Building A Better Pizza - A Little Bit Cheesy

So far I've discussed crust and sauce. Does cheese really need a blog post all its own? Yes.yes it does.

Cheese is there not just to hold the toppings in place. It is there to provide flavor as well. And there are all sorts of cheeses that work well on a pizza. You can go bland or outrageous. But, like sauce, you can overwhelm a pizza with the wrong sort of cheese or with using too much cheese.

I keep going back to the Margherita as an example. It is the most basic of pizza's.  It is the template, the proto-pizza, from which all other pizzas are birthed. The only cheese on a pizza Margherita is clumps of fresh buffalo mooz. That's it. simplicity. That said, we've moved on to a slightly more mature pizza with roots that harken back to the Margherita. And with maturity comes a little more complexity in flavor.

Mozzarella is a great cheese for pizza. It gets all melty and ooey and gooey. And, generally speaking, isn't all that greasy. It has a soft, mild, buttery flavor. And it won't overpower the rest of the pizza. And, if you are only using mozzarella, it's basic function is to hold the toppings in place. But we want more than that out of our cheese. We don't want it to just be food glue.

While I'll get into the topic of toppings in the next post, the first rule of thumb is that you want your cheeses to be compatible with the rest of the toppings. You don't want the cheese to compete with the flavor of the toppings. You want to enhance and compliment.

When I cheese a pizza, the first thing I take into account is what sort of pizza I'm making? If it's going to be just cheese, a single topping, or multi-toppings. If it's a single cheese, I generally like to use 3 to 4 different cheeses. Mozzarella, cheddar (sharp), and provolone are my basic goto's. I'll add Parmesan to the mix as well. Actually, this is pretty much my goto mix for all pizzas.

I layer the bottom with enough cheese to cover. You should see a little sauce  through the cheese, but if all you see is the creamy white color of mozzarella, you've used way too much cheese. At this point, top the pizza. Then, I like to mix 2 parts mooz, 1 part cheddar, and 1 part provolone and lightly cover the toppings.  The cheddar adds a bit of tanginess while the provolone imparts a hint of smokiness to the overall flavor.

You can swap out different top cheeses for different effects. I have a buffalo wing pizza I like to make. And I'll actually use blue cheese as the top cheese along with provolone. It's like putting a nice big bow on the present. Get to know your cheeses. Know what pairs well with other cheeses, meats and veggies.

Speaking of wrapping it up in a bow. Know your cheese. Know what works and what doesn't. We all like ooey gooey geezy cheesy pizzas. Just don't overload the pizza with cheese. Use more than just one single cheese as well. You won't be disappointed.