Simone PADOAN

Open your heart to this profession and believe that it can be changed.
This is the advice that Simone Padoan, born in 1971, a pizza maker recognised as the creator of that haute cuisine pizza that intrigues so much, addresses to younger people and to those who want to get back into the game and start again. He did this about ten years ago, discovering that even in the pizzeria sector there is room for something different. And he was right. 'People are used to eating what you offer them, but they can learn to eat something else, it's up to you,' he explains.
His story starts way back: the youngest of nine siblings all with pizza-making backgrounds, he was 'immersed' in the world of pizzerias from the age of six. Between 1988 and 1994 he worked closely with one of his brothers and learned the secrets of one of the most popular trades in Italy in the field. In 1994, he opened his own pizzeria: a classic pizzeria, very different from today's, with a reduced offer but a focus on seasonal products even then.
With the change of times and the birth of large mixed establishments capable of offering pizzas alongside a classic restaurant menu, Simone experienced a personal work crisis, thinking that the pizzeria world had no future. But he is wrong. And this moment of difficulty serves him as an opportunity for reflection, as a cue to change, to reset a situation and start again.
Thanks to the support of some friends, he learns more and more to believe in his ideas and his qualities: he begins to study the use of raw materials, fermentation techniques, the use of mother yeast.
This is the beginning of the turning point. Working and experimenting, the young pizza maker from San Bonifacio understands that the old pizza identity can be renewed: people are open to change, you just have to dare. 'When you discover a new world,' says Padoan, 'you experience it in a different way, you change perspective and see things from a different angle, you have enthusiasm for what you do'.
This is how the tasting pizza was born, with the intention of making people fully enjoy the product in its simplicity. 'I believed a lot in what I was doing,' continues Simone Padoan, 'but at the same time it scared me. So I started by organising themed evenings on the closing day of my restaurant, inviting the producers I used to use: it was a way to teach, to make my customers understand a path, and to get to know the raw materials, the products I used in my new pizzas. Then, little by little, I began to offer a few pizzas off the menu, even during normal working days, until 2005, a year that was strongly marked by the death of my father, when my consecration arrived thanks to a number of guides, such as Gambero Rosso and a report aired on Matrix.
Since then it has been an evolution, a crescendo, an affirmation of a real philosophy of work and life: 'Our intention,' Padoan explains, 'is to make high quality products in a transparent way. We have never hidden what we do, and if many people criticise me for this because we give the impression of being easily copied, I believe instead that the fact that someone follows what we are doing is a recognition for us, it means that we have left a mark in the world of pizzerias'.
And a mark Simone Padoan's pizzas also leave deep-rooted among customers for the emotion they convey, for the taste that distinguishes them, for the passion and creation that can be perceived as soon as the dish is served on the table. "This job is my life. Many people eat exclusively for sustenance and that is a very sad fact for me. Every dish is born from an emotion and this is what I try to convey,' Padoan comments.
Among the proposals at I Tigli, in addition to the innovative menu that changes constantly, there are must-haves such as the pizza with burrata and San Daniele prosciutto crudo 'riserva 18 mesi' or the one with buffalo buffalo from Campania and date tomatoes with basil. The latter is the one Simone is most attached to, the one he eats most often and which most reminds him of his family, his brothers, his childhood, his beginning.
And if among the Veronese pizza chef's future plans is the desire to realise a dream that he has long held in his heart and head, Simone has no doubts about the future: 'we must return more and more to valuing the human relationship in everything we do, even in our work,' and to those who want to approach the profession of pizza chef for the first time, Simone reminds us not only to believe in the change in a sector that has so much to develop, but above all not to copy and to trust our own ideas so that we never have to be second to anyone.

Massimo GIOVANNINI

Massimo Giovannini has always had a passion for catering, ever since his days in the automotive industry. But it was in 1994 that he decided to turn it into his own business. He opens a restaurant, learns how to make pizza. He closes, moves on, reopens until 2009 when he lands at Apogeo, a real landmark in Pietrasanta, Lucca.
The menu consists of three types of offerings: classic pizzas; historical pizzas linked to his previous restaurant, Pachino; and innovative pizzas that he serves in wedges. These include the pear, pecorino senese and lardo di Colonnata or the strictly seasonal pizzas such as the one with turnip tops, blanched and pan-fried, peeled tomatoes and local Camaiore sausages from an artisan workshop.
'I really like working with burrata,' Giovannini comments, 'which I propose with salmon or anchovies from the Cantabrian Sea, while another pizza appreciated by my customers is the Apogeo with grilled aubergines cut into cubes and tossed with Parmesan cheese, Pachino tomatoes and Colonnata lard'.
Among the types presented, if 80 per cent of those who buy takeaway pizza ask for the classic product, those who choose to eat in the restaurant increasingly prefer the innovative proposal characterised by the external preparation of the topping. "It is not even a year," explains Giovannini, "that we have introduced this new gastronomic offer in the restaurant. Initially, we held chef's evenings and prepared the pizza slices only two evenings a week, but given the public's appreciation, little by little we introduced them permanently on the menu and this choice is rewarding us".
But Massimo Giovannini is also a sommelier: that is why in this restaurant great attention is also paid to drinking and the menu includes a dozen craft beers and about eighty wine labels. The Apogeo, the Fisar headquarters in Versilia, can seat up to 55 people in two rooms, one of which has an open kitchen and oven.
"My dream in the drawer,' Giovannini explains, 'is very simple: that one day pizzeria customers will have the same respect for us as they have for a chef. I would like them to stop constantly asking for changes to the proposals on the menu, modifying them to suit their own tastes. I would like the customer to trust me, what I propose, without removing and adding ingredients as they please, revolutionising a recipe that was designed to offer that combination of tastes and flavours that makes it unique'.
Clear ideas also on the professionalism of the category: 'In this sector we too often deal with approximation, and this is to the detriment of the all-round pizza product. We should make this dish better known and appreciated,' continues Giovannini, 'by enhancing its value: in twenty years Italian cuisine has made giant steps forward, but unfortunately we are only just getting going and I hope that the new generations will be able to study this work in more depth and study it more than we have done so far'.

Lello RAVAGNAN

Great numbers, high quality and the right atmosphere to make the customer experience something special every time.
A former A1 volleyball player, Ruggero Ravagnan has very precise ideas on how his restaurant should be. These are the little secrets of the pizzeria Grigoris, which has been a landmark in the lagoon city for years, even though the restaurant is located in the suburbs. Open four hours a day, exclusively in the evening, it has changed its philosophy over the years while remaining faithful to the search for raw materials of absolute excellence.
'Three years ago,' Ravagnan recounts, 'I went through a moment of professional crisis, I was tired, fed up, I wanted to change something in my way of working but I didn't know what. After a dinner with Simone Padoan at I Tigli in San Bonifacio, I realised that pizza could be something else, something different from what I had always believed until then.
I received new stimuli from that experience and wanted to deepen my knowledge of this work that I had started some twenty years ago. I started attending Molino Quaglia, I learnt how to work with Petra® flour, sourdough and biga, and I renewed myself by finding new stimuli and setting myself new goals to achieve'.
Ravagnan's pizza today is lighter and qualitatively better, the cooking systems have changed over the last few years, his professionalism and that of the employees who work with him have changed, and customers are even more satisfied with the product they eat, also because Ruggero is a person of character, with great energy and he manages to convey this.
Dining at Grigoris's means experiencing an event, being - as he likes to say - at the centre of a situation that is always special, where even the ambience is fundamental in creating an atmosphere, the right one: "Everything helps to create and nurture a suggestion, an emotion: not only the food, which is the undisputed protagonist, but also the music, the fragrances, the colours, the furnishings. Every element inside the restaurant speaks of you, of your philosophy of life and work, and you, the owner, must know how to express the energy you have inside, the energy with which you want to distinguish your restaurant: this is a very important aspect, which helps make the difference. And people don't forget that'.
Ruggero Ravagnan's pizzas are prepared using products endorsed by Slow Food such as Salsiccia rossa di Castelpoto (Castelpoto red sausage), Fior di latte di Agerola (Agerola milk cheese), and San Marzano Dop Agrigenus tomato: a topping of excellence that contributes to giving a special flavour to a pizza whose base already has so much to tell even on its own.
'The pizza market,' Ravagnan goes on to explain, 'has before it the possibility of a great evolution, which will come about thanks to the use of top-quality raw materials. We must never stop searching, studying, understanding, finding and enhancing the products that can go well on a base that must already be able to express to the customer an emotion that is different from what commonly resides in the collective imagination. Pizza made with elements of excellence has an enormous future and in this case I don't think it is necessary to have dozens and dozens of references on the menu: ten or fifteen different proposals may be enough to please and satisfy the customer, but they must be able to leave him speechless'.

Gianni DODAJ

Imagine a normal pizza by the slice and takeaway. Done? Now forget it. Pizzeria Fantasy in San Donà di Piave (Ve) is an entirely different story.
Gianni and his sister Giulia, very young people in their thirties with great intuition, opened a place in 2008 that, with only four seats, is capable of making so many pizzerias with much higher seating numbers envious. The reason is simple and the philosophy of the proposals speaks volumes. 
At Pizzeria Fantasy, the menu is exclusively seasonal and consists of eight pizzas, plus a pizza of the day and a 'do-it-yourself' section in which the customer is given the freedom to garnish the disc of dough as he or she chooses, using only the toppings on offer at that time.
"We are young and in step with the times," says Gianni Dodaj, "which is why we do not limit ourselves to offering pizzas that could be found anywhere. Today lifestyles have changed, people have modified their dietary needs, people don't eat looking for fatty foods to make up for the hard work of manual labour, but they try to eat healthy and well: that is why we have based the work of our pizzeria on these standards".
Always on the lookout for new products and new experiments, at this time of year Gianni and Giulia offer pizzas such as the one with Treviso radicchio, stracciatella pugliese and porchetta, or the pizza with porcini mushrooms from Val Comelico, baked potatoes flavoured with rosemary, local sausage and asiago di malga, or the pizza with fresh friarielli, sausage and capocollo calabrese.
And the Dodaj brothers have clear ideas: 'What we want,' explains Gianni Dodaj, 'is to continue on the road we have taken, trying to improve further and without stopping to learn. Today, the market mentality is lacking in this sector: pizza is considered a poor product and is not appreciated for what it is. It is certainly a product that was born as extremely simple, but today this is no longer the case. Pizza is a single dish with everything in it. First and foremost, it is the mentality of people that must change, along with that of the category that must not belittle and debase a product with great potential'.

Antonio PAPPALARDO

Twenty-four years and a great love for cooking. Since always. Antonio Pappalardo is a young pizza maker from the province of Brescia, confident, determined, passionate about his work. Seven years ago he opened La Cascina dei Sapori and for the past two years has completely changed the philosophy of the menu. And it is a success. Only seasonal pizzas, with the exception of the Margherita and the pizza with Mediterranean anchovies and capers from Salina, for a menu that has some twenty references.
The pizzas change seasonally according to the products on the market. And so in winter there are: the Winter, dedicated to vegetables; the pizza with Sockeye wild salmon that lives in the wild in Alaska; the pizza with Icelandic cod; the pizza with red prawns, Bronte pistachio grain, burrata cheese and black cabbage; or again the pizza with local cotechino (bought from a trusted butcher), fior di latte di Agerola and black cabbage.
'Today the consumer has evolved,' explains Pappalardo, 'and often knows more than the producer: whoever owns a restaurant cannot help but keep up to date. Pizza is no longer something to eat to feed oneself as it was in the 1980s when there was a war to lower prices and only tinned products were used to garnish discs of dough. Today there is certainly less money available,' continues the young pizza maker from Brescia, 'but it is better spent, people pay a lot of attention to what they eat, and it is necessary to create a product that can satisfy the widest possible public'.
Antonio Pappalardo graduated from the Hotelier Institute, but already during his school years he was working in the fields of pizzeria, bakery, pastry and catering. 'I tried out the different sectors,' he explains, 'because I wanted to understand which one I liked best. And there was no doubt: only in the field of pizzerias do I feel I can express my creativity to the fullest. Here you can be more daring because you have not only a leavened base, but also a topping with which you can make various combinations'.
The family-run Cascina dei Sapori has three rooms with a total of 130 seats, but it is best to book in advance. Because the restaurant is always full, both during the week and at weekends: "This is the greatest proof that we made the right choice," comments Pappalardo, "working on quality raw materials and offering a different product. Customers give us a positive response, also confirmed by the Due Spicchi awarded by Gambero Rosso'. The proposal includes three different types of dough made with biga and Molino Quaglia's Petra flour: crispy flatbread pizza, pizza in teglia alla romana, and pizza al padellino. 'The restaurant staff,' explains Pappalardo, 'illustrates the different types to our customers and also proposes tasting routes following a philosophy that takes into account the topping on the pizzas.
The restaurant also has a good wine list with some 40 labels ranging from reds to whites, sparkling wines (Franciacorta, Prosecco, Champagne) and a selection of craft beers from different Italian regions.
Antonio Pappalardo learned how to prepare pizzas directly in the field, but he deepened his knowledge by attending the three levels of the University of Pizza: 'It was a wonderful educational and human experience, which I recommend to everyone. Comparison is fundamental, during the courses you are given a lot of information and new ways of working are opened up, then it is up to each of us to decide whether or not to put them into practice. I think,' Pappalardo concludes, 'that it is fundamental to know the raw material, to know how to work it in order to get the best results. A change is taking place in the pizzeria sector, innovation is being sought, but this cannot be exempt from learning the leavening, processing and baking of dough correctly'.

Roberto GHISOLFI

has innovated the pizza by the slice sector.
Not only for the choice of location, the furnishings and the use of colours, but above all for the creativity and care that he and his wife Fiorella put into the creation of their products. The son of bakers, Roberto has always had the white art in his blood.
Preparing pizzas, working the flour, choosing the best ingredients to use take him back in time, make him savour that taste of his origins and the past linked to his family that, in parallel, excites each of us.
And that extra vibration, that expectation of finding something different can be felt when entering Spicchio di Cremona, looking at those pans capable of churning out fifty different slices one from the other. Yes, because here the most popular pizza does not exist: it is the customer who invents, creates, asks for exactly what he would like to eat.
This is how 'slices' with different toppings are born, but with one great quality in common: the base made with stone-ground Petra® wheat flour and mother yeast, characterised by fragrance and high digestibility.
'My dream,' says Roberto Ghisolfi, 'is to one day be able to have a dough charter and not a pizza charter. A document that illustrates different yeast and dough processes and allows customers to deepen and better understand the work behind the making of a good pizza'.
And it is precisely in order to deepen skills and knowledge that Roberto Ghisolfi has no doubts: 'The future of pizza lies in training, we must learn how to work with doughs, understand the differences, study leavening and raw materials: if the base you prepare is not good or does not reflect the characteristics of health and digestibility, you can put the best topping you have on it, but your final product will never be up to the standard you would like to achieve. Today, unfortunately, there are so many non-credible competitions that do nothing but harm to the world of pizza, but fortunately training courses are springing up and more and more in-depth events are being organised: this is good for our sector and it is what we need to strive for more and more to improve ourselves and to improve the culture that revolves around a world that is so well known, but at the same time so little valued. That's why I have been attending the University of Pizza for years, because it is a place of comparison and exchange where you can talk to colleagues, relate with them, but also learn new processing techniques'.
But Roberto and his wife - 'always together for thirty years', Roberto emphasises with a twinge of emotion in his eyes and voice - have also innovated this sector from another point of view.
In fact, the pizza from Spicchio di Cremona is also famous for being presented and sold uncooked. 'I came up with this idea,' says Roberto, 'observing how the industry works. For example, if you buy a pizza at the supermarket, once you get home you put it in the oven and bake it. Here the process is similar. The pizzas are obviously not frozen, but fresh, but the last five minutes of baking are missing. If a customer eats the pizza at our place, we directly finish the preparation in-house, but otherwise if they buy it to eat at home, they will finish the cooking. This way they will have the opportunity to melt the mozzarella or other ingredients at the last moment, giving the product that added value with the correct consistency when they taste it. And believe me, the taste and fragrance will be different'.
From the passion of Roberto Ghisolfi was born La focaccia di Ale, a dough conceived and studied by the pizzaiolo from Cremona, who makes wonders in his Spicchio. After a long period of experimentation, to which his son Alessio, who is a chemical researcher in Strasbourg, also contributed, Roberto started producing some focaccias with this exclusive dough. Made with Petra 1, 3 and 9 (the stone-ground flour from Molino Quaglia), it follows a very precise process consisting of three pre-doughs: one with biga, one with mother yeast, one with hydrolysis with Petra 9. All made the day before and refreshed the following day, they undergo a double leavening of 24 hours. The result is extraordinary: pre-risen at a low temperature, they are finished during the second baking phase.

Renato BOSCO

"A leavened product for me represents the highest expression of what I can make."
This is the thinking of Renato Bosco, born in 1967, a pizzaiolo 'by chance' himself, as often happens in this profession. Renato began working in a pizzeria at the age of fifteen as a waiter, then he found himself having to replace the restaurant's official pizzaiolo for a certain period of time, stuck at home due to illness. Thus was born his passion for a trade that, after doing his military service, he decided to undertake by opening his own restaurant in partnership with others. And this time he is the reference figure, the one who has 'his hands in the dough', who studies, prepares, experiments, learns, knows, invents, cooks. And it is a success. Renato understands more and more how much this profession is a real passion for him and follows it unabashedly and with great enthusiasm. He understands the importance of sourdough for his preparations, he learns to know it, to work with it, to dedicate time to it 'which is never wasted' because for him it represents a real resource.
And the customers of the new restaurant he opened on his own six years ago know this. Renato's passion infects them, they in turn want to learn and it happens that they ask him how to get sourdough starter. Simple, Renato gives them a piece, explains the procedure and all this represents a different key to making pizza culture, to illustrating how a product that is apparently so simple can be made in different ways, but instead requires great professionalism and competence. More than one might think.
Eating in Renato Bosco's restaurant is therefore an experience not only for the senses (taste and palate first and foremost), but also on a human level for the staff's welcome and for the attention he dedicates to his customers: he brings the pizzas to the table, explains how they are made, the use of ingredients, the differences, the peculiarities.
Listening to him you can't help but feel his enthusiasm, his energy, you feel that the strength of what he is telling you will be in the dish. And so it is. The pizzas at Saporè change with the course of the seasons because "it is the raw material that leads me", explains Renato, but there are some must-haves that always recur in every season and they are: the Margherita Dop prepared with Igp tomato, mozzarella Dop, basil and extra virgin olive oil; the pure vegetarian pizza that changes according to the seasons; the Degustazione pizza with burrata and crudo. But here the pizza can also be prepared in a Roman style pan and the choice ranges from different toppings such as mortadella, misticanza and buffalo, vegetarian again in purity or Roman broccoli with buffalo and sweet local sausage.
Today Renato Bosco's place is changing 'because I have changed,' he explains with a smile. Born as a takeaway pizzeria specialising in pan pizza, today Saporé is much more. While always espousing the use of high quality raw materials, Renato's restaurant is changing its face in an attempt to reflect and express the philosophy and passion of its founder to the full.
So the take-away pizzeria with the place next to it where you can order and consume the meal you want to eat can become a temporary restaurant made with recycled materials, to give a deeper connection with the material even in the space that is used for consumption, for conviviality. The modern pizzeria must also be different in this. It must communicate a well-being, a choice of life, a message, and it must stop being a mere furnishing accessory. "A movement is emerging in the world of pizzerias," explains Renato Bosco, "things are changing, little by little professionalism is growing, the level of knowledge of the product and the search for raw materials is rising, which for me is continuous and fundamental.

Fabrizio PASINELLI

The taste for simplicity. This in a nutshell is the thought that accompanies the work of Fabrizio Pasinelli, 48, a former leather worker then pizza maker by necessity and then by passion. "My philosophy is this," he comments, "a few ingredients, simple and not too processed, respecting the balance of the dish. Fabrizio has been running, together with his brother Marcello, the Pizzeria al Castello for fourteen years, which he opened in Cividate al Piano after various work and life experiences that have seen him as an employee and owner of a pizzeria, but also as a farmer in Umbria of organic and biodynamic crops.
In addition to the classic large and thin pizza that is very popular in this area, he tells us, Pasinelli has been dedicating himself to making a different product for a few years now: 'I have evolved my way of working,' he says, 'after meeting Molino Quaglia and taking courses at the University of Pizza. I learnt about Petra flour, which I now use for the dough and biga, and I also offer my customers a smaller and higher tasting pizza than the other in which I use mainly seasonal products. These are two different doughs that now give rise to two different types of pizza that coexist in my restaurant. The first one, the classic one, has a range of about 60 pizzas that I would like to reduce; the second one has about 20".
Tasting pizzas include focaccia with burrata cheese and Parma ham aged between 24 and 26 months, and pizza with escarole, burrata cheese, anchovies, extra virgin olive oil and Petra crumbs. And it was precisely a variant of the latter that was conceived for the 2012 edition of the Salone del Gusto in Turin, to be offered for tasting also in the restaurant in the province of Bergamo: 'The pizza with escarole is proposed with products from the Colli di Bergamo and with sardines from Montisola del Lago di Iseo. This is the name given to the agon fish, which is salted and dried: this will be one of the top ingredients of my pizza in which the extra virgin olive oil from the Lombard lakes and Agrì cheese from Valtorta, a Slow Food presidium, will also stand out,' Pasinelli explains.
The pizzas offered at Cividade al Piano are the result of a profound search for quality raw materials in which great attention is paid to local products. But in addition to the simplicity of the proposal that reflects great refinement and attention to detail, Pasinelli declares how for him it is fundamental that a pizza be digestible: "Whatever the size of the pizza," he explains, "it must be easy to digest. I fight a lot on this aspect, often challenging the work of other colleagues: continuous research on doughs is needed, study is needed, comparison is needed, which in this sector is particularly difficult because it seems that everyone is the holder of the best working secret and is obliged to jealously guard it'.
And on the concept of in-depth study, Fabrizio has no doubts: 'before starting this job, it would be necessary for everyone, out of respect for the consumer, to train in the right places and not improvise themselves as pizza makers to the detriment of the category. You have to speak and work with solid foundations, built up over time, and then evolve as you see fit, according to your own flair, your tradition, your creativity'.

Beniamino BILALI

The world of pizzerias can only change if all of us artisans believe more in what we do
and if we accompany the customer to consume the food by sharing an emotion and not just thinking about the pure need to feed oneself. These are the words of Beniamino Bilali, born in 1985 and with a family culture linked to the white art behind him. "We must transmit direct emotions, involve the customer," he continues, "making him participate and making him understand that what he is paying for is the raw material and not our image, the quality and the emotions that only ingredients can transmit. And Beniamino has plenty of passion and enthusiasm to communicate, and he does it in his own way, with reflection and pride, recounting how he approached this job over time, how everything is a continuous experimentation and how the activity of pizza maker is linked to the scientific studies he has carried out.
"I started approaching the world of pizza-making by chance, to earn some money, and I immersed myself in this reality at 360°. I am the son of bakers,' he continues, 'and I always thought I would never do a job similar to that of my parents. Instead, here I am, bewitched by the magical universe of leavening through which, over time, I have grown and matured. Thanks to this activity, I have learnt how, by studying and opening your horizons to new research and experimentation, you become more responsible not only in your work, but also in your everyday life'.
For Beniamino, working as a pizza maker has therefore been a path of individual and professional growth and maturation that he still deals with on a daily basis. As a scholar of spontaneous fermentation, he has become passionate about the latest discoveries related to the hydrolysis of starch and has developed research work that has led him to obtain leavening of flour exclusively together with water and salt, obtaining lighter and more digestible bases.
The fermentation achieved by Bilali in the preparation of pizza dough takes place without the presence of added microorganisms, but exclusively by exploiting the quality and characteristics that stone-ground wheat can offer. And as if by magic, the chemistry of the ingredients is transformed into poetry and offers tastes of absolute greatness in its disarming simplicity.
The menu proposed by Bilali is created by strictly following the changing of the seasons, through a fusion of ideas, a sharing of moods and emotions that are then codified through names and colours that bear witness not only to a dish, but also to particular periods in its life. "My menu has a spirit," says Beniamino, "and the customer perceives this because I accompany him on a journey of stories and emotions through a dish that first bears witness to and conveys one or more stories through its ingredients. Just think,' he continues, 'of simple elements such as the red of tomatoes, the green of capers or the colours and characteristics of vegetables and charcuterie products that reflect and testify to the work of artisans and farmers through tastes and textures that always convey a passion'.
So, among the pizzas proposed by Beniamino, don't be surprised to find products such as pomodorino del Piennolo, capers from Salina, natural gorgonzola Dop, culatello from Zibello, butter from Normandy, battuta alla Piemontese, anchovies from Cetara... it will only be the beginning of a great emotional journey in which you will be serenely led.