Top This: Pizza Bianca (à la Pizzeria Mozza)

[Photographs: Kelly Bone]

Have you ever fallen in love? If not, then you haven't tasted the Bianca. When the chefs at Pizzeria Mozza met the buttery, truffle-laced sottocenere, it was love at first bite. The rounds of delicate semi-soft cow's milk cheese, from the Veneto region in northern Italy, are aged in juniper and fennel ash rub, providing a subtle background for the overarching truffle flavor. Mozza's relatively long pizza cooking times (8-10 minutes) brings the high fat content of the sottocenere to its oily breaking point. So owner Nancy Sliverton and Executive Chef Matt Molina add a supporting cast of fontina and mozzarella to keep this consummate white pie velvety.

The secret to this pie goes beyond the cheese combination. Inspired by Pellicano, a neighborhood restaurant near her home in Umbra, Nancy brought the Italian concept of using a foundation of panna, or whipped cream, as the pizza's base. Executive Chef Matt Molina, a veteran of Campanile and Del Posto, who has been working with Nancy Sliverton for 13 years developed what may be a perfect white pizza.

What You'll Need

• 1 portion of dough
• Panna or heavy whipping cream
• 6 ounces fontina cubed dice sized
• 6 ounces mozzarella cubed
• 3/4 cup of sottocenere shredded
• Handful of fresh sage leaves

Mozza Pizzeria

641 N. Highland Avenue Los Angeles, CA 90036 (map)
(323) 297-0101; pizzeriamozza.com