Would you wait three months for a pizza? That is how long it normally takes to get a reservation at The Pizza Bar on 38th at the Mandarin Oriental Tokyo, considered one of the finest pizzerias in Asia.
The concept has taken over the private rooms at Amber, in the Landmark Mandarin hotel in Central, Hong Kong, as a 12-seat pop-up until January 28. But by the time you read this, it’s already too late: reservations were sold out within a week of the announcement.
What makes the pizza at The Pizza Bar so special and coveted is the dough: made with a ratio of 80 per cent water to 20 per cent flour, it is fermented for two days, resulting in a crisp and airy baked crust that is then topped with high-quality seasonal ingredients.
“A chef that cooks with love, using high-quality ingredients with grace, generosity and the proper equipment makes the perfect pizza,” says Daniele Cason, the executive chef of The Pizza Bar on 38th.
As Chua Lam, judge of Fuji TV’s series Iron Chef and renowned Hong Kong food critic, once said, freshness is paramount to Japanese cuisine, and Cason is able to combine this culinary attitude with the techniques of Italian pizza making.
“This is an evolution from [serving pizza] à la carte to omakase following my learning of Japanese culture,” explains Cason. “The menu is balanced and built on classics and seasonal pizza based on my experience.”
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We sampled the nine-course menu at a preview for the pop-up, which included seven slices of pizza. The dough is as light as advertised, with a good balance of blistering and char.
While the size of the pie isn’t too large, seven slices would amount to eating a regular-sized pizza by yourself which, to some, might be akin to a hike up The Peak – you know you can do it, but it’s still a bit of a slog.
The set menu begins with a starter of hot stewed Japanese turnip served with thinly sliced Piave cheese (a hard Italian cheese similar to Parmesan) and a small dollop of caviar.
The dish is accompanied by a crisp white pizza with lashings of olive oil, creating a great balance of slight tartness from the turnips swimming in the umami of cheese. A solid start.
Other highlights include the fourth course, called a Pizzino.
It is a bit of a curveball – a sandwich of mascarpone and black olives toasted in the wood-fired oven, served with black truffle shavings.
By this point, we were starting to feel a bit of a carb overdose, but fortunately, chef Cason uses the rules of omakase to serve a more refreshing course after the richer Pizzino.
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The sixth pizza, called Sansai, was made with Japanese mountain vegetables that are blended into a green mixture served on top of mozzarella cheese.
Typical mountain vegetables include butterbur stalks, ostrich fern and spring chrysanthemum and all have a slight bitter, medicinal taste. And as the sixth pizza, it works as a fantastic palate cleanser.
The finale is the six-cheese pizza of provolone, Gorgonzola, smoked scamorza, Taleggio, fior di latte and Parmesan that is delightfully balanced with truffle honey, ending the meal with a bang. Dessert was an affogato (espresso and ice cream); the coffee is necessary to aid with digestion.
For those who think they’ve had better pizza, that may be true. But it’s not until you’ve had an omakase-style pizza experience, where each slice is served straight out of the oven and onto your plate, that you realise that you’ve been eating mostly lukewarm pizza your entire life.
Even when you’re at a wood-fired restaurant and the entire pie comes straight from the oven, no matter how quickly you can scoff it down, by the third slice it starts to cool and the flavour undoubtedly starts to suffer.
It turns out that the case can be made for a three-month wait for the hottest, freshest pizza after all.
