Marisol Doyle wasn’t bothered by the frozen dough and canned mushrooms common in the pizzas she ate as a child in Sonora, Mexico. It was comfort food.
“But as an adult,” she said, “I wanted something better.” »
Ms. Doyle’s first experience with better pizza was in 2006 at Pizzeria Bianco in Phoenix, and it was probably a lot like yours. Mozzarella melting into pools. Crust that invites comparison with fresh bakery bread. These are qualities found in the Neapolitan-style pies served in the wood-fired pizzerias that have become an integral part of urban America.
In recent years, they’ve also become staples outside of cities, drawing diners to small-community types — from southern Illinois and coastal New England to rural Wisconsin and Oregon – whose restaurant cultures are often dominated by national chains. All those jiggly pies, with their blistered crusts, sprigs of basil, and drizzles of hot honey, taught Americans that they could ask more from a dish usually eaten out of a cardboard box — and consumed by about one in eight people every day, according to U.S. Department of Agriculture research.
This broad appeal, coupled with the relatively low cost of opening pizzerias and the ease of acquiring the information needed to master making high-quality pizza, has made the dish a particularly effective way for chefs to find a voice while earning a living. Until recently, chefs looking to make sublime Neapolitan pizzas had few options beyond traveling to Italy, said Chris Bianco, who opened Pizzeria Bianco in 1988.
“Today you just swipe and study and you can bring great pizza to any city, anywhere,” said Mr. Bianco, who is arguably the most influential pizza maker in the world. country.
The renaissance that followed did more than make pizza in the United States better than it ever was. It has also made the country home to the world’s best pizza — or, at least, in Mr. Bianco’s estimation, “the most hyper-focused and diverse collection of pizzerias.”
There’s no doubt that American pizza is better than ever almost everywhere. That includes Cleveland, Miss., where Ms. Doyle opened Leña Pizza + Bagels last year.
The pizzeria is part of a rare culinary phenomenon: a restaurant trend born from the culture of big city chefs and which is not running out of steam in the inner suburbs. Leña is like many smart urban trattorias, except it’s located in a small village storefront, on a street called Cotton Row.
Leña’s spiritual parents include a surprisingly diverse range of restaurants in every corner of the country, including Pizzeria Sei, Los Angeles’ neo-Neapolitan-influenced pizzeria; Short & Main, a pizzeria-oyster bar in Gloucester, Massachusetts; Yellow, a Levantine bakery and pizzeria in Washington, DC; and Lincoln Wine Bar in Mount Vernon, Iowa.
Although the character and food of these restaurants vary greatly, almost all offer a cross-cultural mix of dishes whose common denominator is a soft, flavorful crust.
At Leña, there are the pizzas expected and loved by everyone, like the margherita and pepperoni (called pepperrory, in honor of Ms. Doyle’s husband and business partner, Rory), but also pies highlighting the products of season and Ms. Doyle’s Mexican heritage, including the Sonora, which swaps tomato sauce for refried beans and is topped with house-roasted jalapeño salsa.
Leña has become a destination in the rural Mississippi Delta. It was a success even before it opened, as a frequent pop-up restaurant. Ms. Doyle remembers posting her plans for Leña after returning from Naples, Italy, where she studied pizza making at the Scuola di Pizzaioli and Associazione Verace Pizza Napoletana.
“People would come up to me at Walmart and ask when the restaurant was going to open,” Ms. Doyle said.
Fancy pizza is nothing new in the United States. They have been on the menu at Chez Panisse Café, Spago, Beverly Hills and Al Forno in Providence, RI, since the early 1980s. In 2003, Mr. Bianco became the first pizza chef to win a regional chef award from the James Foundation Beard.
But the first glimmer of today’s pizza boom didn’t flicker until the 2000s, with the opening of pizzerias that were also full-on, erudite neighborhood restaurants, like A16 in San Francisco, 2 Amys in Washington, D.C. and Franny’s in Brooklyn. . Tandy Wilson was cooking in California at this time, including at Tra Vigne, a famous Napa Valley restaurant with a wood-fired oven that served pizza for lunch and, occasionally, dinner.
Mr. Wilson returned to his hometown of Nashville, convinced that pizza could be a vehicle for creativity, and made it a central part of his restaurant, City House, a regional Italian restaurant with a Southern accent that opened in 2007. He also thought the pizza would attract a wider range of diners.
“Pizza was a way to open up the playing field a little bit and bring more people to the table,” Mr. Wilson said.
The chef-driven pizzeria suddenly became a thing. Restaurants like Roberta’s, in Bushwick, Brooklyn, and Gjelina, in Venice, Calif., have garnered the kind of praise historically reserved for white-tablecloth restaurants. In a 2011 New York Times review, Sam Sifton called Roberta’s, which opened in 2008 without a heat or liquor license, “one of the most extraordinary restaurants in America.”
John Hall, like many other chefs working in high-end traditional restaurants, has observed with interest the accolades for this new pizzeria variety. He was drawn to restaurant style as an affordable way to transition from hospitality employee to owner. The chef, who worked for 10 years at some of New York’s most renowned restaurants, including Gramercy Tavern and Per Se, wanted to own his own business and home.
Mr. Hall ultimately concluded that such things would not happen in New York after learning that one of the city’s best-known chefs had to borrow money from his father-in-law to buy an apartment. He left to open Post Office Pies in his hometown of Birmingham, Alabama, in 2014.
“I didn’t need glassware, dishes, fancy linens and all the expenses that come with opening a high-end restaurant,” Mr. Hall said of the fireside pizzeria. wood, that he and his partner, Mike Wilson. and Brandon Cain, opened without outside investors. “It gave me the opportunity to truly be my own boss.”
Since making pizza, as many home cooks have discovered, can be mastered without going to culinary school or even working in a restaurant kitchen, this dish offered an alternative route to a more people to become chefs and restaurateurs.
Ann Kim had never worked in a restaurant when she opened Pizzeria Lola in Minneapolis with her husband and business partner, Conrad Leifur, in 2010. Ms. Kim is now an acclaimed chef, having opened a string of acclaimed restaurants, including Young Joni, a pizzeria that highlights the flavors of his native South Korea.
“I make the kind of pizza I want to eat,” Ms. Kim told The New York Times in a 2019 interview. “No one ever told me you can’t do that because you’re Korean.”
The restaurant is part of a growing cohort of pizzerias inspired by the cuisines of countries other than Italy, including Mexican-American pizzeria San Lucas in South Philadelphia; the Asian-inspired Hapa Pizza, in Portland, Oregon; and the Argentinian mini-chain Boludo, in Minneapolis.
Not all compelling next-generation pizzerias rely on wood-fired ovens. Khurshed Ahmed opened Amar Pizza, in Hamtramck, Michigan, after working primarily at chain restaurants, including Domino’s. Amar offers thin, Detroit-style pies, baked in a gas oven, with ingredients from Bangladesh, where Mr. Ahmed was born. The sauce for one of the signature pizzas is a chutney commonly found on Bangladeshi tables, made with dried shrimp, anchovies, roasted garlic and cilantro.
This is far from the only Bengali influence on Amar’s menu. “A lot of pizzerias offer pasta,” Mr. Ahmed said. “I thought we were a Bangladeshi pizza place and we could have biryani.”
Some of the best pizza found in rural America comes from multi-purpose businesses. Bakeries like Tinder Hearth in Brooksville, Maine; Flour and Flower in St. Joseph, Minnesota; and White Salmon Baking Co. in White Salmon, Washington, are known for their pizzas served on select nights.
Scratch Brewing Company in Ava, Illinois, is becoming a weekend pizzeria. One of its most memorable pies is spread with pesto made from wild garlic, basil and other herbs, harvested from a nearby forest by owners Marika Josephson and Aaron Kleidon. The pizza is finished with goat cheese from Baetje Farms, melted in Scratch’s handmade brick oven.
When Jesse Sauerbrei started as a server at Lincoln Wine Bar outside Cedar Rapids, Iowa, his primary job was to demystify wine for customers. “Wine, even today, can scare people,” he said. Pizza made in Lincoln’s wood-fired oven helps put people at ease, he said.
Mr. Sauerbrei has continued his focus on local ingredients since purchasing the business in 2014. Spring is especially busy, when local morels are abundant. They’re followed by local asparagus, which he serves on a white pizza with guanciale and Calabrian chili peppers.
It’s one of many locally sourced pies favored by customers who, when they first started coming to the restaurant, only ordered sausage or pepperoni.
“Pizza is a really good way to get people to try new things,” Sauerbrei said. “There’s nothing intimidating about pizza.”