The Art And Science Of The Modern Pizza
Photos by Ingrid Nelson
It’s new-school, New York, high-flavor, cold-fermented, baked hotter, longer, and whatever you do don’t try and call because amidst the music, conversation, and buzz of the kitchen, the absence of a ringing phone––along with pepper and romesco broccolini, pesto and hazelnut carrots, pistachio and radicchio salad, and marinara-swimming meatballs––will take Grass Valley’s latest downtown addition from a single-slice pizzeria, to an apps and taps full-scale restaurant–– Italian wine and all.
It’s round two for Thad Raczkowski, former owner of Little Oven Pizza, in Merced County, where he met his partner-in-pie, and co-owner of Bicycle Thief, Weston Updegraff––the driving force behind their debut menu. “I grew up in New Jersey,” Thad remembers, “riding my bike to every neighborhood pizzeria I could find, and developed this fascination, maybe obsession, with pizza––always finding new places to go, following reviews and online publications. I was in my 20s making these pizza-pilgrimages just trying to figure out what I liked, the different styles, and how they compared. A great bite should be crispy on the outside, light and airy on the inside, with a good balance of cheese, sauce, and dough.”
Weston, a former engineering major turned chef, with deep roots in Sonoma County, may not be building bridges or designing spacecraft (and lucky for us––towers and thrusters have no respect for quality cuisine), but his childhood spent among wine, and thereby food, developed his eye (or shall we say taste) for excellence. And, like Thad, he’s a pizza connoisseur, with a nose for sniffing out great dough. “There’s one ‘tell’ for pizza-people,” Weston instructs, “You know they know pizza if they rip open the crust and smell it. I can tell, just by the aroma, if it’s a long, cold-ferment. If it’s sourdough, I can smell the sourness. If they’re using a young dough I can smell the ‘yeastiness.’ And sometimes, if it’s a dead and dying dough, I’ll get a scent of staleness that isn’t immediately obvious, but pretty clear the proof is past its prime. For me, pizza isn’t about being busy. Our dough goes through a long cold-fermentation and we use a very small amount of yeast in a process called Poolish, which helps to develop the texture and flavor of our dough while also making it easier to digest.”
In 1948, Bicycle Thieves, an Italian film regarded as among the best of all time, debuted to what those Hollywood folk call, “acclaim.” While (to some) its obscurity remains, Thad and Weston have chosen to embody the silver linings of a scene in the film when the main characters enter a restaurant, order a pizza, and are quickly instructed by the waiter, “this is not a pizzeria,” a disparagement of the working class (by which pizza was created) and instead, order two mozzarella sandwiches. “What’s beautiful and poetic about this moment is that they’re able to enjoy themselves, and they have forgotten for that time, for that moment, about what a horrific and catastrophically bad day this has been for them. It’s a moment where they can let that pain slip away and, among food and wine, enjoy each other.”
Despite the established community of “pizza-people” in Nevada County, the region felt ripe for a shakeup, or at the very least, a homecoming. “There’s a simple elegance to everything we do,” says Thad, whose wife, Stephanie Raczkowski, was raised in Grass Valley. “And, it’s funny, because all we have is a pizza oven. So I think there’s a real engineering aspect to how we prepare our appetizers and small plates which are centered around this idea of, ‘What else can we do with this oven?’ Everything we serve, with the exception of ice cream and heating up marinara sauce, is produced in that oven.”
Sticking to this creativity and innovation, Thad and Weston have hosted the first installment of what will be an ongoing experience known as The Bicycle Thief SupperClub. The evenings will offer the duo a chance to partner with chefs, winemakers, bakers, and epicurean diners seeking the ingenuity of a meal uniquely prepared and themed, as their namesake suggests, around famous Italian movies. “Our next event will be during the holidays––with all the information posted to our social channels and website,” says Thad. “It will continue to be centered around exciting guest chefs from out of the area who can showcase their talents among the added challenge of cooking an entire pizza-free meal in a singular pizza oven. I love our pizza, and day-to-day it’s our passion and purpose to produce the best pie we can, but Weston and I are also just fans of amazing food, and we want to use what we’ve built as an opportunity to connect great chefs with an amazing community.”
Bicycle Thief, among a busy dinner service, has also added weekend lunches, welcoming an earlier crowd to their modern-Italian restaurant, or shall we say (because they don’t serve mozzarella sandwiches) ––pizzeria.
122 East Main St, Grass Valley, CA
