Mascarpone – mascarpone cheese is delicious with savoury wood-fired pizzas but those with a sweet tooth really relish combining it with a topping such as pear, figs and honey and even chocolate spread. This Italian cream cheese has been known in Lombardy since the 16th and 17th centuries.
Specialist cheeses – our research also found wood-fired chefs around the UK using specialist cheese on their wood-fired pizzas such as Wrekin Blue (artisan blue cheese from Shropshire made by Moyden’s Handmade), Yorkshire Blue, Strathdon Blue (from the Highland Fine Cheese Company) and Young Buck Blue (from Northern Ireland) as well as the award-winning Blacksticks Blue from Preston, where Orchard Ovens and Valoriani UK is based. Add to this Tain Brie, also from the Highland Fine Cheese Company, and it just shows how wood-fired pizza can literally be a base upon which to showcase artisan local foods, particularly when cooked in a Valoriani artisan wood-fired oven from Orchard Ovens. It just proves you don’t have to stick to the Italian classics!