What Makes a Pizza Master

Would you give your life for perfect crust, sauce and cheese?
by Jason Sheehan June 29, 2011
They would not let me make pizzas at my first job because was, amon! other thin!s, an idiot"
#y first job$ %errara&s 'izza(a nei!hborhood shop of ) thou!ht* no particular renown" + storefront operation,
perpetually hot, perpetually busy, perpetually fo!!ed in a cloud of flour that swirled in the furnace heat of the
bi!, double,deck pizza o-ens and piled in miniature drifts in e-ery corner"
%errara&s was run by a husband,and,wife team" +n!elo was tall and thin with thick,framed !lasses like a mob
accountant and forearms like banded iron" .e&d been somethin! else before, belie-e(a plumber, a ninja or
'resident of the /nited States(but had, at some point, recei-ed a hi!her callin! and chucked it all to smoke
ci!arettes and make pizzas in a rattletrap shop no bi!!er than a rich man&s closet" 0atalie was smaller and
rounder, worked the phones and the short !lass counter and had the misfortune of most often dealin! with me" n
addition to bein! an idiot who could be easily flummo1ed by the simple interaction between a mop and a bucket,
the reasons was ne-er allowed to make pizzas at %errara&s were, in ascendin! order of importance$
1" didn&t know how to make pizzas"
2" was fifteen years old"
2" &d actually been hired as a dishwasher and no one wanted their pies thrown by some twitchy spazz who
stank of dish funk"
3" 0o one at %errara&s made pizzas but +n!elo" 4-er" /nder any circumstances"
+n!elo was a master" + #ichelan!elo of the 0ew 5ork thin,style who&d worked 12 hours a day, se-en days a
week, doin! nothin! but makin! pizzas, !oin! throu!h the same dozen,odd motions, workin! with the same
dozen,odd in!redients for, near as could tell, 1,000 years" .e took no -acations" .e didn&t make sandwiches or
ser-e cheesy bread or smile at customers" .is one pleasure appeared to be the small, flour,furred transistor radio
that li-ed on a shelf abo-e his prep table, playin! an endless -ersion of some accordion,hea-y lo-e son!" .e
would, e-ery now and then, step back from his work, close his eyes and sway sli!htly to the lispin! talian sun!
beneath the honkin! of the s6ueeze bo1, ci!arette bobbin! in the corner of his mouth, the creases around his eyes
wrinklin! in a kind of soft joy that , at 17, was completely incapable of understandin!"
Thou!h had no idea at the time, it became clear to me in later years that +n!e had been !ranted some kind of
mystical direct line to the food !ods" 8apricious sons of bitches that they are, they&d decreed that this tiny shop in
a nowhere suburb of a nowhere city would be the place where the !reatest pizzas this side of 0apoli would be
made(rewardin! +n!e&s dedication like a monk !ainin! enli!htenment after decades spent in penury and
sufferin!" The sauce at %errara&s was a model of sauce$ bri!ht, bloody red, thick and rich with -e!etable
sweetness" The dou!h was !or!eous when raw )shinin! balls of it !leamin! and sweatin! on their trays after
bein! turned* and was a miracle just out of the o-en(!olden, blistered and smud!ed with char"
spent about a year workin! for +n!e and 0atalie(scrubbin! trays, washin! dishes, e-entually bein! allowed
to turn the dou!h, shred the cheese and stand beside +n!e before the blastin! heat of the open o-en, watchin!
while he shuffled pies inside it"
#o-in! on from my jackle! apprenticeship, cooked my way around the country" 4-erywhere went there were
pizzas on the menu(talian pizzas that wept !rease from the cheap cheese that co-ered them like laminatin!
film, %rench pizzas that smelled like a hi!h mass incense censer, foccacia pizzas full of duck and fi!s like the
incomplete sandwiches of a certifiable loon, and 8alifornia pizzas co-ered with split !rapes and oli-es and lamb"
4-eryone thou!ht they knew how to make a !reat pie" 4-eryone was wron!"
9ut cooked them all, walkin! the earth like 8aine from Kung Fu in a stained white chef&s coat, tellin! stories
about my time with the master and all the while fallin! further and further from the true faith" &d tasted pizza
done ri!ht" .ad seen it, up close(standin! silent beside +n!e and watchin! him maul the dou!h with his bi!,
knotty knuckles" :hich meant that all those ni!hts spent assemblin! chicken,and,barbecue,sauce pizzas on
cardboard crusts for beer,drunk knuckleheads, those ni!hts standin! red,eyed, watchin! the pot of balsamic
reducin! for the fi!,and,;aura,8henel bullshit pissaladiere, were not just spent in sin )culinary and otherwise*,
but were, in fact, my Jun!le 5ears(too dazzled by the pro-enance of the in!redients, the confidence of the
chefs, or too lost in the crush of assembly line cookery to remember the !race and beauty of +n!e&s dedicated
simplicity"
+ pizza is, in elemental terms, a simple thin!" %lour, salt, yeast and water, a few tomatoes, a bit more salt, some
ore!ano, a dab of oil, cheese and heat(that&s all that&s re6uired" <i-en the proper supplies and enou!h time for
trial,and,error, a monkey could make a pizza" 0ot a !ood one, probably, but, you know, recognizable"
+nd yet that simplicity(like so many other simple thin!s(belies a comple1ity like splittin! the atom" ;ike the
yeast in its first fizzin! bloom, e-ery step of the process, e-ery motion, e-ery instant of creation, blossoms with
e1ponential %ibonacci con-olution" <ood cooks ha-e spent their careers sha-in! the difference between !reat
pies and transcendent ones e-er finer, and none of them ha-e wasted their time because the pursuit of the
perfection of simple thin!s is a nobility that is, perhaps, the hi!hest !race of cuisine"
Too metaphoric for you= %ine" .ere&s reality" The difference between a !ood pie and a bad one, some would
ar!ue, is purely in the in!redients" t&s in the flour )a hundred different -arieties, each with their own stren!ths
and weaknesses*, the tomatoes )different day to day, -ine to -ine* or the cheese" t&s in the water, they would
insist or the broad potential of top,le-el tinkerin! with the sauce$ addin! spice here, sweetness there, kinkin!
e-ery batch to re!ional tastes and nei!hborhood e1pectations"
>r maybe it&s the techni6ue" Just,made dou!h will suffer -ersus dou!h that has been allowed to rise and de-elop
o-erni!ht" n the o-en, a pizza is ali-e(chan!in! minutely with e-ery de!ree of heat, e-ery instant under fire(
and the ran!e of possible outcomes be!innin! with the 370,de!ree tin bo1 in your home to a 900,de!ree brick
o-en bein! humped by a pro is a bell cur-e of raw to charcoal with a million charted data points"
9oth of these ar!uments ha-e their -alue, but neither is entirely true" :hat matters is puttin! in the work" :hat
matters is time"
#alcolm <ladwell(who writes nothin! about restaurants and, as far as know, cares nothin! for pizza(posits
that the difference between a !enius and a schnook is about 10,000 hours" t&s an idea that bears out in culinary
traditions" + master sushi chef, for e1ample, will spend years in trainin! doin! nothin! but makin! rice" .e won&t
lift a knife, ne-er touch a piece of fish until rice has become like air to him" .e is !ainin! ease? the confidence of
e1perience" :hen the day comes that he mo-es on into the world of fish, rice will hold no mysteries for him" .e
will know rice like he knows to breathe" +n!e ne-er said it, but he knew this about his pizza"
8ompetence is makin! somethin! that won&t kill you by eatin! it" #astery is trippin! throu!h the minefield of
-ariables, comin! out the other side with somethin! ma!nificent" +nd simplicity is nothin! more than knowin!
where all the mines are ahead of time(ha-in! walked the same path countless times before" n!redients matter"
Techni6ue matters" 9ut what matters most are the hands that brin! them to!ether"
:hich all means that the reason the pizzas you make at home suck(ha-e always sucked, will fore-er suck, no
matter how much you paid for your o-en and drop on fancy in!redients(is because you don&t care enou!h"
9ecause you ha-e the commitment of a rodeo bar skank and the loyalty of a rented snake" The reason yours suck
and the trendy pizzas from the new bar down the street suck and the ones you !et from the nose,pickin!
correspondence school drop,outs behind the counter at the place by your old colle!e suck is because none of you
ha-e dedicated your life completely to one o-en, ei!ht in!redients and one result" 9ecause you ha-e not !i-en up
e-erythin! and sacrificed e-erythin! and spent 10,000 hours doin! nothin! but makin! pizzas"
The hands that ha-e are the hands of rare masters" They know their in!redients like they know their own blood"
They know their tools" They understand the depth of processes that you ne-er will" 10,000 hours has bou!ht
them one -ital bit of wisdom$ that simplicity is comple1ity con6uered, and all it takes is@e-erythin!"
&-e known pizza" &-e eaten hundreds or thousands between 17 and today, and recently, for my day job, for a
completely ridiculous project to find the best pizza in 'hiladelphia, put away A0 pizzas from 30,odd shops in
20 days, !i-e or take a couple" :hat small wisdom took away from this massi-e undertakin! was that true craft
is scarce, !enius scarcer still, and that there are a whole lot of pizzaiolos out there for whom 10,000 hours is
askin! about 9,970 hours too much"
Jeff #ichaud makes the best pizza in 'hiladelphia" .e does it at #arc Betri&s >steria, turnin! out )amon! other
thin!s* pizzas which are both fine and rustic at the same time" #ichaud&s !i-en his 10,000 hours(be!innin! at
12, in a pizza shop in 0ew .ampshire, and pro!ressin! throu!h 0ew 4n!land, +spen, 9er!amo, ;ombardia, and
'hiladelphia" .e has put in the time, made his sacrifices, been rewarded by a pie that is beautifully simple, spare,
lo-ely and memorable" +nd yet when ate his work felt also a sadness )if there can be such a thin! as sadness
in a pizza, or in the memory of a pizza*" 9ecause e-ery time walk into a pizza shop, keep findin! myself
cranin! my neck, peekin! into kitchens, lookin! for the thick !lasses, the stron! hands, the forearms dusted with
flour" listen for an accordion that ha-en&t heard play in decades" <ood as #ichaud is, he isn&t +n!elo %errara,
and, thou!h %errara&s closed years a!o, what want more than anythin!(what ha-e always wanted(was just
one more pie from +n!e"
Jason Sheehan
41,cook" :riter" :eirdo" +uthor of 8ookin! Cirty$ + Story of ;ife, Se1, ;o-e and Ceath in the Ditchen" Jason
Sheehan is an editor at 'hiladelphia ma!azine&s %oobooz, and was pre-iously a restaurant critic for Seattle
:eekly and :estword, where he won a James 9eard +ward"