From her kitchen to yours

My mid-morning arrival was greeted with the cacophony of cooking. Entering Pizzeria Mozza through the rear kitchen door, I encountered the pre-opening clatter of pots and knifework blended with well-chosen words from busy workers.

Freshly ground pork sausage formed an aromatic rope as it erupted from the grinder. Redolent with toasted fennel seed, the coarse-ground bulk sausage would be a key ingredient atop two of the eatery's most popular pizzas.

I would have gladly spent the day in the kitchen, but my mission was to talk with Nancy Silverton about her new book, "The Mozza Cookbook" (Knopf, $35). Silverton, Mozza's co-owner-chef and the founder of La Brea Bakery, opened Osteria Mozza and Pizzeria Mozza four years ago in Los Angeles. Fellow celebrity chef Mario Batali and famed restaurateur Joe Bastianich are also owners.

The much-ballyhooed opening of the pizzeria this past fall in Newport Beach made the restaurant's phone ring off the hook with diners jockeying for reservations.

But here, the heart of the matter wasn't how scrumptious everything is at the pizzeria. The point was how meticulously Silverton translated her restaurant recipes into formulas that work successfully in home kitchens. Her hard work and talent color every page of the book, teaming her fine-tuned palate and deep understanding of Italian cuisine with consistent nurturing and problem-solving.

Her recipe for pizza crust is one example. Even for a master bread maker, someone who understands every nuance, it's no easy feat to create a dough recipe that when baked in a home oven — rather than an extremely hot wood-burning restaurant oven — results in a signature crust. She explained that she and baker Jon Davis worked relentlessly to create a formula that is different from the one used at the restaurants, but results in a crust that is equally delicious. She said the ingredients are the same but the process is different.

"I like a crisp crust with a structure that is open inside, filled with air and puffy," Silverton said in a matter-of-fact tone. "I didn't set out to replicate Neapolitan pizza or Chicago deep-dish pizza or New York-style pizza. The crust suits my taste. My preferences."

I think home bread makers will earmark the pizza chapter of the book; pages 121 through 153 will be stained with ingredients and notes will fill the margins. But that leaves 300 pages of recipes for everything from antipasti to pasta, entrees to desserts — irresistible Mozza dishes for everyone, not just baking enthusiasts.

I asked her which recipe she would recommend for the novice cook. Without hesitation, she said Mozza Caprese, her version of a Caprese Salad, a dish that ensures full flavors even when tomatoes aren't in season.

She uses small on-the-vine tomatoes and slow-roasts them with extra-virgin olive oil. Their skins shrivel but the tomatoes remain plump. Once cooled, the room-temperature, stem-on tomatoes sit atop a generous mound of rich fresh burrata cheese that is sprinkled with course salt and a smidgen of basil pesto. Micro-greens add crunch and color.

To my mind, a side of Fett'Unta is a must-have with the salad. This sop-it-up treat of thickly sliced rustic bread is slathered with olive oil and deeply toasted on a grill pan, outdoor grill or heavy-bottomed skillet. Piping hot with a crunchy exterior, the browned surface is rubbed with garlic and brushed with a little more olive oil, plus a sprinkle of finishing salt.

Thumbing through the mouthwatering photos of appetizers, I asked her about how she entertains in her Los Angeles home.

"I love to entertain casually," she said. "I love room-temperature food; I don't have to worry about the food getting cold. And I like to let guests eat at their own pace. Most often, it's in the back yard. I had a fireplace built that I can cook or grill in. And there's a long table that will seat 12, and often I put a big bowl of fresh fruit in the center."

When it comes to dessert, fresh seasonal fruit can be delicious, but it will never put Silverton's Butterscotch Budino out of business.

The budino, a creamy, caramel-colored pudding, is served topped with caramel sauce, plus a little crème fraîche-spiked whipped cream and crunchy Maldon sea salt. Petite Rosemary Pine Nut cookies are served on the side. Words fall short when it comes to describing how scrumptious this dish is.

"Don't be afraid to get that sugar dark," she advised readers making the pudding-like budino. "Use a heavy-bottomed pan and remember: If the smoke alarm in your house doesn't go off while you are cooking the sugar, you're not there yet." Can't you picture the joy on the firefighters' faces, greeted by sweet-salty butterscotch instead of flames?

MOZZA CAPRESE

Yield: six servings

1-1⁄2 pounds fresh burrata cheese

Maldon sea salt or another flaky sea salt, such as fleur de sel

1⁄4 cup plus 2 tablespoons basil pesto, see cook's notes

30 to 40 slow-roasted cherry tomatoes (recipe follows)

High-quality extra-virgin olive oil

Garnish: 30 to 40 fresh micro or miniature basil leaves or 6 large fresh basil leaves

Cook's notes: In a food processor, combine 2 tablespoons toasted pine nuts, 2 peeled garlic cloves, 1 teaspoon kosher salt and 1⁄2 cup extra-virgin olive oil. Add 2 cups packed fresh basil leaves; pulse until finely chopped. Add 2 more cups of basil leaves, 1⁄2 cup extra-virgin olive oil and 1⁄4 cup grated Parmigiano-Reggiano. Process just until pureed, adding more oil, if necessary; be careful not to over-process. Stir in 1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice. Taste and adjust seasoning.

Procedure

Cut burrata into six equal segments and place each one, cut side up, on a salad plate. Season with sea salt and spoon 1 teaspoon pesto over each portion of cheese.

Use scissors to cut tomatoes into clusters of two or three tomatoes. Carefully lift the tomatoes by the stems and gently rest atop each serving of cheese. (The size of the tomatoes determines how many to use. If they are small, use three to five; if smaller, use five to seven.)

Drizzle about 1⁄2 teaspoon of high-quality olive oil over each salad. (See finishing oil in cook's notes in Slow-Roasted Cherry Tomatoes recipe, which follows.) Scatter micro or small basil leaves (or large basil leaves halved).

Source: "The Mozza Cookbook" by Nancy Silverton with Matt Molina and Carolynn Carreno (Knopf, $35)

SLOW-ROASTED CHERRY TOMATOES

Yield: about 36 tomatoes

2 (9-ounce) packages Sunsweet tomatoes on stems, or 1 pound small, sweet tomatoes

1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil

1 teaspoon kosher salt

1⁄2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

Procedure

Adjust oven rack to middle position and preheat oven to 300 degrees.

Place a wire rack on top of a baking sheet. Gently lift tomatoes out of boxes, taking care to keep tomatoes attached to stems as much as possible, and place on rack. Brush tomatoes with olive oil and season with salt and pepper.

Roast in preheated oven until skins are shriveled but tomatoes are still plump, about 1-1⁄2 hours. Remove tomatoes from oven and allow them to cool to room temperature. Use tomatoes immediately, or cover with plastic wrap and store at room temperature for up to one day; refrigerate up to three days. Bring tomatoes to room temperature before serving.

Source: "The Mozza Cookbook" by Nancy Silverton with Matt Molina and Carolynn Carreno (Knopf, $35)

FETT'UNTA

Yield: four servings

4 (1-1⁄2-inch thick) slices from a large loaf of crusty white bread, such as La Brea Bakery's white table bread

Extra-virgin olive oil, for brushing bread

1 garlic clove

3⁄4 cup finishing-quality extra-virgin olive oil, see cook's notes

Maldon sea salt or another flaky sea salt, such as fleur de sel

Cook's notes: Finishing extra-virgin olive oil, as Silverton describes it, is very high quality oil for last-minute drizzling. "The finishing oil we use is an Umbrian oil, Monini DOP," she wrote in the book.

Procedure

Prepare a hot fire in a gas or charcoal grill, or preheat a grill pan, a sandwich press or a heavy-bottomed skillet over high heat.

Brush bread slices liberally on both sides with olive oil. Place the bread on the grill and cook it until crisp and golden brown, about two minutes per side. Remove the bread from the heat and rub the garlic clove over one side of each piece.

Pour 3 tablespoons of finishing oil over the same side of each toast and season oiled sides generously with sea salt. Cut the bread on an angle into halves or thirds and serve.

Source: "The Mozza Cookbook" by Nancy Silverton with Matt Molina and Carolynn Carreno (Knopf, $35)

BUTTERSCOTCH BUDINO WITH CARAMEL SAUCE AND MALDON SEA SALT

Yield: 12 servings

For the budino:

3 cups heavy whipping cream

1-1⁄2 cups whole milk

3 extra-large egg yolks

1 extra-large egg

2⁄3 cup cornstarch

1 cup plus 2 tablespoons dark brown sugar

1-1⁄2 teaspoons kosher salt

1⁄2 cup water

5 tablespoons unsalted butter

2 tablespoons Scotch whiskey

For serving:

3⁄4 cup Caramel Sauce (recipe follows)

Maldon sea salt, or another flaky sea salt, such as fleur de sel

Whipped cream, see cook's notes

Cook's notes: For the whipped cream, Silverton beats 1⁄4 cup plus 1 tablespoon crème fraîche or sour cream with 1 cup very cold heavy whipping cream. She whisks the two ingredients together just until they thicken to soft peaks.

Procedure

Fill a large bowl with ice water and set a smaller bowl inside. Set a fine-mesh strainer in the smaller bowl.

To make the budino, stir cream and milk together in medium bowl. In another medium bowl, whisk egg yolks, egg and cornstarch together. Combine brown sugar, salt and 1⁄2 cup water in a large, heavy-bottomed saucepan over high heat.

Cook the sugar, without stirring, swirling the pan occasionally for even cooking, until the sugar is smoking, nutty smelling and a very dark caramel color, 10 to 12 minutes. (Don't be alarmed: The sugar will become foamy and lava-like with slow-bursting bubbles.)

Reduce heat to low and immediately add the cream-milk mixture in a thin, steady stream, stirring with a whisk as you add it. This stops the cooking process and prevents the sugar from burning. This will cause the sugar to seize, or harden.

Increase the heat to high and cook until the seized sugar has dissolved and the mixture is liquid again, five to seven minutes. Turn off the heat. Ladle out 1 cup of hot cream and sugar mixture and gradually add it to the bowl with the eggs, whisking constantly to prevent the cream mixture from cooking the eggs.

Continue adding the cream to the eggs until you have added half of the cream. Gradually add the contents of the bowl to the saucepan with the remaining caramel, stirring constantly with a whisk, and cook the custard over medium heat until it is thick enough to coat the back of a spoon. Remove the custard from the heat and whisk in the butter and whiskey.

Pour custard through strainer into bowl set in the ice and ladle it into 12 heat-resistant 8-ounce glasses or 7-ounce ramekins, leaving 1 inch space at the top of each budino. Place on a baking sheet and refrigerate for several hours to chill. Remove the baking sheet from the refrigerator, cover each with plastic wrap and return to refrigerator until ready to serve. They can be prepared to this point three days in advance of serving.

To serve, if the caramel sauce has cooled, warm it over medium heat until it returns to a loose sauce-like consistency and is warm but not hot. Remove from refrigerator and spoon 1 tablespoon sauce on each budino. Sprinkle with a pinch of sea salt and top each with a dollop (about 2 tablespoons) of whipped cream.

Source: "The Mozza Cookbook" by Nancy Silverton with Matt Molina and Carolynn Carreno (Knopf, $35)

CARAMEL SAUCE

Yield: about 2 cups, more than needed, but it's difficult to make in smaller portions

1 cup heavy whipping cream

1 whole vanilla bean

4 tablespoons (1/2 stick) unsalted butter

1 cup sugar

1⁄4 cup light corn syrup

1⁄4 cup water

Procedure

Pour cream into a medium saucepan. Using a small, sharp knife, split vanilla bean lengthwise. Use the back of the knife to scrape out the pulp and seeds and add all the scrapings and the pod to the saucepan with the cream. Heat over high heat until it just begins to boil. Remove from heat and add butter, stirring until it melts.

Combine sugar, corn syrup and 1⁄4 cup water in large, heavy-bottomed saucepan over medium-high heat; cook without stirring, swirling pan for even cooking and brushing down the sides of the pan with a pastry brush to remove the sugar crystals until the sugar becomes a medium amber color, about 10 minutes. Remove from heat. Remove vanilla pod from the cream mixture and discard pod.

Gradually add the cream mixture to the caramel, whisking constantly to thoroughly combine, taking care as the mixture will steam and bubble. Serve the caramel sauce immediately, or set aside to cool to room temperature. Transfer to an airtight container and refrigerate for up to one month. Before serving, warm the sauce in a small saucepan over medium-low heat, stirring constantly to melt it.

Source: "The Mozza Cookbook" by Nancy Silverton with Matt Molina and Carolynn Carreno (Knopf, $35)