeavor shines a light of culinary hope on a neighborhood not especially known for quality pizza.

For anyone with thoughts of opening their own pizzeria at some point in the future, be sure to read the interview with Fain below for his insights on the process, as well as his philosophy on pizza itself.

When did the idea for making pizza for a living first pop into your head?

It first showed up around 2009 or 2010 when food carts really started to pick up some buzz, and I saw Pyro Pizza set up in SE Portland with their WFO, and then Wy'east opened. They proved that it's a feasible business.

My initial thought when I was first considering opening a cart was to keep it really, really simple. Do one thing and do it well. With the expectation that there would be a lot of time required to run a business, I was hoping focus on making really high-quality food rather than a lot of menu items. That's not exactly what happened, and in the process of acquiring a business instead of starting my own, I had a customer base that already had certain expectations regarding the menu. So my menu and prep list are longer than I'd like, but the benefit is that I think I was able to keep a good portion of the existing customers.

What adjustments did you have to make going from making pizza at home to making it professionally?

The quantity of food, the pace of the kitchen, and pressure of cooking for paying customers were all markedly greater. I had to learn how to scale up everything, how to prep faster, how to make pizzas faster. There's an extra level or organization required in a restaurant kitchen. At home it doesn't much matter if you run out of a topping, but at work it means lost sales, disappointed customers, or delayed orders. An off night can mean bad Yelp reviews or bad word-of-mouth. A good night can mean positive press. None of that came into effect when I was doing it at home. At home the only person I needed to please was me.

The other thing is that I would only make pizza at home when I really felt like doing it. The business doesn't give me much of a choice. There are definitely days when it's just a job. I'd rather spend my summer Saturdays at the park with friends than roasting onions or washing dishes.

What were some of the unforeseeable obstacles you've had to deal with in your first year in business?

Everything takes three-times longer than you think it will. I upgraded the interior of the garage a little bit—repainted, reworked my service kitchen space, built some tables. The original plan called for about six weeks. It took closer to four or five months to finish it all.

What have been your greatest challenges in owning and operating a pizzeria?

On a day-to-day basis, the thing I fret most about is the customer service. Because I'm the sole person there, I have to both provide customer service and make the food. If I'm taking an order, I'm not making food, and if I'm making food, I am not fully engaging a customer. So, especially during peak eating times, I find myself occasionally alternately apologizing and thanking people profusely for—in my own little time-warped subjective reality—interminable waits for taking their order or serving their pizza. It may really only be about five minutes that someone's waiting to get their order in, but again, in my anxiety-ridden noggin, that seems to be an eternity and feels unforgivable. My hope is that customers don't notice me quietly panicking while I'm serving them. One day I'll have an employee and hopefully this problem will be solved.

The other customer service thing I struggle with is word choice. How do I answer customer questions in an amiable and clear fashion? It's not always obvious. Sometimes I have little epiphanies about how to refine my language after months of saying something in a roundabout or less appealing way. It seems that even minor changes in syntax, tone, or diction can make a major difference in my ability to make a sale, or make a customer feel welcome or comfortable.

On a grander scale, the greatest challenges are maintaining a healthy work-life balance and making sure I don't get too high when things are good or too low when things are slow or I make mistakes. Keeping a level head will make for better decision-making. My work-life balance isn't quite there yet, but the longer I do this, hopefully the better that will be.

What pizza or pizzas are your customers' favorites?

The Margherita. Tied for second are the Pepperoni and the Sausage y Fromage.

In what ways do you want to differentiate Handsome Pizza from the other great pizzerias in Portland? In what ways do you want to emulate them?

The establishment I'd maybe most like to emulate would be Wy'east. [Owners] Red & Squish make stellar pizza and do it while being possibly the nicest people I've met in the food cart world. They have a loyal following and really just seem to love what they do. I can't say for sure if they have major business ambitions, but as a customer you just don't get the sense that it's about the money at all for them (though it is a business and they are trying to support themselves). Handsome Pizza exists because I want to make pizza. Hopefully I can grow the business, but still keep that perspective.

Has working in food service changed the way you act as a customer?

Absolutely. I hope I've always been a pretty courteous customer, but there are things that drive me a little batty at work that's changed my behavior a little bit. I've noticed people don't read signs or menus very carefully, always clean-up after themselves, or put things back where they found them. So I try to be more aware of those things as a customer.

What does pizza mean to you?

It comprises everything. It's food—it keeps me alive. It's my business, my livelihood. It's memories of my youth, eating a half pepperoni, half plain at Jerry's Subs and Pizza with my brother and my dad, sipping on birch beer. It's my dad reminiscing about eating at Yala's in Lorain, Ohio, about the great New York slice. It represents good times with friends, regional accents and history, ontological debates about what it is and what is good. It is arts and crafts. Its circularity, when it is circular, is inclusive, egalitarian—there's pizza of all types for all people: gold-leafed for millionaires, 20-minute delivery for the 99%, and everything in between. It's the neighborhood hangout and the far-off destination. Pizza is perfectly attainable for virtually everyone, but perfect pizza is scarce, subjective, and ephemeral.

Be sure to check out the slideshow for more Handsome Pizza photos!

Handsome Pizza

2730 N. Killingsworth St., Portland, OR 97217 (map)
503-247-7499; handsomepizza.com

About the author:Adam Lindsley is a Pacific Northwest-based writer, musician, and the author of the pizza blog, This Is Pizza. You can follow him at @ThisIsPizza on Twitter. As a contributor for both Slice and A Hamburger Today, he is contractually obligated to say he loves pizza and burgers in equal amounts. Which is to say he is a polygamist.

[Photographs: Kelly Bone]

When Hollywood Pies opened up in June of 2011, the operation seemed mysterious...maybe even a little sketchy.  Purveyors of deep dish Chicago-style pizza, they would deliver just about anywhere, but if you wanted pick-up, you had to show up at some random corner on La Cienaga (near a strip club and a defunct Mexican restaurant) and wait for someone to magically appear with your seemingly five-pound pie. More strange than that? It was actually really good. Fairly quickly, the pick-up spot moved to downtown outside a dance club ("look for the line of EDM fans in ironic tank tops and furry boots"), then back over to Robertson, before finally settling in the quiet section of Pico of which they now reside.

The moves appear to be over now with news that they're opening up a storefront with seating, but to be honest I'm almost dreading it.  Part of the allure has always been the enigma. Who exactly is making these pies? Are they cooking out of someone's house? Is this even legal? Going to get pizza was suddenly a little dangerous (and a lot of fun), and I'm sorry to see the era ending. But it turns out the truth ain't so bad, either.

Hollywood Pies is the brainchild of David Miscimarra, a Pittsburgh native who did time in the Windy City before settling in San Diego. Miscimarra used his engineering background, a la Jeff Varasano, to work up his ideal version of a deep dish pie, and when his friends lost their stuffing over the results, he decided to quit his day job and go pro. He and his girlfriend correctly identified Los Angeles as a city seriously lacking in the deep dish department, and they rented out a series of commercial kitchens (thus the odd pickup areas) while searching for a permanent home.

The Sausage ala Zweig has pork that goes to the edge.

For Chicago transplants looking for a landmark, Hollywood Pies is more Gino's East than Lou Malnati. It's crisp but thick at the ends (maybe a little too thick), and even though there's the requisite lake of cheese oozing across the base, those inclined could easily scoop up a whole slice and take a bite. While I'm usually content going Margherita, I'm a firm believer that Chicago-style pizza necessitates sausage in some form (or many) and David must agree because there's pork on literally half of the menu. The Classic Chicago has small chunks of sweet sausage swimming in mozzarella and house-made ricotta, and the Sausage a la Zweig offers a fairly thick pork patty manhole that covers the entire pie. Of the two, I actually like the more reserved Classic. There's a lot less meat but I think you get way more bang for the buck in the flavor department, and the milky, fresh ricotta balances out the chunky sauce that's occasionally overflowing with a little too much garlic.

I would probably never order a straight cheese pie from Hollywood Pies, but I'm also keenly aware that I'm living in a city that is slowly and surely becoming disgusted by meat, thanks to a thriving vegetarian community.  So to best serve the city, The Vegetarian Foodie herself, Slice correspondent Kelly Bone, volunteered her services for you, the people. I now hand you over to her capable hands.

A cheese pie, Native Style, with crushed tomatoes, oil, and oregano.

Kelly: I'm hardly disgusted, but why add distraction to Hollywood Pie's Cheese ($13/$19) deep dish? I lovetoppings; the more href=" http://slice.seriouseats.com/archives/2013/01/top-this-banh-mi-a-la-mohawk-bend.html">unusual, the better. But when it comes to Chicago-style, I demand to be thumb deep in great mozzarella and brazen tomato sauce—nothing else. Deep dish pizza is a sloppy punch to the gut; I have no want to arm it with brass knuckles of sausage. At Hollywood Pies, the vegetable toppings add more to the tab than to the flavor of the pie. Or worst, dilute the star ingredients. Such as their Spinach pizza ($15/$25), where a paper thin sheet of (albeit fresh) greens and ultra mild ricotta temper the whole-milk mozzarella and garlic-laced tomato sauce. This temperament may be needed when sausage joins the party; but not when getting down to business with a slab of top-shelf mozzarella.

The crust does all that is needed to balance the sauce. Thick with a dry, biscuit-like crumb, the crust is flecked with cornmeal and minimal salt. Some lament this background quality, but it plays the supporting role in the high-pitched solo of the sauce. Brimming with garlic—teetering on the verge of overwhelming—the crust tames the pulpy layer of tomatoes. Still, the sauce lingers on your breath, but more importantly, on your mind.

Fine, I'll say it. Kelly Bone takes really pretty pictures...

For a milder approach, ordering a pie "Native Style" ( add $2) precludes garlic; replacing the sauce with whole crushed tomatoes, olive oil, and oregano. The juicy knots of tomatoes settle into a mountainous landscape as any leftover liquid evaporates in the oven. This leaves behind a lush layer of sweet, nearly roasted tomatoes that are almost as superb as the sauce.

That said, sometimes I do want to jazz up the cheese deep dish. Maintaining regionality, I spike the pie in spicy Italian giardiniera. Perhaps Hollywood Pies will have these hot pickled vegetables as a dine-in condiment—fingers crossed.

The mushroom, pepperoni, and black olives get lost on the Gable.

Lance: Co-signed. Well, mostly. After having the Native Style, I was surprised by how much I preferred the bright crushed tomatoes to the regular sauce, though it does lay the crust a little bare. I should also note that I experimented a bit with the Gable (mushrooms, pepperoni, black olives) and probably wouldn't go back. The ingredients at Hollywood Pies are almost uniformly good, but I could barely taste the pepperoni—even when I picked one out to eat it separately.

There are other options for deep dish pizza in Los Angeles (okay, four to be exact), but Kelly and I can assure you, Hollywood Pies is the one to beat—with or without the danger. Just stick to the sausage (Kelly's note: or the cheese!) and everything will be fine.

About the author:Lance Roberts is a writer in Los Angeles who can be found waiting on street corners for pizza.

About the author: After nearly a decade in Brooklyn, Kelly Bone landed back in Los Angeles where she writes The Vegetarian Foodie. She spends the rest of her time designing office cubicles... you might be sitting in one right now! Follow her on Twitter at @TheVegFoodie

[Photographs: Meredith Smith]

The Criteria

A few months back we put six brands of sliced pepperoni head-to-head in a taste test to find the best ones for snacking and pizza-making. You can check out the results here. But pre-sliced pepperoni and stick pepperoni are different beasts. While the pre-sliced brands are very convenient, most are sliced super thin (as in around a millimeter thin) and aren't likely to morph into little pepperoni grease chalices in the heat of the oven. If you missed the science behind the pepperoni curl, get up to speed would ya—right here!

With pepperoni sticks, you can control how thick you slice your meaty little discs and consequently enhance the chance of rendering up some perfectly cupped pepperonis. Casings factor in as well, and with a stick if it's not right on the package identifying the casing as natural or collagen, you can take an educated guess by noting whether the pepperoni has a slight curve or not.* The curved sticks are most likely stuffed in natural casings, which result in more moisture loss on the exterior walls of the stick and greater moisture contrast between the edge and center, which in turn means better cupping. But in these seven brands, we'll take the guess work out of the equation and let you know what separated our favorites from the rest of the pack.

Just like in the first round of pepperoni tasting, we are looking for a good balance of heat, spice, salt, and that characteristic spike of acidity. And while slicing your own has its advantages, it can also mean rounds that ooze more than a desirable amount of orange grease. So grease release is a factor and of course the coveted power to cup.

*Discerning the casing type on sliced pepperoni usually involved a phone call. However, since the last taste test we discovered you can by natural casing sliced pepperoni by Ezzo from Pennsylvania Macaroni Company. Time for a re-match.

The Contenders

• Colameco's Primo Naturale
• Boar's Head
• Vermont Smoke and Cure
• Hormel
• Bridgford
• Margherita Italian Style
• Margherita Stick

The Brands We Tested

Margherita Natural Casing

This pepperoni topped the chart on pizza for its "meaty chew" and slightly crisp texture. It's punctuated by a "burst of herbaceousness" and a well-balanced flavor. The same texture didn't impress as unilaterally in the snacking side of things, as some tasters found the round to be more "akin to dry-cured sausage" and a little "jerky like." Despite the natural casings, there wasn't a lot of cupping from these slices. One of the down sides of this unpackaged stick could be a lack of humidity control, causing the sticks to overly dry out.

Boar's Head Natural Casing

Boar's Head Natural Casing Pepperoni packs a punch. The spicy heat got high marks as really "standing up to the sauce and cheese in good measure" on pizza. One taster remarked, "If you like a little kick in your pizza, this is the pepperoni to go with." Tasted plain, "fennel notes" were more pronounced, but a couple of taster found it "super salty."

Vermont Smoke and Cure

The "perfect balance of sweet, sour, and tangy" in this flavorful brand caused it to rank first with tasters as a snacking pepperoni. As indicated in the name, a "puff of smoke" was discernible on and off the pizza. And while it "cupped nicely," the "meaty flavor got lost among the other flavors of the pizza."

Margherita Italian Style

The vacuum sealed brother to the Margherita Natural Casing pepperoni garnered a lot of praise on the pizzas for its charred edged that "crisped up nicely." Vinegary heat and herb flavor both characterized these pepperoni rounds, but as a eating pepperoni, it came in second only to Vermont Smoke and Cure. The "good balance of seasonings" and "slight smokiness" at the end set this brand apart.

Brigford

Bridgford's bright red pepperoni held firmly in the middle of the pack in the pizza and non-pizzas applications. Lots of grease pooled in the cups and they threatened to runneth over. But they had a "nice give" when cooked, even if they lacked dimension in the flavor department. Un-cooked, one taster described the texture as "stringy and oily," but flavor-wise it ended with a "burst of heat and spice at the end."

Colameco's Primo Naturale

Colameco's Primo Naturale is part of the Wellshire Farms family. As such, it's uncured, all natural, nitrate and nitrite "free" (except where naturally occurring). The natural collagen casing made from beef protein, not intestine, but the drier, crumbly texture makes them almost seem like they are from natural casings. While this sausage got higher marks as a snacking pepperoni for its vinegary sharpness, others found it salty and bland. On pizza it fell short by not crisping up and being more mealy than chewy.

Hormel

"SALT" was the biggest complaint against the Hormel brand pepperoni. Texturally, these 'ronis were just too fatty. They were "juicing up orange oil" and "curled up like a 'roided out body builder." Tasters noted that these tasted "commercial" and "overly processed" and weren't surprised to see "Hormel" when the answer key was revealed.

About the author: Meredith Smith is the Slice editor. You can follow her on Twitter: @mertsmith.

[Photographs: David Kover]

According to the mission statement for Hot Italian, the owners have constructed the restaurant to, "celebrate Italy's new generation of art, music, design, sport, food, and wine." It appears that they also want to celebrate really, really good-looking people, with each dish on the menu getting named for a famous attractive Italian. (Hence the restaurant's name.)

Hot Italian's menu also offers up a neat little coding system, with symbols to let you know the different ways a topping combination can be prepared. For instance, you can get a Bellucci—tomato sauce, mozzarella, sausage, ricotta cheese—as a pizza, or as a calzone. The Aquilani—arugula, kabocha squash, pumpkin seeds, walnuts, pomegranate—can be a pizza, or a salad.

This playful menu, along with a sleek design job, can make one wonder whether Hot Italian prizes style over substance, but thankfully the food itself offers some pleasure as well.

The Hot Italian we visited in Emeryville, California, land of shopping malls, IKEA, and other big box stores, represents a second location for owners Andrea Lepore and Fabrizio Cercatore. It's Cercatore's upbringing in the Italian Riviera that provides some of the restaurant's pizza bona fides, at least in the publicity materials. However, despite having an authentic Italian on the management team, Hot Italian's pizza doesn't seem to hew to the ideals of any one pizza doctrine.

The original Hot Italian, in Sacramento, uses a wood-fired oven, but zoning rules wouldn't allow that at this second location, so the restaurant instead uses a Cuppone electric oven. At least based on pictures, the pies served at the two restaurants nonetheless appear remarkably similar. The crust we tried arrived light and airy, with an attractive crispness to it. The slices, dusted lightly with cornmeal and speckled with char underneath, stand straight out when held from the rim.

The pizzas we chose during our visit might lead you to believe that I have a thing for strapping Italian athletes, but really we just found ourselves inclined towards the more traditional pies on the wide-ranging menu. Among the pies we did not order, Hot Italian offers one with pureed pumpkin and another with smoked salmon.

The Cannavaro, besides paying homage to an Italian soccer player, is Hot Italian's version of a Margherita. Other than some ribbons of basil on top and a bit of garlic hiding in the sauce, this pie does not offer many bells and whistles. In fact, they employ shredded mozzarella rather than the puddles of cheese we have come to expect on upscale pies. Either way, Hot Italian gets the ratios right on their toppings, creating a layer of intermingled cheese and sauce that strikes that this-is-pizza chord. If you feel the need to spice up this basic offering, Hot Italian provides jars of red pepper oil and rosemary oil to each table.

On the Bortolami—this time, an Italian rugby player—Hot Italian combines tomato sauce, housemade sausage, cheese, mushrooms, and radicchio. The smokey scamorza cheese wafts to the table well before the rest of the pie. When it actually comes to eating, this pie offers a more riotous amalgamation of flavors than one might expect, with the fennel and heat of the sausage, a slight bitterness from the radicchio, and the smokiness of the cheese.

I admit, I wanted to discount Hot Italian when I was confronted with its carefully packaged facade, but the restaurant doesn't try to get by on just its looks alone. Besides, who am I to get all high and mighty? As I sat there, perusing the menu, I ended up turning the ordering process into a giant game of Hot or Not, staging a referendum on the owners' choices of hot Italians. When the waiter originally came to our table, I realized I had been so busy searching Google for pictures of the different names on the menu, I had no idea what kind of pizza those pretty faces represented.

About the author: David Kover is a San Francisco-based freelance writer and food enthusiast. He likes pizza. A lot. He occasionally gets his tweet on at @pizzakover.

[Photographs: J. Kenji Lopez-Alt, except where noted]

A few months ago, my wife and I spent all of 24 hours in Naples on our way home from Sicily. It was probably the second-most pizza-packed 24 hours of my life (the first being when I took my Colombian brother-in-law on a whirlwind pizza tour of New York). We hit over a half dozen pizzerias over lunch alone, and a few more for dinner.

Nobody said the life of a Serious Eater is an easy one.

We talked to pie-men, timed ovens, watched dough being stretched and topped, and all that other fun, nerdy stuff that pizza-obsessives enjoy doing. (Ok, my wife may have been a bit of an unwilling assistant in this endeavor. Bless her for always being a good sport).

Here now, I present to you the Serious Eats guide to Eating Pizza in Naples.

Identifying a Neapolitan Pizza In The Wild

If you're to ask the Associazone Verace Pizza Napoletana—one of the few certification organizations that dole out authenticity certificates to pizzerias around the globe—what constitutes a true Neapolitan pizza, you'll be met with an extraordinarily stringent set of rules. God help the pizzaiolo who claims to be making true Neapolitan pizza and gets audited on his process.

Among the criteria (which is outlined on this 11 page document) are such things as:

• Compressed yeast, biologically produced, solid, soft and beige in colour ,with quite an insipid taste and a low degree of acidity must be used. Yeast must be purchased in packages ranging from 25-500 grams. (Saccharomices cerevisiae) (See Italian Decreto Ministeriale. 21/03/1973 e 18/06/1996). The use of Natural yeast is also permitted (see appendices).
• The dough must be made by slowly adding flour (1.7 to 1.8 kilograms depending on protein content) to a water, yeast, and salt mixture over the course of ten minutes and must mix on low speed for precisely 20 minutes.
• The dough should have a final pH of 5.87, ±10% and a final density of 79 grams per cubic centimeter
• When stretched, the center of the dough must be no more than .4 centimeters (±10%) in thickness.
• The following variations of fresh tomatoes can be used: "S.Marzano dell'Agro Sarnese-nocerino D.O.P"., "Pomodorini di Corbara (Corbarino)", "Pomodorino del piennolo del Vesuvio" D.O.P."
• Certified mozzarella di bufala campana D.O.P, mozzarella S.T.G.

And so on. I sense a lucrative business in certification guarantees would be possible if an enterprising lawyer decides to take it up.

Natural Gestation Habitat: Wood-Fired Oven

The blue oven at Pizzeria Di Matteo

The traditional domed, wood-fueled ovens that a Neapolitan pizza is baked in has remained identical in design for several hundred years. Made with stone or brick and completely sealed (aside from the door and the chimney), it's this oven that allows a pizzaiolo to stoke wood fires (oak, ash, beech, or maple are recommended, though there is no restriction other than that it must be free of moisture or excessive smoke) up to crazy high temperatures. A minimum floor temperature of 905°F and a minimum air temperature of 800°F are required.

There are strict protocols in place for oven sizes—the dome must be 45 to 50 centimeters high, while the door must be 22 to 25 centimeters. The floor space is defined at 140 to 150 centimeters in diameter.

To aid browning of the upper surface, a pizzaiolo might lift the pie up to the top of the dome of the oven for a few seconds as the pies finish, a process that should take between 60 and 90 seconds. Talk about fast food!

Remember folks: these are all rules set up by the extraordinarily strict Associazione Verace Pizza Napoletana. It's not to say that excellent Neapolitan-style pizza can't be made via methods that don't quite fit their stringent criteria. Most pizzerias we love in New York wouldn't make the cut for veracity, but they sure as s$%t are damned delicious nonetheless.

Identifying Markings: Leopard-Spotted Bottom

A great pie from Pizzeria Di Matteo

When inserted into the oven, the moist, loose Neapolitan pizza dough should instantly start to puff, creating bubbles with thin walls and micro-bubbles on top of them, with even thinner walls. These thin walls will quickly brown in the air of the oven and against the hot stone floor while the rest of the pizza will remain more pale. It's this interplay of smoky, slightly bitter notes that comes from the charred spots and the soft, mild, pale dough in between that gives a Neapolitan pizza its great complexity.

By-Products: Soupy Center

Antonio Starita's masterful pies from Starita

Unlike a crisp-crusted New York-style or hefty Deep Dish Chicago-style pies, a Neapolitan pizza will have a soft, tender, nearly soupy center. Some folks find this off-putting. I personally like the sauce, oil, and whey-soaked bits of tender crust that form down in there, and I'll fight my wife for my share of it.

Other Characteristics: Sparse Toppings

A margherita and a montanara from Starita

There are two "basic" Neapolitan pizza styles that cover the vast majority of the pizzas you'll find in Naples: the Pizza Marinara, which combines tomatoes, oregano, olive oil, and garlic (and in which "the green of the oregano and the white of the garlic has perfectly amalgamated"), or the Pizza Margherita which uses tomatoes, olive oil, fresh mozzarella di bufala (water buffalo milk mozzarella), and basil leaves (applied before cooking so that their green color has been "slightly darkened by the cooking process.").

That's it, as simple as that. Some of the fancier pizzerias will offer variations with toppings, but in all cases, the toppings are added extremely sparsely, with an eye towards balance and simplicity. You will never see an American-style "Pizza Supreme," that is so loaded with toppings that the crust is entirely lost. Neapolitan pizza is first and foremost about the interplay of dough, sauce, and olive oil.

How Neapolitans Eat Their Pizza

Option One: Knife and Fork

A margherita from Da Michele

At a sit-down pizzeria, this is how it's done. You will never see a pizza come pre-cut into "slices," as that would cause the very soupy toppings to seep underneath and turn the whole thing soggy. You could try to manually cut it into slices, but they'll be so floppy that you'll need several extra fingers just to hold them out.

In other words, perhaps Donald Trump should consider moving to Naples.

Option Two: The Quad-Fold

A folded slice from Pizzeria Presidente

Before I'd actually been to Naples, I'd heard over and over that "pizza in Naples is always eaten with a knife and fork." Always.

I don't know whether things have changed in recent years or it's simply misinformation, but Naples actually has a very lively no-utensils-required street-pizza ("street-za?") scene, with many of the older pizzerias selling whole pies out of display windows on the street for only a euro or two.

So if they don't cut them into slices, how does one eat them? The Quad-Fold. The pizza is placed on a sheet of heavy duty paper, folded in half once, then folded again, much like you'd see in a Paris crepe-shop.

What you end up with is a tidy little pizza package, ready to be picked at with your fingers, or waiting for you to dive right in mouth first. Does it disturb the sauce and cheese distribution? Yeah, sure it does. But Neapolitan pizzas are a pretty slapdash affair to begin with. Don't worry, it'll still taste plenty good.

Where to Get Pizza in Naples

It's impossible not to run into a decent pizza if you take a stroll down Via Tribunali, a street which runs between the train station and San Domenico Maggiore. Most of the old pizzerias in Naples are in that neighborhood, getting sparser and sparser as you move away. Here's a map of eight of the best and most notable—a good full days' eating if you want to plan a trip around pizza.

View Pizza in Naples in a larger map

The Street-za

Sure, you can sit down at any one of these fine and historic establishments, but their real draw (particularly for pie-heads with a schedule to keep!) are their heated outdoor display windows, where for a couple euros (usually less!), you can grab a hot pie to go.

Antica Pizzeria e Friggitoria Di Matteo

The best of the Street-za's we tried, though it may have been luck of the draw—our pie had come fresh out of the oven, the crust still crackling slightly as it was folded. Very sparse on the cheese (what can you expect for a single euro?), but a bright tomato sauce and a great charred flavor to the tender crust.

This is the pizzeria President Clinton visited during the 1994 G7 summit in Naples. You can see his picture up on the wall.

Pizzeria di Matteo

Via dei Tribunali, 94, 80138, Naples, Province of Naples, Italy (map).

Il Pizzaiolo del Presidente

Riding on the coattails of the fame that Clinton's visit brought to Di Matteo, the brother of the pizzaiolo at Di Matteo opened up his own restaurant—this one actually named after Clinton—just down the block. Even though the place should technically be called Il Fratello del Pizzaiolo del Presidente, we won't knock him for it, because his product is (almost) every bit as good as his brother's.

Il Pizzaiolo del Presidente

Via dei Tribunali, 120-121, 80138 Naples, Province of Naples, Italy (map)

Antica Pizzeria Port'Alba

At over 182 years old, Pizzeria Port'Alba is widely regarded as Napoli's first pizzeria, and as such, perhaps the first official pizzeria in the world. Am I allowed to disparage such a storied pie? I won't hold back—the pie we had was a little pale and lacked significant charring, but the texture was still wonderful, with a melt-in-your-mouth tenderness and bright, fresh-tasting tomatoes.

Antica Pizzeria Port'Alba

Via Port'Alba, 18, 80134 Naples, Napoli, Italy (map)

The Classics

Once you move out of the street-za and 1 euro+ category, a couple of pizzerias immediately jump out as must-visits.

Pizzeria Trianon Da Ciro

Equally swamped with tourists and locals alike, Trianon is a sprawling, three floor pizzeria that offers more than 20 toppings variations. Check out the work station on the first floor as you walk in for an up-close view of the action. Just don't expect the harried pie-men to stop and smile for the picture.

The pies at Trianon are nothing to scoff at, but certainly not the best in Naples. If you find the traditionally soupy Neapolitan pie to be too wet, you may well prefer the pies here, which come out with sturdier, denser crusts, and a drier top. It's almost dry and crisp enough to pick up a slice with your hands.

While the sauce is as bright and fresh as anywhere, the cheese you'll find is drier and stretchier than most.

Pizzeria Trianon Da Ciro

Via Pietro Colletta, 44/46, 80139 Naples, Province of Naples, (map)

Pizzeria Da Michele

Yes there are lines. Yes, it's packed with tourists who want to "eat at that place Julia Roberts at at in Eat, Pray Love!". Yes, the service is quick (though in Neapolitan fashion, always friendly). And yes, they WILL kick you out of your seat if you plan on lingering.

All that said, the line moves fast, and its easy to forgive the servers their brusqueness when your pie appears in front of you.

The pies are cooked rapid fire in the brick-lined wood-burning oven in the front of the dining room. They cook so fast that two pizzaioli work in tandem, one lowering a pie onto the oven floor just as the other removes one.

I pulled my timer out (as I always do at a first time pizzeria visit) and measured the cook time for the pies.

One minute nine seconds! Seriously! It's the fastest pizza cook time I've ever recorded anywhere. The resultant pies are also significantly different than most I've had.

They're soft. Very soft. Like, the texture of a thick blanket, soft. And wet. Very wet. Good luck even thinking of eating these guys with anything but a fork and knife.

Da Michele uses sunflower oil rather than olive oil on their pies (an Italian sign on the wall explains that they want to let the tomatoes and cheese stand out—I say they just want to save a few bucks), but the pies are nevertheless spectacular.

If you don't like soupy pizza (Serious Eats Overlord Ed is in this camp), you may well find it disappointing. Negative online reviews are most often of then "this was so soupy" or "the sauce slid off the pizza onto my boyfriends shoes when we were walking down the street" variety.

But if you can handle the wetness, you'll find a perfect balance of char, bread, bright tomatoes, and fior di latte (they don't use buffalo mozzeralla here either) that melts on your tongue in a way like no other pizza I've had.

Pizzeria Da Michele

Via Cesare Sersale, 1, 80139 Naples, Province of Naples, Italy (map)

The Best: Pizzeria Starita

Luckily, the best pizza I tasted in Napoli happens to be available right here in New York as well. Starita is run by Antonio Starita, a legendary pie-maker who loves to chat with customers as his team makes his fantastic pies (that he doesn't speak any English and we speak no Italian, but that didn't stop him from trying to engage us).

And yep, that's the same Antonio Starita who trained protégé Roberto Caporuscio of Kesté in the West Village. Last year, Don Antonio opened in midtown, near Times Square, also run by Caporuscio. The pizzeria is named after Antonio Starita, and features a menu with some serious nods to his pizzeria in Naples.

Margherita pie

The Margherita pie is a little firmer than the true Neapolitan style you'll see at Da Michele, but to my mind, it's the perfect level of soupiness to crispness. The juices definitely pool in the center as you eat (take a look at the photo up at the top of this post), but the edges and underbelly still retain a thin, thin layer of crispness that adds textural contrast to the whole deal. It's a really exquisite pie.

Montanara pie

Starita may well be better known for his Montanara pie, a pizza which is first deep-fred before being topped with sauce and smoked mozzarella and finished off in the oven. The end result is extra crisp, well-puffed like a cruller, and not at all greasy.

The seasonal appetizers we tried were also fantastic. I particularly enjoyed our ricotta-stuffed deep-fried zucchini blossoms which were rich in the center and crisp on the outside.

Pizzeria Starita

Via Materdei, 27, 80136 Naples, Province of Naples, Italy (map)

Also Notable: Europeo di Mattozzi

Ed's favorite pizzeria in Naples is Europeo di Mattozzi, a healthy 20 minute walk from the downtown cluster of pizzerias, and a big step up in terms of decor and service. It's a charming restaurant with some seriously delicious food beyond the pizza.

Octopus salad at Europeo di Mattozzi. [Photographs: Gianluca Rottura]

We enjoyed the octopus salad, as well as a dish of pasta with clams and broccoli, perfectly simple, and perfectly delicious.

The pizza itself was also great, though to my mind, a little too firm and cheese-laden. It's understandable why some might call it the best in Naples, though.

Europeo de Mattozzi

Via Marchese Campodisola, 4, 80133 Naples, Province of Naples, Italy (map)

About the author: J. Kenji Lopez-Alt is the Chief Creative Officer of Serious Eats where he likes to explore the science of home cooking in his weekly column The Food Lab. You can follow him at @thefoodlab on Twitter, or at The Food Lab on Facebook.

Daily Slice gives a quick snapshot each weekday of a different slice or pie that the folks at the Serious Eats empire have enjoyed lately.

[Photographs: Kelly Bone]

Owner/manager Dara Maleki keeps a keen eye on the shop, chatting with customers and taking his turn on the pizza assembly line. The menu offers 5 newspaper themed combinations—designed by Disneyland chefs—or unlimited topping for $10 ($8 for a cheese). The selection is standard, with a few standouts like Gouda, chorizo, artichoke hearts, and cherry tomatoes. Once the 10-inch crust is loaded, it rolls through a conveyer belt oven into the finishing area where you can get your pie drizzled in sauces like balsamic, BBQ, or hot sauce.

With a crisp non-dimensional crust, the pies are on par with the other major fastcasualpizza players. Where The Pizza Press shines is not in their pizza, but in their craft beer taps and Virgil's root beer floats. Or better yet, beer floats! That is not reason enough to go out of your way to visit, but the freshness and value of The Pizza Press surpasses any pizza sold inside Disneyland Park.

The Pizza Press

1534 S Harbor Blvd. Anaheim, CA 92802 (map)
714-323-7134; pizzapressoc.com

About the author: After nearly a decade in Brooklyn, Kelly Bone landed back in Los Angeles where she writes The Vegetarian Foodie. She spends the rest of her time designing office cubicles... you might be sitting in one right now! Follow her on Twitter at @TheVegFoodie

VIEW SLIDESHOW: My Pie Monday: Lavash Pizza, Fennel Pollen, Strascinati and More!

Happy belated My Pie Monday! Yesterday's holiday put a little delay in this week's roundup, but trust me when I say—it's worth the wait! Starting off we have pizza artistry from TXCraig1 as inspired by John Della Vecchia. Just look at how those stands of chive beckon you to come a little closer. Okaru sends in an all-edge Sicilian using the Food Lab dough science. Perhaps unknowingly, Florida9 combined two recent poll topics on one pie with this week's broccoli and strascinati. Atmast keeps it classic this week with sausage, peppers and onions, and Jimmyg steers clear of anything fancy. Twleslie's pepperoni pizza makes a good case for another pie classic, and of course a steel baked Margherita like the one from Derricktung is hard to beat. Garlic makes a strong showing paired with shiitakes on Corni's pie and spinach on the pie from Kaz. We also get not one, not two, but three lavash "pizzas" from Amusebouche1. And a warm welcome to gaseousclay, who sends a fennel and leek pie topped with fennel pollen!

If you're making pizza this week, send us a shot for next week's My Pie Monday!

Just take one snapshot of your homemade pizza, describe your cooking method (briefly!), and follow these instructions to get it to Slice HQ by 8pm EST on Thursday night. Be sure to let us know your Slice/Serious Eats screen name!

About the author: Meredith Smith is the Slice editor. You can follow her on Twitter: @mertsmith.

VIEW SLIDESHOW: The Pizza Lab: Foolproof Pan Pizza

[Photographs: J. Kenji Lopez-Alt]

It's time for another round of The Food Lab. Got a suggestion for an upcoming topic? Email Kenji here, and he'll do his best to answer your queries in a future post. Become a fan of The Food Lab on Facebook or follow it on Twitter for play-by-plays on future kitchen tests and recipe experiments.

I've got a confession to make: I love pan pizza.

I'm not talking deep-dish Chicago-style with its crisp crust and rivers of cheese and sauce, I'm talking thick-crusted, fried-on-the-bottom, puffy, cheesy, focaccia-esque pan pizza of the kind that you might remember Pizza Hut having when you were a kid, though in reality, most likely that pizza never really existed—as they say, pizzas past always look better through pepperoni-tinted glasses.

It would arrive at the table in a jet black, well-worn pan, its edges browned and crisped where the cheese has melted into the gap between the crust and the pan. You'd lift up a slice and long threads of mozzarella pull out, stretching all the way across the table, a signpost saying "hey everyone, it's this kid's birthday!" You'd reach out your fingers—almost involuntarily—grasping at those cheese strings, plucking at them like guitar strings, wrapping them around your fingers so you can suck them off before diving into the slice itself.

That perfect pan pizza had an open, airy, chewy crumb in the center that slowly transformed into a crisp, golden-brown, fried crust at the very bottom and a soft, thin, doughy layer at the top right at the crust-sauce interface. It was thick and robust enough to support a heavy load of toppings, though even a plain cheese or pepperoni slice would do.

It's been years since I've gone to an actual Pizza Hut (they don't even exist in New York aside from those crappy "Pizza Hut Express" joints with the pre-fab, lukewarm individual pizzas), but I've spent a good deal of time working on my own pan pizza recipe to the point that it finally lives up to that perfect image of my childhood pan pizza that still lives on in my mind.

If only pizza that good were also easy to make. Well here's the good news: It is. This is the easiest pizza you will ever make. Seriously. All it takes is a few basic kitchen essentials, some simple ingredients, and a bit of patience.

The way I see it, there are three basic difficulties most folks have with pizza:

• Problem 1: Kneading. How long is enough? What motion do I use? And is it really worth the doggone effort?
• Problem 2: Stretching. Once I've got that disk of dough, how do I get it into the shape of an actual pizza, ready to be topped?
• Problem 3: Transferring. Ok, let's say I've got my dough made and perfectly stretched onto my pizza peel. How do I get it onto that stone in the oven without disturbing the toppings or having it turn into a misshapen blob?

This recipe avoids all three of those common pitfalls, making it pretty much foolproof. To be perfectly honest, every single one of these steps has been done before, and none of it is rocket science. All I'm doing is combining them all into a single recipe.

You can jump straight into a full step-by-step slideshow of the process or find the exact measurements and instructions in the recipe here, or read on for a few more details on what to expect and how we got there.

No Kneading

By now, everybody and their baker's heard about no knead dough. It's a technique that was developed by Jim Lahey of Sullivan Street Bakery and popularized by Mark Bittman of the New York Times. The basic premise is simple: mix together your dough ingredients in a bowl just until they're combined, cover it, and let time take care of the rest. That's it.

So how does it work? Well the goal of kneading in a traditional dough is to create gluten, a web-like network of interconnected proteins that forms when flour is mixed together with water. All wheat flour contains some amount of protein (usually around 10 to 15%, depending on the variety of wheat). In their normal state, these proteins resemble tiny crumpled up little balls of wire. With kneading, your goal is to first work these proteins until they untangle a bit, then to rub them against each other until they link up, forming a solid chain-link fence.

It's this gluten matrix that allows your dough to be stretched without breaking, and what allows it to hold nice big air bubbles inside. Ever have a dense under-risen pizza crust? It's because whoever made it didn't properly form their gluten in the process.

Now you can see how how this can take a lot of work. Kneading, aligning, folding, linking. That's why most pizza dough recipes takes a good ten to twenty minutes of elbow grease or time in a stand mixer.

But there's another way.

See, flour naturally contains enzymes that will break down large proteins into smaller ones. Imagine them as teeny-tiny wire cutter that cut those jumbled up balls of wire into shorter pieces. The shorter the pieces are, they easier it is to untangle them, and the easier it is to then align them and link them up into a good, strong network. No-knead dough recipes take advantage of this fact.

Over the course of an overnight sit at room temperature, those enzymes get to work breaking down proteins. Meanwhile, yeast starts to consume sugars in the flour, releasing carbon dioxide gas int he process. These bubbles of gas will cause the dough to start stretching, and in the process, will jostle and align the enzyme-primed proteins, thereby creating gluten.

Simply allowing the dough to sit overnight will create a gluten network at least as strong (if not stronger!) than a dough that had been kneaded in a mixer or by hand, all with pretty much zero effort. Indeed, the flavor produced by letting yeast do its thing over the course of this night will also be superior to that of any same-day dough. Win win!

Other than time, the only real key to a successful no-knead dough is high hydration. Specifically, the water content should be at least 60% of the weight of the flour you use. Luckily, high hydration also leads to superior hole structure upon baking. I go for about 65%.

Problem 1: Avoided

No Stretching

One of the happy side effects of having a loose, moist dough is that it practically stretches itself. Form the dough into a ball and let it sit around at room temperature and you'll see it spreading slowly outwards until it it nearly disk-shaped. The only thing holding it back? Friction. It sticks to the countertop or board.

What do you use to eliminate friction? Grease. Coating the dough ball in grease and placing it on a smooth surface (such as, say, the inside of a skillet or round cake pan) allows it to stretch completely under its own power.

All that's needed is a few gently pokes with your fingertips to do the final shaping and to eliminate any ultra-large air bubbles.

You may wonder why we'd want to get rid of those bubbles, when an open, airy structure is what we're after. Well, it's because this dough is almost too good. It's so loose and easy to stretch that large bubbles will form giant domes, shedding their cheese and sauce, eventually collapsing into large barren craters when you pull the pies out of the oven, like this:

Some simple fingertip docking eliminates that problem while sill keeping your dough plenty light and airy.

Problem 2: Avoided

No Transferring

Do I need to spell it out here? If your pizza is constructed in a pan, there's no need to use a peel or a stone. Just throw the pan straight into the oven.

As the pizza bakes, the olive oil it was stretched out in will allow the bottom and sides to fry, getting them extra-crisp.

The one issue you might run into is this:

Air bubbles that form under the crust as it rises will pull away from the pan bottom, preventing them from browning and crisping properly. To avoid that, I make sure to give the dough a quick lift around the edges before topping it, just to release any air bubbles that may be trapped.

You end up with a nice, even golden brown like this:

The Details

Really, that's the sum of the process. Most other details are incidental. You can use whatever sauce you'd like, whether it's simply pureed canned tomatoes with a bit of salt and olive oil, or a cooked pizza sauce. You can use grated mozzarella, or go for a more eclectic choice like cheddar or jack.

Here are a few tips.

Cook Hot

I max out my oven (550°F) when I bake pizza. Why? Hotter cooking leads to a few differences in the end product. For one thing, it produces more micro-bubbles on the exterior, giving your pie more crunch and character. These microbubbles form because air and water vapor inside the dough expands rapidly under high heat, filling up and stretching out gluten-walled bubbles before they harden and crisp. The hotter the oven, the faster these bubbles will expand.

You can easily see the difference in the texture of a crust cooked at 400°F:

Versus one cooked at 500°F:

Cook it even hotter and the differences become more clear.

High temperature cooking also leads to superior interior structure for the same reason: bubbles inflate rapidly, giving a pizza cooked at a high temperature a more open, airy crumb.

Again, here's a pie cooked at 400°F:

And the identical dough cooked at 550°F:

The difference is striking.

Top Away!

Normally I'm a minimalist when it comes to pizza. I like my New York or Neapolitan-style pies with either no toppings, or at most one or two carefully selected items. With a thick, robust pan pizza, on the other hand, I'll add as many toppings as it'll hold, which is a whole lot. Multiple cheese (a good melting cheese as the base and a hard grating cheese to add at the end is my go-to), some pickled items, fresh vegetables, cured meats, whatever.

Toppings

This pizza can handle whatever you throw at it.

Be Generous With The Sauce

Again, it's counterintuitive—normally I'd advise a thin, thin layer of sauce—but for a thick pie like this, you need a nice thick layer of sauce.

Sauce well

I go with around 3/4 of a cup per 10-inch pie.

Cheese to the Edges

With a New York pie, the cornicione, or pizza bones are essential to the slice. For many folks, they're the best part.

Cheese to the edges

With a pan pizza, on the other hand, I've got no such need or desire for those edge crusts. I'd much rather have my pie fully topped from edge to edge, allowing some of that cheese to drip into the cracks between the crust and the pan, browning into those wonderful crisp, charred bits.

Add Some Post-Bake Flair

Some toppings are best added before baking. But a few are better added once the pie emerges from the oven.

Topping that list? Hard cheeses. I like to add grated Parmigiano-Reggiano by the fistful to the top of the pie after it emerges from the oven. I love the contrast you get between the browned, bubbly bits of mozzarella and the sharp, fresh bite of the un-cooked parmesan.

Other than that, there's really not much more to say. Like I said, the recipe is stupid-easy. Mix together ingredients, then let'em sit for a while. Top them, and bake them. It's as easy as that.

Next time someone asks you "I want to make pizza at home. Know any good recipes for beginners?" (and if your life is anything like mine, you hear that question at least a couple times per week), you'll know where to send them.

Get The Recipe!

For a full step-by-step slideshow, head right this way! »

Or get the recipe for Foolproof Pan Pizza here! »

About the author: J. Kenji Lopez-Alt is the Chief Creative Officer of Serious Eats where he likes to explore the science of home cooking in his weekly column The Food Lab. You can follow him at @thefoodlab on Twitter, or at The Food Lab on Facebook.

Yesterday, Eater announced that Mathieu Palombino's next Motorino opening will take place not in Williamsburg, where we've had our attention directed, but in HONG KONG! The Brooklyn Motorino is still underway, but first Mathieu will have to make sure the onsite contracted Steffano Ferrara oven is firing nicely by March 14th, the proposed opening date. Then it's back to NYC to get things in order for the Williamsburg opening.

What with the Singapore Mozza location and now this Motorino opening, it seems like some pizza makers are naming Asia as the new pizza frontier. Of course, the chains have laid some tracks, but they're notpretty. That's not to say that there aren't already good, if not great, pizzas to be had though out the East. Gino's Brick Oven Pizza in the Philippines shows promise, as do Cibo, and Nuccio's. Maybe it's time for a list of Eastern hemisphere pizza notables...

About the author: Meredith Smith is the Slice editor. You can follow her on Twitter: @mertsmith.

[Photographs: Casey Barber]

I came for the homemade mozzarella but left with a belly full of pizza gain.

Avellino's in East Hanover (there's another, newer location just north in Lake Hiawatha) is a local favorite for its homemade mozzarella, which stars in its Caprese salads, made-to-order subs, and panini sandwiches, as well as on its Margherita pizza. And I arrived with every intention of judging the pizzeria on its mozzarella merits. But it was the pizza rustica ($2.99)—also known as pizza gain, pizza chiena, or Italian Easter bread—that caught my eye at the front counter.

I'm not one to wait around for a specific holiday to eat the seasonal food I love; I've been known to make single servings of Thanksgiving stuffing in August and pull together a plate of grilled hot dogs and baked beans in January, no cookout necessary. So although this particular pie is most often associated with spring, I don't need to wait around for bunnies, chicks, and the appearance of Cadbury Creme Eggs in the supermarket to eat a slice of pizza gain.

For those of you who've never experienced this belly-filling Italian specialty, it's essentially a salty, meat- and cheese-filled quiche stuck between two thin pizza crusts. Avellino's version was a stellar example of the genre. Studded with a panoply of cured pork bits—I found prosciutto, ham, pepperoni, and soppressata in my slice—the pie was mortared with a deeply savory filling of Provolone, Parmesan, cheddar, ricotta, egg, and potatoes. A crispy crust no more than an eighth-inch thick enveloped the mass. Throw a little spinach in the mix and you'd have all the food groups in one heavy, hand-held package.

This thing was dense. It was salty. Did I say it was salty? And it was just what I needed on a below-freezing day. My friends in Minnesota, where the wind chill is bringing their temperature down to -37°F, probably need the soul-warming properties of pizza gain a lot more than I do right now. But I'm here with the hearty pie and they're not, so it'd be a shame to let it go to waste. Like I said, why wait?

Avellino's

About the author:Casey Barber is the editor of Good. Food. Stories. and author of the forthcoming cookbook Classic Snacks Made from Scratch: 70 Homemade Versions of Your Favorite Brand-Name Treats. Find her on Twitter: @GoodFoodStories

[Image: David Brion

Pizza makes science so much better, as evidenced by this comic that was delivered into the old Slice mailbag. Annie A. wrote: " I was sitting in my A&P class tonight and I suddenly hit on the notion of pizza-making via mitosis. I thought it would make a fun new pizza doodle, but then realized somebody had probably already thought of it. And somebody had...here.

Thanks for sharing, Annie!

About the author: Meredith Smith is the Slice editor. You can follow her on Twitter: @mertsmith.

I love pizza, and I have a soft spot for gummy candy, so what could be bad about gummy pizza?

Turns out, we've actually covered the stuff before, way back in 2007, at which time we proclaimed that it tasted like... ass.

Personally, I'd call the flavor profile 90% indeterminate fruitiness and 10% plastic. For me, that rates at least a little bit better than ass, but as I said, I have a soft spot for gummy candies.

However, I found myself far more interested in the pizza toppings they'd chosen to represent on this gummy pie. The mushrooms and green pepper are pretty clear, and it only took me a moment to realize that the white, molar-y looking things are actually whole cloves of garlic. I spent longer puzzling over the bean-shaped clump of purple before deciding that it's an eggplant, though I'm not confident about that. And I simply have no idea about the glob of red that's sinking into the sauce. Any guesses?

Want your own gummy pizza? Check out the e.frutti website, where you can also get gummy hamburgers, hot dogs, and fried eggs.

About the author: David Kover is a San Francisco-based freelance writer and food enthusiast. Follow him on Twitter (@pizzakover).

I'd never eaten an Annie's product until it was time to research this post, because when I'm in frozen food mode I'm usually more concerned with price than I am with organic toppings or cow antibiotics, and Annie's focus on quality bumps her prices up out of my financial comfort zone. That's not to say I don't respect Annie's approach to the game, just that it happens not to align with my own.

But maybe I'm just being close-minded. You can miss out on a lot if you insist on cramming things into narrow price ghettos; some of my favorite food memories are of $18 hamburgers and $9 pints of beer. There's a lot of value to be found in ordering high-end versions of typically humble restaurant foods, and I suppose it's possible that the same rule could apply in the grocery store. Actually, I know it works in the condiment aisle, where the $4 mustard is leagues better than its half-price shelfmates. Why can't Annie's Rising Crust Organic Supreme Pizza be worth the ... wait? What? $10.99 for frozen pizza?* All right, let's investigate.

*At Whole Foods in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Annie does have the good grace to sell you a pretty bulky pie for your $11: It's 11 inches across and weighs 25.4 ounces. Sure, you can get more than two pounds' worth of DiGiorno Rising Crust Supreme for about half the price, but DiGionro's best for when you're walking home drunk and hungry and the real pizza place is already closed so you have to resort to the 24-hour CVS and you've got just enough self-esteem left to know you deserve better than Red Baron. Annie's is positioned (and priced) as real food for real humans to eat during real meal hours, so I expect more than girth for my near-dozen dollars. But, yes, girth is something, and Annie has it.

The first thing I noticed upon unboxing my pizza is that the pre-risen crust looks too wide. The edge is about 1.5 inches all the way around, which means you get a cross-pie ratio of 3 inches of edge to 8 inches of properly topped pizza. Not ideal. And since I was in the measuring mood, I checked the height--about half an inch before baking and rising--and counted eleven pepperoni slices. Into the oven for 20 minutes at 400 degrees.

Well, Annie certainly makes good on her rising crust claims. This baby ballooned up to over an inch tall, more than doubling its frozen height. I was afraid that would make it gross and spongy, but it was actually pretty good eating. The light, dimpled, cornmeal-dusted bottom had a slight crunch before giving way to a nicely chewy interior that was better than expected though a bit light on flavor. It reminded me of a street-vendor pretzel.

The toppings were acceptable across the board, but there were no major stars. The uncured pepperoni was meaty, substantial, and mercifully greaseless, but it was underspiced. The mild Italian pork sausage was similarly good but meek; the light fennel and black pepper flavors could have asserted themselves into more of the void left by the unassuming pepperoni. The stray bits of onion and red pepper were predictably bland, though the green pepper chunks showed surprising snap and flavor. The sauce was pasty and seemed overcooked; though it wasn't bad, it was another missed flavor opportunity, though it gets minor credit for not being super sweetened. The mozzarella was organic, which is a nice touch, but it was every bit as wimpy as your typical frozen pizza mozzarella. It's unfair to ask frozen commercial mozzarella to carry a pizza, but none of the other elements of Annie's Rising Crust Organic Supreme asserted themselves, either. This is a pretty good frozen pizza, but for $11, I want better than pretty good.

About the author: Will Gordon loves life, particularly the parts of life that involve bourbon and Totino's Pizza Rolls. You can eat and drink with him in Boston or follow him @WillGordonAgain.

This video from 1974, which is making the rounds on the web this week, documents the first computer assisted pizza order. The experiment enabled the speech impaired subject, Donald Sherman, to place an order for a large 16-inch pepperoni, mushroom, ham and sausage pizza to be delivered to the Michigan State University Artificial Intelligence Computer Lab, which developed the technology that made the call possible. It took several attempts for a pizzeria to accept the order, with a hangup from Domino's, before Mr. Mike's Pizza patiently took the order. From a quick Google search it looks like any pizzeria by that name in the Lansing area is long gone.

Thanks to James Schulman (aka jamesws) to sending this in to Slice, via Boing Boing.

About the author: Meredith Smith is the Slice editor. You can follow her on Twitter: @mertsmith.

[Animations: Jessica Leibowitz]

These shots were taken in a pizzeria in Milan and show off some nifty pizza acrobatics. Which got us thinking...

What's your favorite move?

The Egyptian.

Is it stretching the dough on the countertop? Taking advantage of gravity by throwing it into the air?

About the author:Jessica Leibowitz is in charge of all things video at Serious Eats. You can follow more of her adventures on her site mycameraeatsfood.com, or on Twitter at @photo_delicious.

"Special Requests," from Amazing Super Powers. Click through for punchline. Warning: NSFW. [via Reddit]

• Brother's Pizzeria, Fresh Meadows, Queens [NYPP]
• The finest pizza in Havana [IDoP]
• Spinach Schiacciata with Crust of Jeruselem Artichoke, Bacon, Cilantro and Ancho Chili [Pizza Goon]
• "Cut my life in two pizzas, this is my last calzone" [SPJ]
• Tucci's Fire N Coal Pizza, Boca Raton, Florida [Pizza Quixote]
• On pizza and beer [Pizza Quest]
• How has Pizzamaking.com changed home pizza-making? [PM]
• Octopizza Pie [Instructables]
• Worth rereading: "When did pizza meet red pepper flakes?" [Daily Meal]
• Cane Rosso's Jay Jerrier talks expansion, ranch dressing, more [Eater]
• Elizabeth Falkner's Brooklyn pizzeria Krescendo gets 2 stars [NYT]
• Capo's has old Chicago flavor in San Francisco [SFGate]
• What the heck is this pizza topped with? [Pizza Boxes]
• Would someone just give Norma Detroit citizenship, already? [LKtMP]
• Pizza invades breakfast menus [NRN]
• Paxti's Pizza makes $320K settlement after being busted for pocketing Healthy SF surcharges [Inside Scoop SF]
• Pizza pizzazz at Celebre's, Philly [TYTOPaSI]

About the author: Adam Kuban is the founder of Slice, where he has been blogging about pizza since 2003. You should follow him on Twitter: @akuban.