The art of the pizza

By Paul Reidinger

PIZZA IS – like its Italian relation pasta – one of the most malleable of food forms. Over the years I have eaten pizzas topped (not at the same time, of course) with hamburger, pineapple, Thai shrimp, tandoori chicken, sausage, calamari, goat cheese; with (at the same time) gravlax, dill, and cream cheese; with tomato sauce and without. I have never had anything like the cucumber pizza Kramer so infamously proposed on Seinfeld – has anyone? let us hope not – but other than that, the pizza waterfront has been covered. I have even been to Shakey's, to Round Table, to Pizza Hut and Pizza Pit, to Godfather's and Rocky Rococo's and some incredibly authentic place in Manhattan's Little Italy I can't remember the name of but know I could find again if I looked.

The pizza, like Christianity, has been adapted by many interests to many purposes. It can have a thick, bready crust or a thin crust or a part-cornmeal crust; it can be heavily or lightly topped, with toppings traditional or eccentric, served hot or cold, for lunch or dinner or breakfast depending on the situation. When we talk of pizza, we can be fairly sure we're talking about a disk – or perhaps a square – of baked, yeast-risen dough, topped with something. Beyond that point, certainty ends, and the pizza roads dramatically diverge.

We cannot fairly call Pizzetta 211, a tiny pizzeria deep in the avenues of the Richmond, fundamentalist – not when the place is finishing its pies with, among other things, farm eggs, currants, and pine nuts. Nonetheless, there is a purity to the proceedings there; it begins with the hand-tossed crusts – fabulously thin and so crisp that the point does not sag when you raise a slice to your lips – and includes the stylishly functional kitchen (baker's racks, pizza oven, small but formidable espresso machine, agleam with chrome and brass, whose cup warmer is stacked with little Picardie tumblers), the selection of books for perusing while you wait (there is a fine volume on the wines of Italy), and, on one wall, the chalkboard with the daily specials, mainly soups, salads, and desserts.

Artisanal is the better word for Pizzetta 211. The menu stresses a commitment to organic ingredients and to the value even of small contributions to a better world: "We believe even small businesses can make a difference." Yes, and one way to do that it is to make each order to order, by hand; when you order a pizza or calzone at Pizzetta 211, you will not be pointing at tired pies cooling in glass display cases. You will see, instead, the dough for your pie being tossed, shaped, given toppings, and slipped from the peel into the oven.

If you order soup, on the other hand, you will see it being ladled from a huge urn – but then most soup benefits from some sitting there, certainly if it is mixed bean ($5.50 for a broad bowl), with tomatoes and Swiss chard in a simple vegetable broth. A perfect Italian-style soup for winter, with an unexpected and delightful kick of chili heat.

Although some of the pizzas carry unusual cargo, the toppings (and calzone fillings) are, in the main, mainstream. One week's calzone ($8.25), for instance, was stuffed with ricotta and goat cheeses and a coarse tomato sauce the bright red color of blood. (Also, the crust seemed to have been given an oil or egg wash before baking, which produced the golden shellac one associates with pastry.)

You can get pepperoni pizza ($9.25) as a variant of what is essentially a pizza margherita – tomatoes, mozzarella, and basil, with the basil here turned into dabs of pesto. If, for one reason or other, pepperoni doesn't appeal, spend another 50¢ for an upgrade to white anchovies (a staple of tapas bars in Spain), filets of which are laid out from center to edge like the spokes of a bicycle wheel.

Pizza is (like pasta) a natural staple of vegetarians, and Pizzetta 211's menu tilts notably though not dramatically away from animal flesh. (Cheese is another matter.) We were quite taken with the rich sharpness of a pie topped with rosemary, Fiore Sardo sheep's-milk cheese, and pine nuts ($10.25) – the pine nuts, with their irreducible, inimitable flavor, making the dish as they tend to make any dish they are a part of. An accompanying farm salad was dressed with a lively balsamic vinaigrette, though it did seem to me that $3.75 was a bit steep for a small plate of baby lettuces, even if of the highest quality.

On the other hand, $5.50 seemed like a more than fair price for a big slice of house-baked almond cake (like pound cake only, we were assured, "less fatty"), soaked with some dried-fruit compote from the big bowl on the counter and served with a fog bank of whipped cream – on the side, of course, not on top.