How to Make Rubirosa's Tie Dye Pizza

Plus: The Secret for Making an Extra-Crisp Crust

Dec 08, 2023

Friends, hello!

After years of admiring the Rubirosa tie dye pizza from afar, I finally tasted it in real life last Sunday evening with one of my oldest friends, and it exceeded expectations — the whole meal did, in fact: I loved the crispness of the pizza, which allowed the sauce to shine; I loved the salad: a wedge dressed with Italian chopped salad fixins; and I loved the whole vibe, bustling and cozy with tables close together surrounded by groups of friends, families with young children, and couples on date nights. It was a blast.

In today’s video, we are making the Rubirosa tie dye pizza in a home oven:

Keys for Success

To make a pizza with an especially crisp crust in a home oven, the keys for success are threefold:

Use the right dough and roll it thinly.
Use a hot oven and cooking surface.
Parbake the dough.

The Dough:

For this style of pizza, you want to use a thin-crust dough. I unfortunately cannot share my Pizza Night thin-crust dough recipe, but in the recipe below I share some thoughts should you wish to use a homemade dough or a store-bought one. You’ll want to roll the dough as thinly as possible. See the video for guidance.

Hot Oven and Surface:

When using a home oven, it is important to preheat it sufficiently (ideally 1 hour) and to use a Baking Steel or pizza stone. I am partial to the Baking Steel, which conducts heat better than stone, and which truly is the simplest, best investment you could make to improve your at-home pizza game. I recommend the Original, which I’ve had for years, or the Pro, which I just bought, and which I love but which is very, very heavy.

Parbake:

I almost never parbake my thin-crust pizza doughs because I don’t mind a thin crust that is also pliable. But when I am looking to create an especially crisp crust, a parbake makes all the difference. Here we parbake the dough for just 60-90 seconds: the dough will be bubbly but still very pale.

The Recipe

As noted in the video, I used the Rubirosa sauces, which I just discovered this week and which are really tasty. Of course, use your favorite jarred sauce or make the sauce yourself. This is my go-to cooked tomato sauce recipe, which can be easily made into a vodka sauce.

Additionally, you’ll need whole milk, low-moisture mozzarella (I love Calabro), finely grated Pecorino Romano, and basil pesto. I unintentionally bought vegan pesto, but it was delicious and worked beautifully on the pizza.

Rubirosa Tie Dye Pizza

Makes one 13-inch pizza

Here’s a printable version of the recipe.

Notes:

Dough:

Homemade: I unfortunately cannot give away my thin-crust dough recipe because it is in the yet-to-be-released Pizza Night. If you do not have a go-to thin-crust dough recipe, you can adapt this dough recipe to be a thin-crust dough recipe by doing something like this: use 355 grams (2¾ cups) of water and add 28 grams (2 tablespoons) of extra-virgin olive oil. (Use the same amount of flour, salt, and yeast.) Because the dough will be lower hydration, you will need to knead it gently in the bowl or add a set of stretches and folds 30 minutes after you mix the dough.

Store-bought: I find store-bought dough to be a little harder to roll out. It helps to let it sit at room temperature for many hours before using. Also, give it time to rest while you are rolling it out — roll it out; let it rest for 5 minutes; repeat.

Sauce:

I used the Rubirosa brand tomato and vodka sauces here, but if you want to use homemade, this is my go-to recipe, which can be easily made into a vodka sauce.

Cheese and Pesto:

I love Calabro Mozzarella.
Finely grated Pecorino Romano or parmesan — you want the pre-grated stuff here.
Pesto (I accidentally bought vegan pesto (Gotham Greens brand), and it was great.)

Equipment:

Baking Steel (Original or Pro) or pizza stone
Pizza peel
Parchment paper
Rolling pin
Squeeze bottle

Ingredients

245 grams (roughly 8 ounces) thin-crust dough ball, see notes
Flour for dusting
Semolina flour, for the peel, optional
3 to 4 tablespoons tomato sauce, see notes
3 to 4 tablespoons vodka sauce, see notes
4 ounces low-moisture whole milk mozzarella (I love the Calabro brand), pulled into pieces
1 to 2 tablespoons finely grated Pecorino Romano
Basil pesto (my recipe, Rubirosa’s recipe), store-bought is fine

If you are using refrigerated dough, allow it to proof at room temperature in a covered vessel for 2 to 3 hours (longer is fine, too, especially in these colder months). If you are using room-temperature dough (as in dough that has risen once and has been portioned and balled up), you likely won’t need quite as long of a proof — aim for at least 1 hour.
Place a Baking Steel or pizza stone in the top third of your oven and preheat it to 550ºF convection or as hot as it will go. Once the oven gets up to temperature, allow it to preheat for roughly 1 hour if time permits.
Lightly flour a work surface. Place the dough ball on the surface, pat it gently, then pinch the edges to depress the air. Roll out the dough into a 13- to 14-inch circle, using flour as needed and flipping the dough every few strokes.
Line a pizza peel with parchment paper. Dust with semolina flour, if using. Transfer the dough to the prepared peel.
Shimmy the dough, parchment paper and all, onto the Baking Steel or stone, and cook for 60 to 90 seconds — the dough will be pale but bubbly. Remove the dough, parchment paper and all, using your peel.
Top the dough with the sauce: make a few rings of tomato sauce; fill the spaces with the vodka sauce — there’s no right way to do this, just try to evenly distribute both sauces. See video for guidance.
Scatter the mozzarella over the top, followed by the Pecorino.
Shimmy the pizza back into the oven for 3 to 4 minutes or until the edges are browned to your liking.
Remove the pizza and transfer to a serving board. Place the pesto in a squeeze bottle, then finish the pizza by making a pesto spiral over the dough.
Cut and serve.

Questions? Any topic you’d like covered? Let me know. See you next Friday 🍕🍕