Franco Pepe's Margherita Sbagliata Pizza
Here's How to Make Franco Pepe's Margherita Sbagliata Pizza from the Netflix Show "Chef's Table: Pizza"
Servings: 1 12"-14" Pizza
Equipment
- 1 Pizza Peel (Wooden)
- 1 Pizza Stone or Pizza Steel (I use both on the same cook, switching from stone to steel at the end.)
- 1 Chef's Squeeze Bottle for the tomato purée placement / design on top of the pizza.
Ingredients
Pizza Dough
- 14 oz Pizza Dough for 14" pie (See dough recipe link in instructions below.) (12 oz for 12" pie)
Pizza Toppings
- 1 cup Whole-Milk, Low-Moisture Mozzarella Freshly Shredded (See notes)
- ¼ cup Extra Virgin Olive Oil
- ½ cup Tomato Puree
- 2-3 oz Pesto (I subbed pesto for the basil purée.)
Instructions
Preheat Conventional Home Oven
- I baked this in a conventional home oven. I have a pizza stone on the bottom rack, and a pizza steel on the top rack. The oven gets preheated to 525º F, and then holds for one hour before baking the pizza. (If your oven will go to 550º, do that.)
Pizza Dough Base
- See my Pizza Dough Recipe: https://pizzaismylife.com/pizza-dough-recipes/easy-ny-style-pizza-dough-recipe/
- See my How-To on Shaping the Dough: https://pizzaismylife.com/pizza-dough-recipes/how-to-form-the-pizza-round/
Pre-Bake Topping the Pizza
- Evenly distribute shredded mozzarella, leaving about a one inch edge uncovered.
- Drizzle all over with Extra Virgin Olive Oil
Baking the Pizza
- Bake at 525° F 7-8 minutes for 14", or 6-7 minutes for a 12" pizza
Post-Bake Topping the Pizza
- Here's where it gets a little artsy. There is a distinct pattern for placing the tomato purée on top of the pizza using the squeeze bottle. Use the photo as a go-by for the placement. To draw the tomato purée dashes as thick as they are, you will need to go back and forth with the thin lines touching each other to create the thicker dashes.
- Once the tomato purée dashes are complete, then randomly dollop the basil pesto around the pizza. Slice and eat right away. This one tastes best hot.
Notes
For this pizza we are using Whole-Milk, Low-Moisture Mozzarella. Do not use part skim, or pre-shredded. You will not get the desired result. (Look for it at the deli counter rather than the cheese section in the store. I use Boar's Head, and just tell them to cut me a big block.)
Whole milk mozzarella is richer in taste, melts better and provides the stretch consumers associate with pizza. Part-skim mozzarella browns evenly at a faster pace than whole-milk mozzarella. - IPAP.com
Pre-shredded cheese has potato starch added to it to prevent it from sticking together. That adds too much moisture to your pizza. Leave your cheese in the refrigerator, and shred it right before you are going to use it so it doesn't stick together.