Pizza Marinara is the classic Neapolitan pizza. There’s no cheese, so it’s all about the tomatoes, simply topped with garlic and oregano. Enjoy your lunch !
Alex and I spent hours traveling to Naples, Italy, the birthplace of pizza. And our pilgrimage ended in one place: Da Michaele, the famous generations-old pizzeria. The green-and-white stoneware wood-fired oven, the tangy tomato sauce, and the pasty crust: it’s all there Exactly authentic. They only serve two flavors, the most classic of all Neapolitan pizzas: Pizza Margherita (mozzarella, tomato and basil) and Pizza Marinara (just tomato – no cheese!). And my, oh my, it was epos. Want to make the classic marinara pizza at home? Here’s our recipe: and we think it’s perfect as hell.
Related: Looking for a marinara sauce for a pizza? Go to Easy Pizza Sauce.
What is marinara pizza?
Marinara pizza is the simplest of the classic Neapolitan pizzas: that is, a Naples, Italy-style pizza. This pizza has a plain topping, a thin center crust, and a puffed outside, typically baked in a wood-fired oven at a very high temperature. The marinara pizza has no cheese: just tomato sauce, minced garlic, and oregano. It’s similar to Pizza Margherita but without the cheese. Some sources indicate that marinara pizza originated in Naples as early as the mid-18th century.
As you can imagine, the taste of pizza marinara with just a handful of ingredients depends on the quality of the ingredients. Here’s a little more on how to make marinara pizza that’s serious. classic.
Cravings for Neapolitan pizza with Cheese? Here is our main recipe for the perfect Neapolitan pizza.
For the tomatoes
The quality of the tomatoes in a marinara pizza is paramount. In Italy, the variety of tomato used for Neapolitan pizza is called the San Marzano tomato. San Marzano tomatoes are grown throughout Italy and have a wonderfully sweet flavor. They are becoming increasingly popular here in the United States and are available under many different brand names.
Well, we’re pizza purists here. We used to only use canned San Marzano tomatoes for our pizzas. However, we have found a variety that tastes even more like what we know from Naples: fire-roasted tomatoes! Do you know that sometimes when you taste a bite of tomatoes straight from the can and it tastes bitter? Fire roasted tomatoes come out of the box with a sweet taste: and not bitter at all. Canned roasted tomatoes are available at many major grocery stores and also online.
This marinara pizza uses our “famous” easy pizza sauce, which can be made in a blender in just 5 minutes. All you need are fire roasted tomatoes, garlic, olive oil, dried oregano and salt. It’s so simple we memorized it. And you absolutely will surprised if you try the blender. We promise!
For the dough
Alex and I spent 10 years researching our pizza dough recipes. They went through many revisions until we found the absolutely perfect paste. You can use one of two pizza dough recipes for your marinara pizza (and you can of course shorten it by using store-bought dough):
- Best pizza dough It’s our standard pizza dough that’s perfect. We make it with a stand mixer, but you can also knead it by hand.
- light thin crust is similar but makes a thinner dough to roll out – it would work just as well here!
For the pizza stone
To make the most authentic marinara pizza, you need a pizza stone for baking. Why? Well, classic Neapolitan pizza ovens get up to 1000 degrees Fahrenheit and bake pizzas in a minute or two. Your standard oven can only reach a maximum of 500 degrees (unless you want a pizza oven… see below!). Thus, the pizza stone helps get heat under the pizza itself; it makes it crispy on the bottom but soft on the inside.
Well, if you use a pizza stone…you also need a pizza peel! Read on for our recommendations:
What about a pizza oven?
A pizza oven is not necessary to make homemade marinara pizza. But if you want to up your pizza game, traditional artisanal pizza is baked at much hotter temperatures than your standard oven can reach. We found a relatively inexpensive pizza oven that heats up to 1000 degrees Fahrenheit in just 10 minutes! This is the oven we use, the Ooni pizza doorand why we think it’s the best pizza oven on the market.
Ready to make marinara pizza?
Well, that’s all you need to know to make a classic Neapolitan Marinara Pizza! Garnish the base with the pizza sauce, a pinch of chopped garlic and fresh oregano. We like to serve ours with a drizzle of olive oil to get just the right amount of moisture when serving. Let us know if you try it in the comments below!
The description
Pizza Marinara is the classic Neapolitan pizza. There’s no cheese, so it’s all about the tomatoes, simply topped with garlic and oregano. Enjoy your lunch !
- Prepare pizza dough: Follow the Best Pizza Dough recipe to prepare the dough. (It takes about 15 minutes and 45 minutes to rest.)
- Place a pizza stone in the oven and preheat to 500°F. OR preheat your pizza oven (this is the pizza oven we use).
- Prepare pizza sauce: Prepare the easy pizza sauce.
- Preparation of the toppings: Finely chop the garlic clove. Chop the oregano leaves.
- Bake pizza: When the oven is done, dust a pizza peel with corn or semolina flour. (If you don’t have a pizza peel, you can use a rimmed baking sheet or the back of a rimmed baking sheet. But a pizza peel is worth the investment!) Roll out the dough in a circle; For instructions, see How to stretch pizza dough. Then carefully place the dough on the pizza peel.
- Spread the pizza sauce thinly over the dough with the back of a spoon. Garnish with thinly sliced garlic.
- Use the pizza peel to carefully transfer the pizza onto the preheated pizza stone. Bake the pizza until the cheese and crust are golden brown, about 5 to 7 minutes in the oven (or 1 minute in a pizza oven).
- Take out of the oven. Garnish with a drizzle of olive oil, a few pinches of kosher salt, and fresh oragno. Cut into pieces and serve immediately.
- Category: main course
- Method: Cooked
- Kitchen: Italian
Keywords: Pizza marinara, pizza without cheese, pizza without cheese
Looking for more pizza recipes?
Aside from this truffle pizza recipe, here are some of our favorite pizza recipes:
