Journey | Naples, the "holy city" of pilgrimage pizza

If you have also seen the movie "Food, Prayer and Love", the plot of the heroine Elizabeth in Naples, Italy, eating pizza with her companions will definitely impress you. Elizabeth said with a serious face: "This is pizza from Naples. It is your mission to eat that pizza well!"

The pie body is crispy on the outside and soft on the inside, the cheese that will brush when you bite it, the ham on the top layer, the delightful and wonderful sauce...every time you eat a delicious pizza, you will feel full of happiness, and the taste is just Like Elizabeth said: "I am in love, and I am in love with my pizza."

The prototype of pizza appeared very early, but the familiar Italian pizza with cheese and tomatoes as the main ingredients did not appear until the end of the 17th century. Italians are arbitrary about everything, but they are only obsessed with food. It is said that a truly sophisticated Italian gourmet will not eat pizza from countries other than Italy.

Whenever we talk about Italian pizza, every Italian, out of full of pride, will catch you and talk about their experiences all over the world: thick and unchewy crust, greasy and rough cheese, and Those absurd ingredients...If you are on the scene, you can clearly feel their disgust: lingering resentment in your tone, rolling your eyes to the sky, frowning and frowning, you can imagine, How harmful is this kind of pizza to Italians?

In 1984, Naples established the Pizza Standard Association (l'Associazione Verace Pizza Napoletana), which stipulated the recipes and practices of authentic Neapolitan pizza in detail. Flour must be made with extremely fine No. 00 flour made from wheat cores. Tomatoes must be made of San Marzano varieties with low acidity and refreshing sweetness. The raw material for cheese must be buffalo milk and for baking pizza. An open fire fireplace uses fruit trees to ignite a raging flame. The temperature in the center of the fireplace is as high as 500°C. Pizza can be cooked in 90 seconds. Basically, the pasta, tomatoes, and cheese have not yet reacted, and the delicious flavor has been secured Firmly shaped, locked in the pizza.

This is not the most important thing. UNESCO has also included the approximately 3,000 pizza masters in Naples-that is, pizzaiuoli-on the representative list of human intangible cultural heritage. The world finally recognized the ability of a pizza master, no, it is the ability of a Naples pizza master!

This Guimao association even has regulations on the taste of pizza. Only two flavors qualify as Neapolitan pizza. One is the Margherita (La Pizza Margherita) just mentioned, and the other is La Pizza Marinara, which is made with tomatoes, garlic, oregano and olive oil. It is also called "Sailor Pizza". "Because it does not contain cheese, the raw materials can be stored for a long time, which is very suitable for sailors to cook while sailing at sea.

About three years ago, I visited Naples with the Italian Trade Promotion Association. In an old pizza restaurant in the city center, a chef with a flowery arm took out a piece of dough from the refrigerator’s freezer and sprinkled it on the marble workbench. I added some flour, and then slammed the dough down. "This is called beating," he said. Then, he spread the sauce, sprinkled with cheese, sprinkled with oil, grabbed the area that would bulge into the side of the pizza, dragged it onto the long-handled wooden spatula, and then put the pizza into the wood-burning stove.

"This is an art," the chef said. "It originated in Naples, and despite so many sufferings, earthquakes, eruptions of Mount Vesuvius, wars, and world wars, it has survived for centuries."

When it comes to pizza in Naples, one must not forget the most famous pizzeria in the city—L'Antica Pizzeria Da Michele.

Given that the best pizzas in Italy come from Naples and the best pizzas in the world come from Italy, this means that this pizzeria must provide...I can hardly tell you the superstition... "The best pizza in the world?" When the local reception staff told me the name of the store, they were serious and warm. I almost felt like I was breaking into a secret organization. He stuffed his address into my hand and said quietly: "Please go to this pizzeria. Order Margherita pizza with double cheese. If you didn't eat this kind of pizza in Naples, please lie to me that you did it. ."

Although the store is not very spacious and can only accommodate dozens of people for dining, there are always long lines at the door of the store, attracting many tourists, including Maradona, Julia Roberts, and F International superstars such as Lester Whitaker. For more than a hundred years, Da Michele has not pursued uniqueness, but has only pursued excellent traditional delicacy. It has only made two kinds of pizza-Margherita pizza composed of tomato sauce, mozzarella cheese and basil and only added tomato sauce and Marina pizza with oregano leaves. Above its century-old pizza oven, there is a golden statue of San Antono Abate, the patron saint of pizza chefs and firefighters. In Naples, the connection between fire and pizza can rise to a certain religious level. By the way, reservations are never accepted at Da Michele.

To further pay tribute to minimalism, Da Michel's menu, except for these two flavors of pizza, only offers simple drinks, including Coke, Fanta, beer and water, and the price is the same. The pizza-making kitchen in the store is an open space. In the store, diners can see that the pizza chefs are constantly busy and have a clear division of labor. Some are responsible for opening the crust and making the bottom of the cake, some are responsible for adding fillings, and some Baked pizza. Da Michel uses the most traditional open-fire oven to bake pizza, the temperature can reach 450 ℃, so the pizza baking speed is very fast.

The pizza master pushes the pizza in with a long handle, and pays attention to the ripeness of the pizza at any time. It rotates, changes sides, and moves. When the pizza is taken out, the uncontrollable heat will be squeezed from the dough, and the aroma will overflow. Very tempting! Dark brown hornet dots are evenly distributed around the fluffy pie, which is the family symbol of Neapolitan pizza.

In fact, my love for this pizza made me faint, and I believe that my pizza also replied my love. I established a relationship with this pizza, almost a love affair.