Guest Bloggers

OK, let’s play fill in the blank: A pizza is supposed to________.Take your time with the answer because this is not a simple question. In fact you can think of it as the fundamental jumping off point for your own personal pizza quest, a sort of Zen koan that can move you towards pizza enlightenment. The late great pizza maker, Ed Ladou, described his pizza crust as an edible plate…Read More…

Note from Peter:  I’ve been corresponding recently with a fascinating guy name Bruce Vetter, a retired motorcycle builder who is now a passionate whole grain bread baker. I asked him if he’d be willing to share some of his unique personal story with our viewers and he sent me this photo essay. I’m hoping he’ll keep sending us contributions like this — he represents a rare breed of good old…Read More…

Most of you have probably read Brad English’s superb coverage of this years Pizza Expo. The Expo is certainly the premier event for pizza pros and is, quite simply, the “must see” event for anyone who is serious about a career in pizza. With that being said, this year I overheard something that at once disturbed me and got me thinking about where pizza is headed. While standing at the…Read More…

Note from Peter:  Jenn Burns, who last appeared here following her coffee farm adventure in Central America picking beans on a steep mountain slope, is back. Jenn just graduated Magna cum Laude from Davidson College, a few miles north of Charlotte, with a degree in Food and Environmental Studies. During her four years at Davidson I’ve been following her career through her writings as she transitioned through the many universal…Read More…

The Pizza Guy, or is he the “Other Pizza Guy? Let me explain. I found myself driving through the desert thinking a lot about pizza.  Having thoughts of pizza dance around my head wasn’t out of the ordinary, but you don’t often connect pizza with the desert.  I was cruising east at about 5 miles per hour over the speed limit to avoid being taken down by one of the…Read More…

Note from Peter: Our friend Stan Ginsberg and, as of last week, now an IACP award winning author of the wonderful book, Inside the Jewish Bakery, started a small mail order specialty flour company called New York Bakers, to meet the need for those of you who have been searching for hard to find, high quality brands. You can read more about Stan in the Contributor Profiles section. We welcome…Read More…

I was having an interesting night. I haven’t always been comfortable just going out alone and sitting in a restaurant while surrounded by people who were out together enjoying a social experience.  I don’t remember when that changed exactly, but I do remember how it became that much more of a comfortable thing while I was working in New York.  I realized that I liked it in a way because,…Read More…

Note from Peter: This is Part Two of Brad’s recent personal pizza quest in New York City on Bleecker St in Greenwich Village. Following the lead of guest columnist John Arena’s dictum that this was the best pizza neighborhood in the country, Brad had quite an interesting adventure and shares it with us here. If you haven’t seen Part One, scroll down the page and begin there — this new…Read More…

John Arena recently wrote a Guest Column here on Pizza Quest about one of the best areas in the country to go on a pizza tasting tour, or to engage in a personal pizza quest in one single neighborhood.  He doesn’t claim that this is the “best” place to go, lest he start a pizza turf war.  Rather, he defines Greenwich Village, NY as a special place that will deliver…Read More…

As students of pizza we spend a lot of time trying to uncover the “secrets” of past masters. We are constantly trying to reach back into antiquity with the assumption that there was a “golden age of pizza” and that it is our duty to resurrect these honored traditions. To a certain extent there may be some truth in that belief. But let’s not ignore the possibility that some of…Read More…