Sponsored by Orlando Foods.
What goes into the perfect slice of pizza? A delicately balanced sweet and acidic tomato, creamy, rich mozzarella, and a dough base with flavorful yeast create the perfect bite. Quality in these base ingredients is a necessity that pizzeria operators and consumers notice.
According to Chef Domenico “Mimmo” Tolomeo, corporate chef for Orlando Foods and a certified pizzaiolo by the Associazione Pizzaiouli Napoletani—the governing body of pizza makers in Italy—learning how to create the perfect bite isn’t the true test; it’s being able to do it at scale. “When you get into a real service and are doing 450–600 pizzas in a night, you learn how to manage tickets, dough and the oven,” Tolomeo says. For Tolomeo, that same discipline extends to ingredient selection—particularly when it comes to tomatoes and tomato sauces.
“There is no way to process a great flavor if the raw product isn’t good,” Tolomeo says. “Grow it well, harvest it at the right time, process it quickly, and don’t overwork it. The tomato has to come first.” Understanding that principle is one thing, but knowing how to apply it is another. How do operators decide when to use a DOP San Marzano versus a quality whole-peeled plum tomato?
“If the tomato is the star of the dish, a DOP San Marzano makes a lot of sense,” Tolomeo says. “But in a busy pizza operation or doing a longer-cooked sauce with a lot of other flavors, a premium whole-peeled plum tomato gives operators exactly what they need.”
Authentic, DOP-certified San Marzano tomatoes are exclusively grown in the Campania region of Southern Italy and are appreciated for their balanced flavor and structure. However, operators need to be careful, as many products are labeled San Marzano without being authentically grown in Campania. Tolomeo advises chefs to look beyond the label.
“A true San Marzano is more elongated and fragile than a traditional plum tomato, with fewer seeds and thinner skin,” Tolomeo says. “It has a great balance of sweetness and acidity, along with a pulp structure that works beautifully for pizza and sauces. But the name alone doesn’t guarantee quality—chefs still must check the can to make sure that it’s legitimate.”
For Tolomeo, there is one tomato choice he stands behind. “I used Ciao from when I was at Kesté to when I became an operator myself. What I love most about the company is that Ciao is all about preserving the highest-quality tomatoes with consistency.”
Ciao’s DOP-certified San Marzano tomatoes are grown within the protected Campania region and produced according to strict standards for variety, cultivation, processing, and traceability. Their premium whole-peeled plum tomatoes offer the same consistency and flavor for more complex applications.
Ciao tomatoes are sourced and packed in Southern Italy within hours of harvest, preserving the fruit’s flavor, color, and body. Creating the perfect bite is never easy, but leveraging high-quality ingredients like Ciao’s tomatoes allows operators to control one more aspect of the process and serve pizza they are proud of.
Discover the difference of Ciao tomatoes at orlandofoods.com/products.
