Recipe Pizza Rossa Roman-Style

[MypinchofItaly]

Pizza Rossa Romana aka Pizza Rossa in Italian, ‘Red Pizza’, is one of Rome’s best-loved street foods, a pizza with a thin and crispy crust base topped only with tomato sauce and Oil, no mozzarella. That’s why it’s called ‘red pizza’, because it only has tomato and a drizzle of raw oil to complete the goodness. It is sold cut into squares and wrapped in paper so that it can be enjoyed in the best possible way while walking through Rome alleys. The tomato sauce should be neither too rich nor too little, it must have that balance between acidity and flavour. Here’s how to make it at home. I've added a sprinkling of dried oregano just for my tastebuds.

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Makes about 8 pieces of pizza, Preparation 10 min + 2 hours rising, Baking 20 minutes

• 400 g plain flour or Italian flour 0
• 7 g dried yeast
• 2 teaspoons of sugar
• salt, 1 heaped teaspoon + a pinch
• 250 ml lukewarm water
• 2 tbsp EVOO – Extra Virgin Olive Oil + a drizzle for seasoning at the end
• 200 g of tomato puree
• Dried Oregano, optional

Method

Pour the sifted flour into a bowl together with the sifted dry yeast and the 2 teaspoons of sugar, mix with a wooden spoon.

As you stir, add the warm water a little at a time and continue stirring, add the olive oil and finally a heaped teaspoon of salt. Continue to mix.

Now start kneading with your hands until you get a slightly sticky and not too uniform dough.

Place it in the bowl just with a light dusting of flour, cover the bowl with cling film and leave the dough to rise in a warm place for 2 hours or until doubled.

Preheat the oven to 190 C / Gas 5 / F 375.

Cover a flat baking tray with baking paper, grease it lightly and place the dough stretching it with the fingertips, no rolling pin needed, season with a good quantity of tomato puree, a drizzle of oil, a pinch of salt and if you like also a sprinkling of dried oregano.

Bake in a static oven for 20 or 25 minutes.
As soon as it is cooked and taken out of the oven, season it with a drizzle of raw oil and let it cool a little at room temperature.

This pizza is even more excellent eaten cold!

 

[Termyn8or]

Funny this comes up now. Not long ago I got in an argument with an Italian about whether this is actually pizza or not. Later I am reading on it and find it is called something similar, and pizza rosso might be it, I don't remember.

We had a guy here who made it that way, had to order EVERYTHING but the crust and the sauce. His sauce was hot though, not extreme but well beyond mild for most people but not painful.

Want pepperoni ? Sure Man, takes a bunch of shaved pepperoni and throws it on there, then if you want cheese he sprinkles romano on top. The family, they sent a crew, drove 40-50 miles round trip to get it. On the way back, the heat of the sauce and crust is making the grease ooze out the pepperoni and making it really good. Sometimes they went and bought it in bulk. They got a deep freeze. Stacked em up. There was one left when Grandma died, and she was a fanatic about this stuff. When she died after the funeral they finished it completely. Place had gone out of business. They did resurface on the west side fro a time but didn't last long. Great pizza but not for that many people. They had regular pizza then and stil all they knew was make those big sheets, or half sheet size, want less then by the slice.

Y'know, we had some reallty good pizza places here in the past. These new places cannot compete. I might have to post about that.

T