The Pizza Masterclass in Milan, Italy.

How do you go to Italy and not have a bucket list of food to try? It is just not possible, is it?
I had made a list of items, mainly compiled of suggestions from friends, to bless my tastebuds with when in Italy. The overwhelming suggestion was to fill up on pizzas. How would have guessed that the best Italian pizzas actually come out of Italy? What a total surprise.

I had an excellent experience in Venice at the seafood restaurant. It sort of raised my expectations. What do I mean by expectations? Well, it is evidently harder to find genuinely tasty food made in authentic fashion in 2023. It is just so much more profitable for restaurants to ride the reputed wave of authenticity while cutting down on costs, skipping authentic habits, serving more patrons, and not really caring for the art or experience.

The seafood restaurant wasn't a Michelin-rated nor a specialty gastronomy with a renowned chef. It was just another restaurant among a sea of others competing to stay ahead in business. Yet, I found myself genuinely enjoying the experience because it somehow managed to stick to authenticity, at least in the kitchen and taste, while still staying relatively affordable in a touristic region.

While in Milan, I took a detour of roughly two and a half hours. A very long walk from the Duomo down to the lesser visited landmarks and then back to the Duomo. On the way, I had my eyes peeled for good pizzerias as I was getting hungry and I wouldn't leave the city without a good Margherita pizza.

Why Margherita, you ask? It is the best baseline when it comes to pizza. The mother of all pizzas. The threshold to determine the skill of the chef and the quality of the pizzeria is the basic Neopolitan pizza - Margherita. It is extremely simple, so it makes for the best litmus test paper.

Over the years, I have had so many Margheritas. From absolutely horrendous to pretty okay. I have documented a few of these experiences on the chain. The thing is, it is easy to make which makes it easy to personalize, too. I have never been a critic of people trying to "reimagine" the Margherita, but some have destroyed it by trying to recreate it.

https://peakd.com/hive-120586/@blind-spot/trattoria-calabria-loved-the-food-liked-the-experience-disliked-the-details	https://peakd.com/hive-120586/@blind-spot/chef-ala-still-strong-4-years-into-his-restaurant	https://peakd.com/hive-120586/@blind-spot/literally-biting-more-than-i-can-chew

I have to confess my due diligence had come short. There are plenty of places around the Duomo but I thought they would be more catered towards fast service and touristic experience, as well as expensive. Some places kept coming up online and seemed promising. However, places like Marghe or Lievita were artisanal enough but a bit too inauthentic for me. The most popular recommendation was Gino Sorbillo. It is also close to the Duomo which was perfect for me, but the line was oh so long!

I had to find a compromise. A place that doesn't have a line, doesn't need reservations, won't shoot a burning hole in my pocket, and would still somehow be authentic enough.

On the way from the Chiesa di Santa Maria presso San Satiro to the Duomo, there is a tiny street wedged by a triangular protrusion of a building that marks the entryway leading to the Duomo. Now, one thing about restaurants in tourist cities, around the tourist spots, is that the Maitre d does not only greet the guests, seat them, or take care of dining needs, but also rally to bring in patrons from the street be it shouting to grab attention or blocking your way.

I do not know if those restaurants are any good, but I tried avoiding them. I ended up choosing to go to the restaurant at the corner of this "wedge" building. I took a quick look at the menu, asked if they had a wood-fired brick oven, and then wanted to sit as close as possible to the oven.

Sitting at the trottoir by the restaurant next to the street and dining is a unique experience and part of the culture of just a select few countries. I would have loved to experience that were I not exhausted from the long walk, and it would also mean I would not be able to look at the brick oven at work.

The restaurant isn't anything spectacular. If fancy shmancy mancy is what you are looking for then there are quite a few places in the neighborhood including a few spots right next to the Duomo. Bar Mercurio is the name of this place. It is also not going to be your cup of tea if you are looking for air conditioning or a quiet place.

One side of this restaurant, the largest part, is the bar, and the side I sat at is more restaurant. However, there are bottles of Aperol climbing up to the ceiling and other liquor bottles shelved up to the ceiling almost at every corner.

Pizza was originally invented as a quick source of nutrition for the working-class people of Italy. It was made to put together the affordability and availability of ingredients, as well as taste, into a meal. This place will remind you of that. Every pizza order is swiftly made and the runners are busy shifting them to the tables at the ring of a bell.

Everyone is loud. Or at least it feels like that. They speak clearly and are very verbal. To a non-speaker like me, it came off as loud. It partly made my experience a bit more genuine. Kitchen workers are always loud and in this restaurant, it is not any different.

I am still not convinced that the brick oven was fuelled by wood. However, I sat right next to the pizza station and watched the cooks roll out the dough by their hands, "throw in" the ingredients, pop it in the oven, pull it out, and spread toppings before ringing the bell.

This restaurant is dead in the center of the tourist area. Just a few minutes walk from the Duomo. So a lot of the behaviorism of the business is set to cater to that audience. It certainly does take away from the authenticity points. The funniest part was that there was 2pac playing on the speakers. But if it weren't for the next pizza experience I would have in the beach town I traveled to after this, I would never have realized the massive differences.

I had to choose the Margherita. Credit where it is due, it was delicious. I can say for a fact that it tastes absolutely different, in a better way of course, than every Margherita I have ever tasted. The simplicity of the pizza is palpable, really.

The biggest difference I could taste had to do with the dough and the tomatoes. Let me get this out of the way: it wasn't all that I had expected, but I was thoroughly impressed. Mostly because of the cheese and I felt like it was overcooked. I mean, apart from the locally sourced fresh ingredients, the pizza resembled the pizzas I would get at an Italian fast food place in the Hague or Rotterdam. Then again, this is a tourist area so I shouldn't have expected any different. But the taste of the ingredients itself had me hooked.

Nevertheless, the dough and the tomato paste made a whole world of difference. I can now see why many people do not like pizza crust. If pizzas all over the world used the same dough, with the same resting period, hardly any crust would be left uneaten.

Since I had a different image of Margherita in my head, and I was already hooked to the flavor of the ingredients; I decided to try something else.

I cannot stress enough how different the dough tastes. I would go on to have pizzas in other places while in Italy and the dough would be just as delicious. The ratio of garlic to tomato in the tomato paste is another delicious mystery. I could taste the garlic but just enough to remind me that there is garlic, but not enough to change the main tones of the flavor.

The Arugula and Buffalo Margherita would come next. The rocket simply drenches on the top to absorb the flavor from the olive oil and buffalo. I think I'll just stick to Margheritas but the buffalo mozzarella cheese is superb.

The bottom line is that no matter where you go, tourist area or not, you will get Italian food better than all the other places outside Italy. Even if the restaurants do not keep true to customs or techniques, the fact that you are in the country, surrounded by mannerisms, behavior, traditions, and locally sourced ingredients will always make the dining experience authentic to some degree. It is not difficult to find the local experience in tourist areas, you just have to look, wait, or compromise with one thing or the other. But I am telling you, Italian food is simply the best in Italy, and I would go back just to eat.

---

_{Follow me on twitter}

---

Affiliate links

_{Rising Star
Exode
Huobi
Appics
Splinterlands
Actifit
Binance
Ionomy
Cryptex}