White pizza with courgettes and ricotta

dairy Italian · regular · 210 min, including 50 hands-on

Two white pizzas with fior di latte, oven-roasted courgettes and Parmesan, finished with creamy spoonfuls of lemon ricotta in the last few minutes of baking, then torn mint and a little lemon juice.

easy version

Ingredients for two

Method

1. The evening before (or that morning; see step 2), dissolve the yeast in the 195 g lukewarm water (25°C) and leave for 2 minutes. Add 300 g flour and mix with a spoon, then by hand, until no dry flour remains. Cover for 10 minutes, add 8 g salt, then knead for 8–10 minutes on a barely floured surface, using some of the reserved 20 g flour: the dough should become smooth, supple and elastic, and a piece stretched between your fingers should turn translucent without tearing.
2. Shape into a ball and place in a closed container large enough for the dough to double in volume. Leave at room temperature for 1 hour, then refrigerate for 12–18 hours. If starting that morning, leave for 1 hour at room temperature, then refrigerate for 5–6 hours; never leave it out all day (at 25°C or above, the dough collapses and turns sour). When taken out, it should have risen slowly with small bubbles beneath the surface, without collapsing.
3. On the day, 3 hours before baking, divide the cold dough into two balls of about 250 g. Shape by tucking the edges underneath to tighten the surface, place in a container lightly dusted with the remaining flour and close the lid. Leave at room temperature for 2 hours 30 minutes to 3 hours: the dough should relax, and an indentation made with your finger should spring back slowly.
4. 45 minutes before baking, preheat the oven to 250°C conventional, with an upturned heavy baking tray or pizza stone in the upper third. Slice the courgettes into 2 mm rounds, toss with 2 g salt in a colander over a bowl and leave to release their water for 20 minutes. Tear the mozzarella into 2 cm pieces and pat dry with kitchen paper; drain the ricotta if whey is visible at the bottom of the pot. If using garlic, crush the clove into the 10 g oil for the courgettes, leave to infuse while the courgettes drain, then remove it.
5. Press the courgettes firmly in a clean tea towel: they should feel dry. Grate the zest from half the whole lemon, then cut it and squeeze one quarter into a small glass for serving. Mix the ricotta with a fork, adding the zest, 20 g grated Parmesan, 2 g salt and the coarsely ground pepper: it should be thick enough to hold on a spoon. Taste; it should be well seasoned. Refrigerate. Grate the remaining 10 g Parmesan separately.
6. Dust the work surface with half the semolina. Flatten one dough ball with your fingertips, working from the centre outwards and leaving a 1 cm rim. Stretch over the backs of your hands to a 28 cm round, without using a rolling pin. Shake off excess semolina and place the round on a sheet of baking paper cut to fit, on a thin board or the back of a cold baking tray to use as a peel.
7. Add the toppings, leaving the rim clear: scatter 50 g mozzarella directly over the dough in well-spaced pieces, then lay half the raw courgettes flat in a single, slightly overlapping layer. Drizzle 5 g oil over the courgettes and sprinkle with 5 g Parmesan. Do not add ricotta yet: if spread out and baked for 10 minutes, it would dry out and release its whey.
8. Open the oven, swiftly pull the paper and pizza onto the hot tray and close the door. After 3 minutes, the dough will have set: lift the edge with a spatula, pull the paper out sharply and discard it so the base can brown better. After 6 minutes, pull the shelf halfway out and quickly add 100 g ricotta in 8–10 dollops between the courgettes, using a teaspoon. Close the oven and bake for another 3–5 minutes, 9–11 minutes in total (rotate halfway through if the oven heats unevenly). It is ready when the rim is puffed and brown-spotted, the courgette edges are browned, the mozzarella is melted and the base is dry and coloured. The ricotta should stay white and creamy, never dry or golden.
9. While the first pizza bakes, shape and top the second on another sheet of baking paper on the now-free peel (steps 6 and 7). Lift the first out with a spatula onto a serving board and put the second in within a minute. Finish the first with half the torn mint, a drizzle of 5 g oil and 3–4 drops of the juice from the lemon quarter—no more, as it should lift the ricotta rather than overpower it. Cut into portions and share it piping hot while the second bakes, Neapolitan style. To serve both together, keep the first on a wire rack, never a plate, for no more than 8 minutes.

On your plate

Cooking tips

This is a dairy dinner: serve a pareve vegetable starter, without bread or mozzarella so it does not repeat the pizza. The stated 210 minutes cover the dough balls' final rest, preheating and baking both pizzas on the day; make the dough itself the evening before in 25 minutes, or that morning, followed by 1 hour at room temperature and 5–6 hours in the fridge. In a very warm room, check the dough balls after 2 hours: they should stay puffy, not spread into puddles. The courgettes do not need frying: salted, well dried and laid flat while raw, they roast on the pizza and develop brown spots in 9 minutes. For extra flavour, you can sear them in a single layer in a very hot, dry pan for 1 minute per side without stirring before adding them. Add the ricotta in spoonfuls (a ciuffi), never as a layer; if you prefer not to open the oven, add it to the piping-hot pizza after baking, so it warms through and stays creamy. The lemon quarter gives more juice than needed: use 3–4 drops per pizza, since the zest already provides the aroma. The garlic infusion is optional; it flavours the courgette oil without leaving visible garlic.

Equipment : large mixing bowl, lidded container for the dough, scales, heavy baking tray or pizza stone, baking paper, peel: a thin board or the back of a cold baking tray, large spatula, wire rack, colander, clean tea towel, fine grater

Ricotta and courgette pizza bianca from the pizzerias of Rome and Naples: ricotta a ciuffi, roasted courgettes and a mint and lemon finish.