Make: fried pizza a la Sophia Loren

Say wine, snacks or haute cuisine and the gourmands at online food magazine FavorFlav know where to drink, how to eat it and what to cook. This time our cheffies serve you: fried pizza by Diva Sophia Loren.

Sophia Loren dares to challenge some sacred cows: ‘The famous Neapolitan pizza is not up for debate, but I have also eaten delicious pizzas in New York, Nice, and Paris, almost even better than those made nowadays at the Gulf of Naples.’ She can say that, the 85-year-old actress is full-blooded Italian and crazy about cooking. In her cookbook Cooking with Love, she suggests a very indulgent dish: fried pizza.

Preparation: 120 min
Preparation: 60 min 
Servings: 4

INGREDIENTS
600 grams of flour
16 grams of dried yeast
olive oil
3 cloves of garlic, chopped
1 kilogram of tomatoes, cleaned and diced
300 grams of mozzarella or fior di latte
grated Parmesan cheese
basil
frying oil
salt

How to make fried Neapolitan pizza

• Make a smooth bread dough from the flour, yeast, and some salt. Let it rise in a bowl dusted with flour, cover the bowl with a thin cloth or plastic wrap.
• Make the sauce while the dough is rising. Pour olive oil into a heavy frying pan, sauté the garlic in it.
• Add the tomatoes. Make sure you don’t get too much moisture from the tomatoes in the pan, otherwise the sauce will be too watery. Add a pinch of salt and let the sauce cook on high heat for a quarter of an hour.
• Has the dough risen? Then cut the mozzarella into small pieces, chop some more garlic, and tear the basil into small pieces.
• Heat the frying oil.
• Tear off a piece of dough from the dough ball (you absolutely must not use a knife according to Sophia!) and shape it into a flat, round pizza. Fry it in the hot oil, turning it quickly.
• Cover the pizza with a tablespoon of sauce, a bit of mozzarella, some Parmesan cheese, basil, and garlic.
• How do you eat this pizza? Fold it in half so that everything melts and mixes due to the heat. No plate or cutlery, just eat it with your hands!

Title: Cooking with Love
Author: Sophia Loren
Publisher: Luitingh-Sijthof
Price: €24,99