9 wild and amazing pizzas of southern Italy

When do dough, tomato sauce, and mozzarella stop being mere ingredients and become pizza?

It’s a philosophical question that has divided chefs and diners for decades. For some, only pies in the Neapolitan and Roman styles are acceptable – Sicilian, at a stretch. Others extend the goalposts as far as Chicago deep dish.

But pizzas have been eaten in southern Italy for hundreds of years, and the rainbow of variations that can be found there – if you know where to look – rivals the rest of the world’s best efforts. Its proximity to North Africa means that flatbreads have been popular for centuries. Forget calzones – I’m talking about pizzas and pittas created specifically for breakfast, or marvels the size of entire tables, or baked spirals of crust begging to be torn into satisfying, savoury chunks.

It’s not easy to discover these secret pizzas in the towns and villages; the economically troubled region doesn’t yet enjoy the number of tourists you find elsewhere in Italy. If you don’t speak Italian, you’re likely to struggle. When I go, I bring a guide: chef Francesco Mazzei, arguably the world’s leading ambassador for the cuisine of his native Calabria. His London restaurants include Fiume, Radici, and Sartoria, and he’s the author of Mezzogiorn o (Preface Publishing, 2015), a celebration of southern Italian cooking. Even better, on this occasion he’s suggested bringing along Pierre Koffmann,ok the three-Michelin-starred French chef whose protégés include Marco Pierre White and Gordon Ramsay.

We pile into Mazzei’s Maserati for a road trip that starts in Calabria, winds through Basilicata, and ends in Puglia – the three southernmost provinces on Italy’s mainland. Our quest? To find the wondrous pizzas of his home culture, some of which have never been seen outside the region. We cover 402km (250 miles) over four days, sampling perhaps 20 versions. I’ll ultimately gain five pounds. Koffmann will tell me later that it took him months to get the weight off. “The pizzas were so good, I kept on eating,” he says. “We think we know all about pizza, but I’m still surprised by the variety.”

Calabria

Our journey starts in the rugged and parched province that provides the toe of the Italian boot. It’s a wild region of mountains and remote villages that bear little resemblance to the sophisticated cities and resorts most visitors know. Mazzei grew up here and learned to make gelato in his uncle’s shop. His family owns a tiny cottage on a hillside, with views across sun-scorched land to the Mediterranean. “Mezzogiorno means noon, half-day, or lunchtime,” Mazzei says. “But for me, it just means home.”

When we visit, a forest fire is raging so fiercely, the billowing smoke brings traffic to a standstill on the highway. We join other travellers standing outside cars, watching the flames in awe.