And of course this has its outcomes: awarded by guides and critics, he’s known most of all thanks to his pizzas, a tribute to robust and true Tuscan tradition, like the one made on the peel, with cocoa in the dough, the one with boar, Maremma-style, and extra virgin olive oil.

He started making pizza out of necessity. In 1998 with his brother Federico – who runs the dining room with Silvia, Tommaso’s wife, and manages the cellar – he took over the restaurant-pizzeria, which had been a prominent culinary point of reference in Siena since the Seventies. People came here, and still do, for the typical local cuisine and for the pizza, which at the time was a little neglected, rolled out with a pin, using traditional seasonings. The kind that was popular at the time.

«At first I continued with this approach, because it worked – says Vatti. – Then over the years I started to look around and found some nice local products: from cured meat made with cinta senese pigs to pecorino made by producers who arrived from Sardinia back in the Sixties. So I started to work on seasonings, focusing on some local products, such as beans from Sorana, meat from Maremmana cattle or anchovies from Certaldo. As a pizzaiolo I joined Alleanza Slow Food, quality is important. I also believe in “Km vero”: I couldn’t do without mozzarella or tomatoes from Campania or Puglia, prosciutto from Sauris or Bitto Storico».

He also pays strong attention to extra virgin olive oil, thanks to which Vatti received the Airo award for Pizzaiolo dell’Olio 2018, and to meat and cured meat matured in special ways.

Tommaso’s research also includes dough. Today he uses five types, all with living mother yeast, and type 1 flour or special blends. There’s the classic one for pizza served in a plate, two types for pizza baked in a pan, with whole-wheat or Evolutiva flour – which he uses, for instance for his summer pizza with cream of courgettes, tomato confit, bresaola from Valtellina and Muntok white pepper.

There’s also the one for the Roman peel (which he serves in a round version) and the one with cocoa, from Valrhona. Then there’s bread, served with the food from the kitchen. And with the arrival of the autumn there will also be a dough made with whole-wheat and water aromatised with sage, to be topped with roasted cinta senese pork.


Luciana Squadrilli
source: http://www.identitagolose.it/news/view.php?id=104

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