The JournalThe Wood Oven1 min read

Pizza without tomato

Half the pizza list has no sauce on it at all. Bianca, Quattro Formaggi and Salsiccia e Friarelli are the ones people walk past, and they should not.

Stellina Ristorante
A slice of white pizza with greens being lifted at Stellina

Most people read a pizza list looking for what is on top of the tomato. On this one, half the pizzas do not have any.

Start with the Bianca

Fior di latte mozzarella, olive oil, rosemary. That is all. It is the simplest thing in the kitchen and it is the pizza the cooks eat, because with no sauce there is nothing between you and the dough and the fire. If the crust is right, a Bianca is one of the best things on the menu. If it is not, you will know immediately, which is exactly why they keep it there.

Order one for the table early, before the wine has arrived, and treat it as bread.

Quattro Formaggi, which is not mild

Fior di latte, provola, gorgonzola and reggiano. Two of those four are assertive: the provola brings smoke and the gorgonzola brings the sharp, salty edge that people either love or carefully avoid. This is not the safe cheese pizza it sounds like, and it wants a red with some acid behind it.

Salsiccia e Friarelli, the Neapolitan one

Fior di latte, sweet Italian sausage, broccoli rabe, olive oil. Sausage and friarelli is a Naples combination and the bitterness of the greens is not a flaw to be corrected, it is the reason the pairing exists. If you have only ever had broccoli rabe as a side, have it here instead, sitting in the fat from the sausage.

And the two with truffle on

The Al Tartufo and the Ricotta di Buffala e Tartufo are also whites, and they are a different conversation. We wrote about those two separately.

Read it, then come and eat it.

Forty seats, one service. The book opens thirty days ahead.

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