Neapolitan Pizza (Pizza Napoletana)

Ingredients:

1 recipe dough

3 cups drained seeded plum tomatoes - (abt 2 lbs)

1 pound fior di latte mozzarella cheese -- sliced

8 salted anchovies -- cut small pieces

2 teaspoons dried oregano

1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.

Divide the dough in half and roll each piece out on a floured surface into a 13 1/2-inch round. 

Place the rounds on each of two lightly oiled 13-inch pizza pans.  You can stretch the dough to fit an even larger pan, if you wish. 

Turn in the overhanging edge 1/2-inch to form a rim. 

Or place the rounds on 2 wooden peels, sprinkled with cornmeal, if you plan to bake the pizza on baking stones.

Divide the tomatoes and spread them evenly on each pizza.  Divide and layer on the cheese. 

Divide the anchovies and scatter them over the top.  Divide and sprinkle on the oregano and olive oil.

Bake the pizzas for 25 to 30 minutes, or until the bottom crusts are nicely browned and the cheese is melted on top.  Cut the pizzas into wedges and serve immediately.

If using baking stones, preheat the stones for 20 minutes, then sprinkle them with cornmeal and transfer each pizza from the peel onto a hot stone.  Bake until the crusts are nicely browned, about 25 minutes. 

Cut the pizzas into wedges and serve immediately.

This recipe yields two 13-inch pizzas.

Comments:  Ask for pizza Napoletana in Naples and you will be served a crisp disk of dough with a layer of freshly chopped and seeded plum tomatoes, fresh buffalo mozzarella cheese, anchovy fillets, and a sprinkling of oregano. 

Since buffalo mozzarella is very perishable and rarely available, substitute fresh whole-milk fior di latte.

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