Maybe you remember the 1960s – all but the youngest Boomers do. But even if you weren’t there in person, you may have heard a bit about that tumultuous decade.
Vietnam. Woodstock. The Summer of Love. Kent State.
Social upheaval was rife throughout America, as college students occupied campus buildings (decades before they occupied Wall Street); police and protesters battled one another at the Democratic convention in Chicago, and the Civil Rights movement smoldered, then burned fiercely – in Selma. And Detroit. And Watts.
Not all the changes during that decade were violent, though. A gradual shift was happening in American tastes, as well. The can-opener cuisine of the 1950s was being replaced by something new and fresh – literally. Canned tomatoes gave way to fresh heirlooms, Cheez-Whiz in a jar to organic goat cheese, and we’ve never looked back.
The 10 years between 1974-1984 were a watershed decade for pizza. Biscuit crusts and canned anchovies disappeared, to be replaced by airy yeast-based crusts topped with fresh (and exotic) ingredients, seared to perfection in wood-fired stone ovens.
Chef Jeremiah Tower, in his book Jeremiah Tower Cooks, lays claim to creating the first of the single-serve “gourmet” pizzas – on August 28, 1974, at a birthday celebration for Chez Panisse, Alice Waters’ 3-year-old restaurant in Berkeley, California. The concept took off, and Chez Panisse’s wood-oven pizzas became wildly popular.
It wasn’t until 1982, however, that gourmet-style pizza traveled beyond northern California. Chef Wolfgang Puck, enthralled by the imaginative pizzas created by Ed LaDou at San Francisco’s Prego restaurant, promptly stole LaDou for his own new launch, Spago, about to open in West Hollywood. Over the next 3 years, LaDou and Puck created and served more than 250 different pizza “concepts” to their Hollywood audience of star (and star-struck) patrons.
LaDou eventually went on to create the menu for California Pizza Kitchens; while Puck opened a series of restaurants all over the country, including outposts in airports and shopping malls. And gradually, pizza beyond pepperoni (barbecued chicken; spinach and garlic; roasted vegetable, et. al.) went mainstream.
I decided to experience for myself what those first signature pizzas might have tasted like. I’ve got a pizza stone, great flour, and access to a typical 21st-century American supermarket – which offers many of the ingredients that, back then, were so exotic.
And since Jeremiah claims to be the gourmet-pizza godfather – let’s start there.
Of his Potato, Fontina Cheese, and Fresh Sage Pizza in Jeremiah Tower Cooks, Tower says, “Many pizzas are more exotic or esoteric than this one, but simplicity of flavors should rule, without too many ingredients. This is my everyday (if I were so lucky) favorite.”
Let’s check it out.
Looks like a fairly typical recipe, eh?
Wow, that’s a lot of olive oil. And I can tell by looking at the flour/liquid ratio that the dough, even using high-protein bread flour, is going to be unworkably sticky; so I cut back the water by 1 ounce (2 tablespoons). The result is a nice, smooth dough.
Note: It could be that Chef Tower measures his flour differently than we do here at King Arthur. We use the sprinkle flour into your cup, level with a straight edge method; he might simply dip his measuring cup into the flour and scrape off any excess, which can result in an extra 25% flour in each cup, compared to our method. This discrepancy is why, when you’re using a recipe from an unfamiliar source, it’s good to try to determine how the author measures his/her flour.
Once it’s risen, Tower directs that the dough be divided into four pieces, each shaped into an 8″ round.
These rounds are pretty thick; but that’s OK, I enjoy thick-crust pizza.
For topping, the chef calls for thinly sliced (1/8″ thick) “yellow, waxy” potatoes (I choose Yukon Gold); Fontina cheese; fresh sage, and freshly grated Parmesan.
I have to start winging it at this point; like many chef cookbooks, the directions are a bit scanty. For instance, while Parmesan is listed in the ingredients, it’s never called for in the directions; ditto salt and white pepper.
And, if Chef Tower can tell me please how to thinly slice a soft cheese like Fontina, I’ll be eternally grateful (er, greatful).
I forge ahead, brushing the crusts with olive oil, sprinkling with chopped fresh sage, then layering on the potatoes. I figure this is a good time to use the salt and pepper, before adding the cheeses.
via:http://www.kingarthurflour.com/blog/2014/03/16/jeremiah-wolfgang-and-alice/
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