Famed New York Pizzeria Roberta’s Is Coming To Sydney

Where the bloody hell are you?, goes our country’s now infamous tourism ad. In the American pizza-pie scene, Philadelphia’s Pizza Beddia was first to answer the call, setting up at Bondi Beach Public Bar for a week in July.

Next, it’s Roberta’s from Brooklyn making a one-day-only appearance at Surry Hills’ Firedoor. It’s in the country thanks to support from Tourism Australia, the government agency responsible for the Lara Bingle ad campaign.

Armed with his “mother” dough starter, head chef and owner Carlo Mirarchi will be pulling Roberta’s trademark Neapolitan-style pizzas from the restaurant’s two woodfire ovens. Firedoor’s Lennox Hastie will work the remainder of the electric power-free kitchen, dishing out a yet-to-be-released menu of sides and mains, on Sunday December 9.

Roberta’s pizzas have been described by respected food magazine Bon Appétit as “clever/delicious”. It’s a place where highbrow ingredients meet lowbrow names (sound familiar?), where loyalists order the “Famous Original” with tomato, mozzarella, caciocavallo (a stretched-curd Italian cheese, similar to provolone), and those in the know make a beeline for the off-menu Bee Sting pizza with spicy soppressata and honey.

Hastie describes Roberta’s pizzas as “that pizza perfect balance” of puffy, chewy, and charred textures and flavours.

“Roberta’s is [serving] up probably the best pizza in New York … [and] this will be the first time that Roberta’s has come to Australia and the last collaboration in our Fireside series [Firedoor’s collaborative dinners with guest chefs] for this year. We’re planning on throwing quite the pizza party,” he told Broadsheet.

In some events billed as “collaborative” dinners, it’s not uncommon for featured chefs to simply present alternating dishes. Not so for Mirarchi and Hastie. They’ll be side-by-side experimenting with pizza-dough recipes using a combination of Australian and Italian flours and Mirarchi’s dough starter.

Gelato Messina – which will be creating a tricolour Neopolitan dessert for the event – has donated its Rosebery kitchen for the dough experiments to take place.

Fire & Slice featuring Roberta’s is on Sunday December 9 from 1pm, until the pizza dough runs out. Firedoor is at 23–33 Mary Street, Surry Hills. Walk-ins only.

firedoor.com.au