Montanara — fried pizza
Before pizza was baked it was fried, and the montanara is the proof: a small disk of the same Neapolitan dough, deep-fried until it puffs into a golden, blistered cushion, then crowned with tomato, basil and a flurry of cheese. Naples sells them off carts; you can fry a stack at home.
Tell the page how many you're frying and it weighs the dough for the batch — the calculator's math, pointed at the fryer instead of the oven. Get the oil properly hot, top them the second they drain, and eat standing up.
How much dough
For 6 montanare, on Neapolitan dough — 90 g of dough a montanara:
| Ingredient | Baker's % | For 6 montanare |
|---|---|---|
| Flour | 100% | 327 g |
| Water | 62% | 203 g |
| Salt | 2.8% | 9.2 g |
| Yeast | 0.23% | 0.7 g |
Making more or fewer? The dough scales straight off the count:
| Montanare | Total dough | Flour |
|---|---|---|
| 3 | 270 g | 164 g |
| 6 | 540 g | 327 g |
| 9 | 810 g | 491 g |
| 12 | 1080 g | 654 g |
The yeast is weighed for an example 8 h rise at 21 °C — set your real schedule in the calculator and it reweighs the pinch.
What else you’ll need
Beyond the dough — for 6 montanare:
- about 1 L neutral oil, for deep-frying (sunflower or peanut)
- 200 g tomato sauce (passata or crushed San Marzano), warmed
- 100 g fior di latte, torn and well drained
- 30 g Parmigiano Reggiano, grated
- a handful of fresh basil
How it’s done
- Make the dough: 6 × 90 g pieces of Neapolitan dough — 327 g flour, 203 g water, 9.2 g salt and the yeast, weighed by the calculator for your schedule. (Leftover pizza dough works too.)
- Divide the dough into 90 g pieces and gently stretch or press each into a small disk about 12 cm across, keeping the rim a touch thicker so it puffs.
- Heat 4–5 cm of neutral oil to 180 °C / 355 °F in a deep, heavy pan.
- Fry the disks one or two at a time, about 45–60 seconds a side, turning once, until puffed, deep golden and crisp. Lift out and drain on paper.
- While each is still hot, spoon over a little warm tomato sauce, add a few pieces of torn fior di latte, a basil leaf or two, and a shower of grated Parmigiano.
- Eat immediately — the contrast of crisp fried dough against cool fresh sauce is the whole point, and it fades the moment it sits.
Questions from the counter
What is a montanara?
A Neapolitan fried pizza — a small disk of ordinary pizza dough deep-fried until it puffs, then dressed with tomato, basil and cheese. It predates the baked pizza and is still sold as street food and as a starter (the antipasto fritto) across Naples.
Won't fried dough be greasy?
Not if the oil is hot enough. At 180 °C the surface sets and puffs almost instantly, sealing the dough before it can drink the oil; cool oil is what makes fried food greasy. Use a thermometer, fry in small batches so the temperature doesn't crash, and drain on paper.
Can I bake them instead?
Then it isn't a montanara — the fry is the entire identity of the dish. If you'd rather bake, you've essentially got a small pizza, and the classic recipes here are the better guide for that. For the real thing, heat the oil.
Which oil should I use?
A neutral oil with a high smoke point — sunflower, peanut or other vegetable oil — not extra-virgin olive oil, which smokes too low and tastes wrong here. Strain and reuse it once or twice for frying if you like.
Get the dough
The Neapolitan preset weighs the batch and writes the schedule — mix, rise, shape, bake. Montanara is what you do with it.
The clock is a suggestion. The dough is the boss. In bocca al lupo!