4 pizzas
Cipolla e Acciughe
- Hydration
- 65%
- Dough ball
- 250g
- Fermentation
- 49h
- Salt
- 2.8%
- Bake
- 60–90 sec
- Oven
- Wood-fired oven
- Makes
- 4pizzas
- Active time
- 30min
Ingredients
- Dough ball PizzaLovers house dough 65%, cold-fermented 48 h
- 250 g
- Peeled San Marzano tomatoes, crushed by hand
- 70 g
- Onion, thinly sliced and slowly softened in oil
- 60 g
- Anchovy fillets in oil 4–5 fillets
- 14 g
- Extra virgin olive oil
- 7.0 g
- Dried oregano
- 0.4 g
- Black olives optional
- 15 g
Total dough416 g
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Scale up or down — the yeast is recalculated automatically.
Method
- Take the dough balls out of the fridge 2–3 hours before baking and let them sit covered at room temperature.
- Preheat the oven well in advance: 45–60 minutes for a steel in a home oven, 20–30 minutes for a gas oven, longer for a wood oven. Measure the floor with an IR thermometer — you want around 450 °C (840 °F).
- Stretch the ball by hand from the centre outward on a semola-floured surface. Never touch the outer two centimetres.
- Soften the onion in olive oil over low heat for 20 minutes until translucent and sweet, then let it cool.
- Spread the onion over the sauce and lay the anchovy fillets on top.
- Slide the pizza in and bake for 60–90 seconds. Turn it two or three times so the crust colours evenly.
- Let the pizza rest for a few seconds, add anything meant to go on after the oven, and serve straight away.
Onion and anchovy is the combination that makes southern Italian food make sense: salt, sweet and fat in the same bite. The onion has to soften in a pan first, otherwise it burns in ninety seconds.
outside AVPN – a traditional southern Italian combination, but not named in the disciplinare.
Topping order
- Tomato sauce
- Softened onion
- Anchovies
- Oregano
- Olive oil
Common mistakes
- Raw onion, which burns at the edges and stays raw in the middle.
- Too many anchovies – five is the limit.
- Salt in the sauce on top of salty anchovies.
Tips
- Soften a whole onion at a time; the rest keeps in the fridge for a week.
- A splash of vinegar in the onion once it's done balances the anchovy.
Variations
- With mozzarella for a milder version.
- With capers instead of olives.
Recalculate the recipe
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Read more
- Neapolitan pizza dough – the full recipe and the why behind it
- Alici e Capperi
- Napoletana
- Tomatoes for pizza – San Marzano and the alternatives
- Stretching – push the gas towards the rim, never out of it
