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Pizzaperta

Sally Webb

Pizza passion: Seating is all outdoors at Pizzaperta.
Pizza passion: Seating is all outdoors at Pizzaperta.Sahlan Hayes

Italian$$

For a pizzeria that's little more than a hole in the wall under The Star casino complex, Pizzaperta has made a bit of a splash since it opened in November, but it would be wrong to expect just an ordinary pizzeria from Stefano Manfredi, the chef and restaurateur who took Italian food to the top of gastronomy in Australia.

Manfredi is riding the crest of the new wave of "pizzerie", which he's been observing in Italy over in the past few years, including Gabriele Bonci's famous Pizzarium in Rome. At Pizzaperta, he's aiming to redefine the idea of modern pizza, by looking at its essential elements, including the flour used and the method of maturation and fermentation.

To that end, he has imported not only distinctive stoneground flours milled by Molino Quaglia near Padova Padua, but also people who know how to work with them, including pizzaiolo Gianluca Donzelli, a passionate Neapolitan, and Antonio Pappalardo, an old friend from Brescia, who spent months before Pizzaperta opened experimenting with different flours and fermentations.

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A prosciutto pizza in the making.
A prosciutto pizza in the making.Supplied

He has also imported a Stefano Ferrara oven made by a Neapolitan family who've been making them for more than 100 years.  

The menu at Pizzaperta is divided into three parts. "Traditional and classical" includes a real marinara, topped simply with tomato, garlic and oregano, and with not a whiff of seafood in sight, and the pleasingly salty Sicilian with capers and anchovies. The dough is crisp and oven burnished on the outside, but wonderfully soft and spongy within.

"Seasonal and new wave" pizzas get are more creative, and change with the produce available. Our prawn, zucchini and mint pizza was a little bland until we doused it with chilli oil. The "Roman teglia style" pizzas look more like focaccia sandwiches than pizza. I'm an Italian traditionalist when it comes to mixing seafood with cheese (ie, don't do it), but the calamari with rocket, mozzarella and olives is truly a revelation.

The pizza dough is matured and fermented for a minimum of 24 hours, which makes it more easily digestible.

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With such consideration given to the quality of the bases and the integrity of the ingredients on top, I can't help being a little disappointed that everything is served in cardboard takeaway boxes, with recyclable cutlery and unbreakable poly glasses. This, says Manfredi says, was dictated by the space, or lack of it, and allows Pizzaperta to keep its prices reasonable.

Call me old fashioned, but I do prefer plates and glassware when I'm dining out, and it doesn't encourage you to linger on the handful of long communal tables and benches spilling out in front. (Perhaps that's the idea.) Nor am I crazy about the pre-made salads and desserts in plastic takeaway packaging.

That said, what Manfredi has given Sydney is a combination of the classical Neapolitan pizza and a taste of the new wave that's sweeping the world, and for that, we say "grazie".

THE LOW-DOWN
Do … go with a group, so you can order and taste a variety of pizzas 
Don't … miss the arancini as a pre-pizza snack
Dish … Roma Roman teglia style pizza with calamari and rocket
Vibe … Pizza for both classicists and the curious

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