Pizza al Taglio Class at Vetri

Chef Spence Serves up Pizza #1

Last Tuesday we SEPTA'd into town to attend a class on Pizza al Taglio presented by Amis chef Brad Spence. Chef Spence had returned from Rome and a week working Gabriele Bonci the previous Thursday so this was probably a non-professional's best chance to get some insight into the Bonci magic.

The Vetri demonstration kitchen occupies a former apartment directly above the restaurant with very tight seating for 10 lucky guests. The kitchen is toward the rear of the building and a large "all purpose" space overlooks Spruce St. There are evidently plans to use this space for private events, intimate concerts in conjunction with the Curtis Institute, and so forth.

The class began with frequently refilled glasses of Prosecco while Chef Spence talked about the differences between Roman pizza al taglio dough and other types of pizza. The recipe is pretty simple:

Flour: 1000 grams
Water: 800 grams
Salt: 30 grams
Olive Oil: 40 grams
Yeast: 50 grams fresh, 15 grams dry (use less if you have more time)

Weigh Everything

Chef Spence strongly suggested using a combination of flours. In class we used a dough made from 900 grams of regular '00' flour and 100 grams of spelt flour.

Mix - Don't Knead

After weighing the ingredients into a large bowl they were mixed until a rough dough formed and all the ingredients were well combined.

About 45 minutes after the previous picture

The dough is then allowed to rise for an hour, folding it over on itself every 15 minutes. After the initial rise it goes into the refrigerator for 24 hours.

With the dough explained it was time to try some pizza - that's the one Chef Spence is cutting up in the picture up top. It's just tomato sauce topped with a bunch of prosciutto, arugula, and a drizzle of olive oil.

At this point we shifted from Prosecco to a red wine and began to make our own pizzas. The ten of us divided into 5 teams to build personalized pizzas.

Some old guy came in to try some of Chef Spence's original pie while we worked.

As the pizza baked we drank more wine and chatted about Rome, pizza making, pizza eating...

After about 20 minutes at 500° F the pizzas started coming out. And you know what?

Every darn one was delicious.

Then someone mentioned Nutella.

Oh yeah.

Chef Spence grabbed a left over dough ball, stretched it onto a tray and popped it in the oven while someone went in search of a jar of Nutella.

All of it?

Yep... all of it

Spank It!

As the evening wrapped up Chef Spence and the staff packed to-go boxes with the left over pizza and most of us stepped out into the upstairs dining room for conversation, coffee, mignardises, and grappa. Fortunately, I wouldn't have to start my car for another 90 minutes... (thank you SEPTA).

A fantastic class, with wonderful people, a beautiful space, and a dynamic chef with a contagious love for his craft. Watch the Vetri website and grab the first class that grabs you - you won't regret it.

Gabriele Bonci's Broccolini And Mortadella Pizza

The long awaited English translation of Gabriele Bonci's book on pizza finally arrived last Tuesday. So I spent the rest of the week browsing through the recipes trying to decide on which to try. Broccolini And Mortadella won out.

The first step (and by far the most time consuming) is making the dough. That process is documented in detail in the book and on many other blogs, so I'll skip it here. I made a full batch of the white dough recipe: 

White Pizza Dough

Recipe by Gabriele Bonci

Ingredients

• 1 Kg. Bread Flour
• 700-800 gm. Water
• 7 gm. Instant yeast (1 packet)
• 20 gm. Sea salt
• 40 gm. Olive Oil

Cooking Directions

1. Combine the flour and yeast, mixing well.
2. Add the water and mix until a shaggy mass forms.
3. And the remaining ingredients and mix for a few minutes until well combined. The dough will be rather wet.
4. Let the dough rise, covered for 1 hour.
5. Dump the dough onto a very well floured surface and gently shape it into a rough rectangle with a short side nearest you.
6. Fold the top 1/3 of the rectangle down to the center and press it down gently.
7. Fold the bottom third up over the center and press it down.
8. Turn the dough 90 degrees, re-shape the rectangle and repeat the folding.
9. And do it again.
10. And again.
11. Put the dough back in it's bowl and let it rest for 15 minutes.
12. Repeat the folding and resting 3 more times.
13. After a final resting divide the dough into 3 or 4 equal balls and place them in the refrigerator in lightly oiled bowls and covered tightly in plastic wrap, overnight.
14. The dough balls may also be frozen or simply allowed to rise in a cool place until you're ready to bake.

Two 600 gm. dough balls

I'm already pretty familiar with Bonci style dough and knew that it would take about 600 grams to fill my small jellyroll pan. So I divided the full batch into three balls: 2 for the pizza and 1 went into the freezer for next week. Those two went into a couple large bowls for the final fermentation. Since I would be using them in just a few hours I put them out on our rather chilly porch instead of overnighting them in the refrigerator.

Broccolini And Mortadella Pizza Filling

Recipe by Adapted from Gabriele Bonci

Ingredients

• 250 gm. Broccolini or Broccoli raab, Chopped
• 125 gm. Mortadella
• Salt
• Olive Oil
• Lemon Juice

Once the dough is made the process is simple.

Stretch one ball so it fills the pan. That's an aluminum 1/4 sheet pan about 10.5 x 15.15 inches.

That's Broccoli Raab

Spread on the chopped broccolini, lightly dressed with olive oil and a little salt. I used broccoli raab, which is a lot more leafy than broccolini.

Stretch the other dough ball and place it on top. Bake at 500 degrees for about 20 minutes.

Carefully lift off the top crust and give the broccolini  spritz of lemon juice, then layer on the Mortadella.

Put the top back on and let it cool a few minutes, then slice and eat.