No tomato, and none missing
White Pizza
Mozzarella, dollops of whole-milk ricotta, sliced garlic, olive oil, black pepper and oregano, on the same 48-hour base.
A white pizza is not a pizza with something missing. Take the tomato away and the acid goes with it, so the whole thing has to be rebalanced: more garlic, more black pepper, a real amount of olive oil, and ricotta in dollops rather than spread, so you get pockets of something soft and mild against the browned mozzarella.
The ricotta matters more than anything else on it. Supermarket ricotta is stabilised and it weeps in the oven, which is how you end up with a watery white pizza — a common enough fault that a lot of people think it is just what a white pie is like. Ours is whole milk, drained overnight in a cloth, and it holds.
It is the pie we most often recommend to somebody who says they do not really like pizza, which is usually a way of saying they do not like a lot of sweet tomato sauce.
What goes on it
The base
The 48-hour round dough, brushed with olive oil instead of sauced.
The mozzarella
Whole-milk, shredded here, and a little less of it than on a plain pie to leave room for the ricotta.
The ricotta
Whole-milk, drained overnight, in about twelve dollops across an 18-inch pie.
The finish
Sliced garlic before the bake, then cracked black pepper, dried oregano and olive oil after it.
How it is made here
Oiled, not sauced
A brush of olive oil straight onto the opened dough, right to the rim, so the crust colours properly without sauce under it.
Dolloped, not spread
The ricotta goes on in spoonfuls. Spread flat it dries out and turns chalky; in dollops it stays soft in the middle.
Twelve to fourteen minutes
At 600°F, the same as a plain pie.
Finished off the heat
Pepper, oregano and a last thread of oil after it comes out. Black pepper in the oven goes bitter.
White Pizza — what it costs
- 18" pie$28
- 14" pie$22
- By the slice$4.50
Prices include every topping listed above. Extras are $3 for vegetables and $4 for meats. Prices change when our costs do; the menu here is the menu in the shop.
Before you order this
A shared flour kitchen, and what that rules out. Our kitchen handles wheat flour in open air all day, along with milk, eggs, soy, tree nuts and fish. Flour becomes airborne every time a dough ball is opened, and it settles on every surface in the room, including the peels, the oven floor, the cutting board and the wheel. We can tell you what we put on a pizza, and we will tell you honestly. We cannot tell you that anything leaving this kitchen is free of an allergen, and we will not say it. If a reaction would send you to hospital, this is not a safe kitchen for you, and we would far rather say so than take the order.
The kitchen is one room. Every pizza here is opened on the same bench, baked on the same floor and cut with the same wheel, and that is true of this one as much as any other. The pages on allergens and cross-contact and vegetarian, vegan and dietary questions set out plainly what we can and cannot tell you, including the things most shops leave you to assume.
The rest of the menu
Other things worth ordering
New York Cheese Pizza
The plain pie the whole shop is judged on: a thin, foldable base, a thin bright sauce and low-moisture mozzarella browned in patches.
From $3.75
Pepperoni Pizza
Small-diameter natural-casing pepperoni that curls into cups and chars at the rim, over the plain pie.
From $4.50
Sicilian Square Pizza
A thick square pie proofed in an oiled steel pan: an airy open crumb, a fried golden base and a crisp cheese edge.
From $4.25Asked at the counter
White Pizza — questions
Can I have spinach on it?
Yes, and it is the most common addition — $3. It is wilted and squeezed dry first, because raw spinach releases a startling amount of water onto a pizza with no sauce to hide it.
Is there any tomato at all?
None. If you want both, order a half-and-half on the 18-inch, or look at the vodka pie, which is the middle ground between the two.
Is it vegetarian?
The toppings are, but read our dietary page before you rely on that — it is cut with the same wheel as everything else and the hard grating cheese is not made without animal rennet.
Twelve to fifteen minutes, and worth the wait
Order a pie
Telephone the shop and we will tell you honestly how long the kitchen is running before you commit to anything. Collection is always quicker than delivery and the pizza is always better for it. If you are ordering for a crowd, the catering page has the trays and the notice we need.