A pizza that screams "summer"

When we were writing The Book of Pizza, the New York-style dough was the one we tinkered with the most. My coauthor Martin Philip agonized over it as long as he could, not finalizing the recipe until he absolutely had to. (Book deadlines are great motivators.) I couldn’t blame him — few styles of pizza are more scrutinized or debated than New York-style, and Martin is a perfectionist who wanted to make sure he got it right. And he did get it right, formulating a low-hydration dough with a little bit of sugar, a little bit of oil, and a lot of gluten-forming bread flour.

But then it was time to tackle the toppings. Over the course of several research trips to New York, Martin and I clocked several slice shop staples we wanted to include in the book. A classic cheese slice, of course. A pepperoni with jalapeños. A calzone (controversial, I know — but that’s another newsletter). And the ultimate summer slice: the caprese.

Caprese slices are typically some of the saddest in the case, with rounds of pale, waterlogged beefsteak tomatoes pressed into calcified cheese. Three of the five authors of this book live or have lived in New York, and none of us were ever excited to eat those pitiful slices. But we believed it could be a magnificient pizza, and after several tests we landed on a caprese nobody could ever pass up.

Here’s how we did it: Instead of sad beefsteak slices, we opted for cherry tomatoes, macerating them with salt to extract all the extra water that would otherwise make a pizza soggy. We sauced the pizza with pesto rather than simply throwing a few basil leaves on top, and we dotted the finished pie with creamed mozzarella. (This trick, which I first saw in a cookbook by Abra Berens, makes regular mozzarella as creamy and decadent as burrata.) And, of course, we sprinkled the finished pie with olive oil and fresh basil leaves.

The result is a pie that’s a celebration of summer; I really can’t imagine eating it indoors. It begs to be taken to the porch, the deck, the yard. Have an outdoor pizza oven? Perfect. But know that if you eat it indoors, standing at the kitchen counter, that also works. You can take this slice out of summer, but you can’t take the summer out of the slice.

• Alex Roberts recently developed two recipes for us. Here, he gives a peek behind the curtain of the development process:

• Our blog editor went on vacation and we published a Dot Cake explainer behind her back. (Enjoy, Rossi Anastopoulo!) Also: Here’s a Reel we published with ideas about what to do with all those scraps.

• Meanwhile, our friend Edd Kimber saw Dot Cakes and raised it with Coupe Cakes:

• Our Summer of Pizza is just beginning, and on July 1^st we’re going live on Substack with Alexandra Stafford of Pizza Every Friday!

• You’re hearing it here first (maybe): Over 4th of July weekend we’re having not one, but two big sales. 20% off On-Demand classes! 15% off $60! Make a note to visit kingarthurbaking.com on the 2nd.

• Lastly, the fried apple pies are back, which is making Jessica Battilana very, very happy. I have to say, though, that these are just as good, maybe better.