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Going for the dough

Consistent Grosseto takes top spot in pizza tournament finals

By Dave Faries
Staff Writer, The Prague Post
February 21st, 2007 issue

VLADIMÍR WEISS/THE PRAGUE POST
Grosseto's Robert Štrba with his prize-winning pies.
In last week’s story on the pizza playoffs, I mentioned that sudden-death competition of any kind is inherently unfair. Before launching into a play-by-play of the final rounds of this first-ever Prague pizza tournament, I’d like to amend that statement.
True, hundreds of things can go wrong, any one of which can topple an otherwise respectable restaurant. Maybe the No. 1 pizza chef called in sick that day. Perhaps management decisions — to increase profits by skimping on certain high-cost ingredients, for instance — forced a compromise that weakened one particular menu item. Wood not drying properly, errant deliveries from a purveyor, a bad batch of yeast … all can contribute to one-off problems.
Yet restaurants are full of paying customers who expect (or rather, should expect) the best from everything listed on a menu. In other words, kitchen and wait staff are in the business of anticipating and overcoming disaster.
The Tourney
A famous American chef once told me of the time when, catering a fancy outdoor shindig, his temporary kitchen lost both electrical power and gas flow — with 400 uncooked steaks waiting on the line. They quickly rigged up “ovens” from plate warmers and sterno tanks. Guests never knew about the catastrophe backstage.
Round 3
That being said, inconsistencies uncovered in the penultimate round proved troubling. The task at hand was to bake a pepperoni pizza — the local version, loaded with bell peppers. Pepperoni in this form tests a kitchen’s ability to ward off the cruel habit of vegetables to sweat water, and of bacon to leak grease. Both liquids will potentially pool on the surface or seep through and destroy a perfectly good crust. In addition, the flavor combination can be a tricky one. Too much hot pepper will beat down the other elements. The wrong kind of bacon may add nothing but texture to the pie.
Only one of the final four restaurants was up to the task. The pepperoni served by Grosseto is an extraordinary pizza. Although it could have benefited from more of the thick-cut, smoky bacon, the flavors built into a complex scaffold: sweetness, fresh vegetal tastes, a rising burn, husky undertones and, wafting in the midst of it all, the familiar meaty smoke of good bacon. The crust stood out as near-perfect, teetering in that nether world between crisp and pliable.
Detaillo’s problems started with an erratic spread of ingredients, leaving some pieces bland, some fiery. The chef opted for large strips of very dull bacon, which capitulated in mano a mano combat with hot pepper. And it’s hardly worth mentioning the crust, which melted into mushiness under the swamp water leaching out of the other ingredients. I must confess to a certain affinity for Detaillo. The restaurant dominated the Napoletana round, and the idea of a Palác Flora food court establishment grabbing top honors seemed irresistible. But this was one bad pizza.
Capua, so consistent throughout earlier rounds, also faltered. A messy presentation emphasized paprika. The sweet burn of the pepper eliminated every other flavor, one by one, so the whole became one-dimensional. And it was sloppy — oily, wet discharge obliterated Capua’s usually remarkable flatbread base.
This opened the door for Modrá Zahrada. In the absence of pepperoni, I ordered its quattro stagiano, because mushrooms and artichokes are equally capable of washing out a crust. It’s certainly not the best pizza and, although the dough held up, it’s an unconvincing arrangement not really worthy of a spot in the finals. Yet that’s how it worked out.
Final
The championship match, a wild-card round pitting unique pizzas against each other, ended as a somewhat lopsided affair. Modrá Zahrada’s “salami” is, in fact, one of the city’s best representations of an American-style pepperoni. Thin-sliced, spicy meat, a tangy and faintly herbal sauce, cheese that melts into a firm, dense mass — it’s a pretty good pie.
But in the “moderni,” Grosseto meets the challenges of white pizza with confidence and flair. The crust is again a thing of beauty, teetering on the edge of crispiness. Sun-dried tomatoes, rucola and pine nuts combine for a flavor wavering between upscale and bucolic. The only fault was not tearing the rucola leaves into bite-size pieces. The tomatoes are rich, fruity and tart, like an old wine on the verge of slipping. Pine nuts kick in a warm and comfortable hint of toasted malt. The rustic edge comes from handfuls — literally — of greens tossed onto the pizza upon its removal from the oven.
Grosseto just nudged past competitors in the first and second rounds, never performing to its peak but never wavering much. In the end, though, consistency, along with a few stellar moments, wins championships.
Now it’s up to Grosseto to defend its title next year.

Dave Faries can be reached at dfaries@praguepost.com


Other articles in Night & Day (21/02/2007):

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