Pizzas are not only the known open top ones
ingredients for 8 pieces of pizza (total cost about 9 Euros)
- 450 g flour from soft wheat
- 50 g whole wheat flour
- 150 ml mineral water
- 100 ml full fat milk
- 125 ml EV olive oil
- 10 g salt
- 4 g dried yeast
- 2 small garlic cloves
- 1/2 red hot chilli pepper
- 2 anchovies
- 80 ml EV olive oil
- 15 g raisins (sultanas)
- 15 g capers
- 15 g pine nuts
- 1 large or 2 small heads escarole
- 1 bunch rainbow chards
- salt
- An egg yolk for brushing
- 12 drops of Colatura di Alici (optional)
In Naples, Italy, the Christmas eve dinner is mainly made with fish products. Actually the world famous “Spaghetti alle vongole” is a Christmas dish!!!
Every Christmas eve dinner in Naples starts with a “Pizza alla scarola” a stuffed pie with an oil crust, which reminds us more a French pie than a local pizza.
After a lot of trials I have made some small changes at the classic recipe, respecting the original version, as I always do:
a) I added a small portion of whole wheat flour, which makes the dough tastier and more “country like”
b) I added a small bunch of rainbow chards which make the filling tastier and visually more attractive
c) I added some drops of colatura di alici, the magic Italian umami fortifier sauce. If you cannot find Italian Colatura di alici, just omit the sauce, do not use common fish sauces, as they have an industrial and cheap taste and they are not healthy at all.
Let’s make our Neapolitan Christmas pizza together.
First of all we must prepare the dough. We shift and mix the flours with the salt. We bring the liquids (water, milk, olive oil) in room temperature (23 to 25 Celsius grades) and we dilute the dry yeast in them. We pour the liquids in the flour mix and we start initially stirring and then kneading. We knead manually for about 15 minutes (10 if we use an electric mixer), till the dough becomes very soft. We put the dough in a greased bowl we cover it with cling film or with a dump cloth and we leave it to rise for about 90-120 minutes, depending the room temperature.
Waiting for the dough to rise:
a) We put the capers and the anchovies in a bowl with water, aiming to remove their excessive saltiness.
b) We put the white raisins (sultanas) in another bowl of water to soak them
c) We toast the pine nuts, taking care not to burn them
d) We wash and then fry in olive oil the chards and the escarole to remove their liquids. We add the garlic, cut in slices, the chilli pepper and the anchovies, minced, the capers and the raisins, strained and we cook for 2-3 more minutes. We remove from the heat and we add the pine nuts and the colatura drops, if we have. We check the salt, adding some, if required. We strain the mixture to remove the excessive humidity and we add some more olive oil. We wait for the mixture to cool.
We divide the dough in two pieces, one of about 500 gr and the other of 380 gr. We grease with oil a round baking pan, wide 28 to 30 cm.
With a rolling pin or with our hands we prepare two rounds of dough. We put the largest round in the baking pan, trying to cover all of its surface and also leave a border about 2cm outside of the pan. With a toothpick we make some holes in the dough.
We add the escarole-chard mix, flattening it with our hands and we spread it over the dough. We cover with the smaller round of dough and we seal the borders of the pie, pressing the edges of the dough. We repeat the holes making with the toothpick.
We brush with the egg yolk and we bake the pie for about 25 minutes at 180 Celsius degrees. We wait it to cool and we cut in pieces.
