I was sitting in a Queens beer hall when I realized that everything I knew about New York pizza was wrong.
Until then, I would have said the best pizza in town comes out of a big oven; that the dough needs to be soft, raw and elastic when it starts to cook; and that the ingredients should be Italian.
Yet here I am, eating a 10-by-10-inch square pizza with a pre-baked crust. His ingredient was crumbled Egyptian broad bean falafel dotted with white sauce from a halal food cart, then baked in a portable electric oven smaller than a microwave. And every sacrilegious bite was delicious.
The person responsible for this epiphany was Natalie DeSabato, who sells her square pizzas at bars, breweries and other businesses throughout the City under the name Traze. She is one of several nomadic cooks putting inexpensive portable ovens in places that might not otherwise have pizza.
Since the start of this decade, vagrant food businesses have sprung up in the City, cultivating a following thanks to temporary stands and product launches advertised on social media without the expense or stability of a permanent address. Some of the most active have been mobile pizza kitchens.
The ovens used by pop-up pizzerias, such as the electric Breville Pizzaiolo and ovens made by Ooni that run on propane or wood pellets, were designed for residential use and introduced in the last decade for prices under $1,000.
These devices have allowed self-taught pizza makers to try their luck in a business that has not always been easy to break into.
Two of the most avidly followed pop-up businesses in the City are run by women, which is unusual for traditional pizzerias.
Some of these cooks emulate traditional pizza styles, adapted to the 12-inch diameters that fit in their ovens. Others improvise. Most do both.
Auggie Russo, who operates his pop-up Tiny Pizza Kitchen out of the backyard of a Brooklyn bar, has created several original pizzas. One of them, the Miss Betty White, is a seasonal vegetable pizza. Every time Miss Betty White shows up, her wardrobe changes, depending on what Russo has found in the rolling markets. One night, she was dressed in sautéed currants, pomegranate seeds, yellow squash, and leeks, and garnished with edible flowers and fresh spices.
The base of many of these pizzas has a lot more flavor than you would find at a typical pizzeria. LTraze’s fluffy bread dough is made with sourdough, preferment and a small amount of yeast, along with finely chopped spices.
Whenever a pop-up pizzeria draws a sizable crowd, its small ovens can become something of a bottleneck; it’s not uncommon to wait 20 minutes for a pizza that bakes in two minutes or less.
Although pop-up pizzerias are a phenomenon across the US, the New York scene reflects local tastes.
Felix Toro, whose Happy Bull Pizza is one of the busiest temporary businesses in the City, makes pizzas with New York flavors on a crispy crust.
Tracking down pop-up pizzerias often requires checking their Instagram accounts or the 8it food recommendations app. Typically the easiest place to find them is a brewery, or in a food truck outside a brewery.
The more popular a pop-up pizzeria becomes, the more likely your pizza man will think about setting up shop. Russo has been looking for a permanent space. He said that would give him more time to invent, and mentioned putting quince on a roast duck pizza.
His decision to settle down would leave a hole in the temporary business landscape. But there are so many Ooni and Breville ovens in apartments and backyards all over the City. At least one of them has to be from someone who has an excellent dough recipe and wants to get it out on the street.
By: PETE WELLS
BBC-NEWS-SRC: http://www.nytsyn.com/subscribed/stories/6779732, IMPORTING DATE: 2023-06-27 21:40:08
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