Pizza off – pizza making at Serafina

To celebrate Serafina’s First anniversary recently, Food Bloggers Association of India (FBAI) www.facebook.com/foodbloggersindia and Serafina invited some of us food bloggers to Serafina, the Italian Restaurant at Palladium  for a Pizza making contest.

We started off getting an introduction to Serafina’s approach to Italian cuisine. Rustic with a focus on authentic flavour. Most of the ingredients therefore are imported from Italy. We actually tasted the San Marzano tomatoes used to make the pizza sauce. Not only did they look different they tasted different…. Adding the authentic Italian taste to the pizzas.

Before the opening of Serafina, four chefs were sent to New York  for intensive training over several months. So much so that each of the chefs is an expert in pizza making – to the extent that picking up the ready mixed dough to taking the ready pizza out of the Wood stove, it takes all of 3 minutes!

With this introduction, and the glowing reports I had heard of the Serafina pizzas, I was sure that I would be in for a treat.

We actually made pizzas, one each, from scratch. Starting with  kneading the dough under the chef’s watchful eyes and helpful guidance. Then we went 2 at a time to the pizza making station near the Wood Stove to “roll” the dough and use a variety of toppings (from  24-30 delicious ones including 4-5 varieties of cheese) to create a winning pizza. In foodie paradise.

There were some delicious ones made by @pushpz, @kneadwithlove, @divi1401, @riotofflavours, @amritarana…..among others.

By the time i got around to making a pizza, I was pizza’ed out tasting the 18 pizzas created before me. So I made a very simple one – lots of pizza sauce, whole black olives, finely chopped basli, only a  bit of cheese and seasoning. Suitable for my son who is allergic to milk products- I used cheese sparingly…

And guess what – I won! To my great surprise.

Thanks to FBAI and Serafina for an awesome evening and really great pizza. I recommend their pizzas – thin crust and a huge choice of toppings including personalising them with arugula, pesto sauce, gorgonzola cheese…..apart from the usual. I am definitely heading there to satisfy my pizza cravings.

I also met the bacon jam girl (@Amritarana) you can order the jam and other savoury sauces like salted caramel (YUM YUM). Check out https://www.facebook.com/LifeKiRecipe

A review of Serafina will follow soon, they fed us some delicious appetisers and a great hazelnut caramel for me to know I have to head there with the family soon.