I’ve been watching (more importantly, eating) my friend Anton’s homemade pizza for a while now, and his Neapolitan is without a doubt the best I’ve ever had. Suck it Menomale.
Me and Anton were classmates at Computer Science at KTH, and he’s probably the classmate I’ve been able to nerd out with the most, especially about functional programming and Clojure. Over the years I’ve known him, Anton has branched out his nerdiness and cooking (luckily for me) became one of his hobbies, specifically pizza. He’s had me over a couple of times to serve me and some friends freshly baked pizza in his backyard, so after a couple of very satisfying and convincing pizza parties, I decided that it was time for me to learn a bit from the master.
I’ve watched Anton go to painstaking measures to sharpen his pizza skills, so I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t a bit intimidated. He’s always keen to show off how the crust ends up bubbly and charred just the way he likes, and when he’s attending to the pie as it sizzles away, for those 90 seconds he is in his flow state, completely focused and in the moment. So I listended attentively as we began his ritual of flour and fire.
With his pizza-specific table folded up and the dough ready, we began a walkthrough the likes of which you could catch on morning television where a seasoned pro guides a bumbling bafoon through making some culinary delight. Anton takes pizza making seriously, he’ll even cook a couple more pies after everyone’s full just to get some practice in while the oven is still fired up. With his guidance, I managed to cobble together a solid base which I topped with Anton’s homemade tomato sauce, some mozzarella, and a bit of parmesan-pecorino blend. Simple, yet so damn savoury.
The trickiest part is actually cooking the pizza. The oven is fired up to just under 500 degrees celsius, so the pizza only ends up cooking for 90 seconds, and you gotta be ontop of everything for those 90 seconds. Any mistakes and you’ll bust open a hole in the base, spilling the melted cheese and tomato guts over the piping hot stone, effectively ruining your chances of a clean rotation. It’s a dance which requires strict timing and precision. Infront of the pizza oven, Anton is the surgeon, the pizza spade is his scalpel, and the pie is his patient.
But with the help of the master, I was able to time the turns right and ended up with my own little skateboard shaped novice-piece. Not bad for a first try, not bad at all.
Anton does not take bookings from outsiders, so you’ll just have to take my word for how good his Neapolitan is. I’ll keep enjoying my meals at the best and most exclusive pizzeria in Sweden, maybe even the world.