What is a California Style Pizza? SoCal Discoveries
We’ve tried our hand at what we felt were “classic” Cali style pies — BBQ Chicken, goat cheese and sun dried tomato, wild mushroom. We used a NY style dough, for a higher gluten, chewier crust. But what is a Cali style pie anyway? We’ve been sampling pizzerias in the Southland that sport more Cali-style toppings to see what we would find.
We kicked off our year of pizza with what is widely viewed as some of the best pizza in our region — Mozza, which I reviewed earlier. Since then, we’ve made our way through a number of high quality Cali pies.
One of our next stops was Pitfire, which along with California Pizza Kitchen is a widely regarded as a chain that has defined the Cali pizza trend. I tucked into a Big Sur with vegan cheese, featuring gulf shrimp, tomatoes and mint. The pizzas at Pitfire sport a thin, blistered crust in an almost flatbread style. Their pizzas range from the traditional Margherita to more Cali inspired toppings like Kale or my Big Sur.
Our local hipster bakery, Lodge Bread takes a very different take. They are known for their big round crusty multigrain loaves. Their pizzas at first glance look like a puffy Neapolitan, but with much more chew. The smaller blisters are a give away — The crust doesn’t have the big airy bubbles of a Neopolitan crust despite the volume, but have a more even crumb and a much higher gluten flour. My guess is they use a process much closer to breadmaking than a traditional pizza dough process. Their toppings stay relatively traditional despite the very non traditional crust — summer squash, wild mushroom, pepperoni. Like Mozza, Lodge is redefining the pie with an alternative take on the crust, with delicious results.
One of my favorite pies in the region was surprisingly at Love and Salt in Manhattan Beach. Everything at Love and Salt is beautifully executed, and their pizza is no exception.
Love and Salt and Mozza have continued to rise to the top for us when we are seeking a high end pizza treat. Lodge is where we go for a fun pie with fabulous side dishes and bread to take home, and Pitfire for a casual and kid friendly Cali pie. Maybe the essence of the Cali pie is the wide range of what it means to be inventive in this region and serve a truly diverse diverse range of desires!
