YOU DO NOT use a knife and fork, you pick it up and roll it. Use both hands. Fold it over like this, then straight into the mouth. If you cut it, it loses something.
So ends the lesson in pizza-eating etiquette, delivered by Pino Piano, a man who should know. Born and raised in Naples (the birthplace of pizza, where a 19th-century royal chef created the classic pizza Margherita for the reigning monarch), Piano is the man behind Gaia, the stylish Italian restaurant at 181 Queen's Road, Central, which he opened about 18 months ago. His crispy-crust pizzas, Roman-style, are a speciality of the house. They are light and delicate and carry heavenly toppings.
It might take two or three minutes to cook the pizzas in Gaia's imported Italian oven, but there is nothing fast about the food. The art of the pizzaiolo (pizza-maker) has been handed down from father to son over generations. On top of that, Piano sends to Italy for his ingredients, where he believes the ingredients are of better quality.
Even more unusual for a restaurant in Central is that you can eat outdoors, European-style (while happily avoiding the traffic fumes), in Gaia's al fresco piazza at Grand Millennium Plaza.
When we visited on a Tuesday at lunchtime, the restaurant was already full. Piano came over to show us the 'right' way to eat rughetta with prosciutto (fresh arugula and thin-sliced Parma prosciutto, HK$148), and melanzane (eggplant, black olives, tomato and mozzarella, HK$128).
These exquisite treats are a meal in their own right, or they can be savoured and shared as appetisers.