Pizza Quest with Peter Reinhart

I knew pizza was a hot subject but we recently received a note from the folks at the California Culinary Schools website telling us about their top 50 pizza blogs. We’re happy to have made that list, considering we’ve only been up and running for three months and probably were just getting started when they started working on it. But I want to congratulate all the blogs and websites who…Read More…

This week we continue our Gastro adventure with a trip back to the Pizzeria Delfina kitchen, where head pizzaiolo Anthony Strong gives us a lesson in how to pull fresh mozzarella curds into smooth, creamy cheese balls. A definite must-see, which will post on Thursday! On Tuesday I’ll be posting on my Peter’s Blog a link to the California Culinary School’s top 50 pizza blogs list. It’s a great list…Read More…

Lately I’ve been thinking about barbecue pizza. My favorite local purveyor of pies recently had a daily special he called, “BBQ Pizza.”  I could not order it.  I have little doubt that it was a delicious nosh, but the name just rubbed me the wrong way, and I shared my thoughts, which follow here, with the pizziaolo. Topping a pizza with some combination of meat and barbecue sauce—regardless of quality—does…Read More…

In this segment, Pizzeria Delfina’s head pizzaiolo, Anthony Strong, takes me on a short walking tour of the one block section of San Francisco’s Mission District known as The Gastro. We explore the Bi-Rite Market where we eat gourmet chocolate and devour the lightest, flakiest pork rinds (chicharones) I’ve ever had And then we go across the street to visit with owner Ann Walker at the Bi-Rite Creamery for some…Read More…

This is Part II of my recipe pictorial of Jay Buonchristiani’s Lamb with Fennel Sausage and Mushroom Pizza recipe.  You saw the making of the the first pizza in the original pictorial.  I continued on, making 2 more pizzas since you can never just make one pizza anyway, right?!  But, the reason I split this pictorial up was because I sort of stumbled on something interesting.  I have had great…Read More…

In my last post I wrote about the sprouted wheat flour brought to the festival by Joe Lindley. Pictured here is the breakfast focaccia I made with that flour, along with a whole lot of golden raisins and dried cranberries, glazed with a citrus fondant flavored with orange essence (I put on the glaze after this photo was shot). It was, in a word, delicious!  I’ll post the recipe next…Read More…

This is the Paschal season, the perfect time for lamb so in this, the week leading up to Easter and Passover, we feature Part Two of Brad English’s Lamb Pizza adventures. This time, Brad takes the wonderful pizza recipe he learned from Jay Buonchristiani that we featured last week, and makes it on a grill. This, in turn, got him thinking about all the ways he could modify a grill…Read More…

  Scott Thorsen was my wing man at the Fire Within Conference in Boulder last October. Together, we mixed and shaped enough dough to crank out over 200 pizzas during the weekend, and we managed to save a few Country Doughs for this video demo. Scott, who has his own wood-fired rig in Sacramento, California, and a pizza and catering business that he runs out of the rig called Bella…Read More…

Lamb Fennel-Sausage and Mushroom Pizza paired with a wonderful BUONCHRISTIANI 2006 Artistico Syrah! Not long after we started the website for Pizza Quest, we received an email from a pizza enthusiast named Jay Buonchristiani who happens to be one of 4 brothers who own a Napa Winery of the same name (http://www.buonwine.com/).  He grew up in Napa and has fond memories of cooking large meals and making wine in the…Read More…

I’m off on a trip this week to America’s heartland, so will continue my Asheville Bread Festival blog report next week when I return. However, we do have some fun features to bring you this week, including an instructional video with Scott Thorson, of Bella Familia Wood-Fired Mobile Oven of Sacramento, California. In the video he’s going to demonstrate how to make a delicious, bubbling five-cheese pizza on our own…Read More…