Concluding Roman Pizza

For our third style we tried Roman pizza. Thin, crispy and cracker-like, Roman style pizza focus more on toppings then the either two styles, and is especially tasty with fresh vegetable toppings.

Making The Dough

For this style, we tried two different types of pizza — rectangular and circular. We started with rectangular, Al Taglio style. Traditionally enormous, our recipe scaled it down to a more home-friendly size, fitting entirely on a half sheet pan. While similar to the Neapolitan dough, the quantity of ingredients aren’t identical, with a bit more salt, and a bit less yeast in the Al Taglio. For the circular style, we used the same dough as the Neapolitan style, the only difference was that we cut the dough into 5 balls instead of 3.

Shaping the Pies

In the rectangular style, there is almost no shaping at all. We simply covered the pan with damp parchment paper, and flipped the dough onto it. From there we pulled the corners of the dough out the edge of the pan, covering it.

Pre-Stretch

Post-Stretch

Shaping the circular style is also quite simple, all you have to do is roll the dough out with a rolling pin. Since this style is entirely flat, you don’t have to worry about preserving bubbles or making a outer crust.

Toppings

Working on a style known for its toppings, we ended up trying a ton of different ones. While we eventually got to more complex combinations, we started off with a simple classic, plain olive oil and salt, and marinara. It was tasty, but we added too little sauce and too much salt.

Plain / Marinara Half and Half

On our next try, we added cheese to the mix, using an almost New York style cheese combination. This one turned out well, and was delicious, if a bit greasy because of the low-moisture mozzarella.

Marinara / Margherita Half and Half

For our third try we did a straight plain pizza, with a separate board so the slices could be individually topped. For our toppings we used a variety of cheeses, meats, tomatoes and arugula. The fresh toppings made this one of our favorites.

Plain Pizza (Left) and Topping Board (Right)

Fourth, we tried doing the classic Neapolitan pomodoro combination — fresh mozzarella, tomato sauce and Parmesan. While this combination is always fantastic, we thought that it was better on the Neapolitan dough.

Pomodoro Royale

Since we had 5 pies making the circular style, we were to try even more toppings. The first combination was a simple tomato sauce, olive oil, oregano, garlic combination. Simple and good.

Plain Tomato

Next, we went with one of our favorites, pesto. Because the Roman style is so much thinner, we skipped the extra cheeses, and only topped it with fresh mozzarella and Parmesan. Much lighter then either the Neapolitan or New York style pesto, this is one we will definitely return to.

Pesto

Our final try, and probably our favorite, was arugula, cheese and fresh cherry tomatoes. Roast tomatoes before topping. One challenge is that they like to roll off when sliding the pizza off the peel.

Arugula, Cherry Tomatoes and Cheese

Things We Learned

• Stretch your Al Taglio carefully. The first time around, we stretched the corners unevenly, creating brown burned spots near the center of the pizza.
• Fresh light toppings work best. The most delicious versions of Roman pies were topped with veggies and small amounts of cheese. The tomato sauces, rich cheeses and meats that work so well with Neapolitan pies felt to heavy for the ultra thin Roman crust.