They don’t have a hip restaurant, but the pizzas from Pizzacos from Zwaag are among the tastiest pizzas in the country. At the Pizza Baking Championships, Domenico Malerba and his colleagues’ pizza finished in second place. NH reporter Rosanne van Veen put it to the test.
Of the fourteen participating pizzerias, Loulou Pizzabar in Amsterdam came out on top. But where Loulou’s pizzas are prepared in a modern kitchen, the Pizzacos bakers work up a sweat every day in a food truck.
“Unreal,” Domenico reacts to the result achieved in front of the NH camera. “You hope so, but you don’t expect it.”
Tomato sauce in dough
For the Dutch Championship, the pizzerias had to devise and prepare an innovative pizza. “We made a pizza in which the tomato sauce is incorporated into the dough, on top of which we made broad bean cream, there is cooked cicoria [witlof-achtige groente, red] gone over it, and over that is pecorino [sterke, zoute kaas, red] gone, sun-dried tomatoes and fresh olive oil.”
The award-winning pizza will not be available when NH visits, but the key ingredient will be there. “The dough is ultimately the most important thing,” says Domenico. The secret behind that? “Unfortunately I’m not allowed to share that.”
Presentation point for improvement
And how Pizzacos plans to dethrone Amsterdam competitor Loulou at the next National Championship? “We have to think carefully about that this year, what other recipe we should do. But I think the presentation is the main point for improvement.”