A former fine-dining chef is bringing his precision to New York-style pizza.
Daniel Holzman, owner of Danny Boy’s Famous Original Pizza, opened his pizzeria because he loves to be hands-on in the kitchen.
"Every bit of it is fun, I don’t know. It’s fun," he said.
Holzman grew up in New York City delivering pizza as his first job and, of course, eating lots of it. After he advanced into the kitchens of some iconic restaurants and got his culinary degree, high-end dining was his path for many years.
Holzman began to miss connecting with customers, so he opened a more casual concept called The Meatball Shop. It started as one location and soon turned into a mini-franchise. The Meatball Shop is still open today, though Holzman took a step back.
“I wanted to get back into a job where I was hands-on, where I knew everybody on the team by name and where I was working for a living. I like making food. I enjoy talking to guests, and I don’t love sitting in an office,” he said.
After he moved to California and took a break from cooking, Holzman's next venture just had to be pizza. His pizza is all about science. The dough made from flour, yeast, water, salt and olive oil sits for four days in a cold temperature.
“Yeast reacts to warmth, so if you start with cold water, you can ferment the dough for longer and get more flavor.”
Holzman’s sauce actually isn't seasoned until after it is spread onto the dough. He said that's an inside secret and “for certain pizzas, we can change the amount of seasoning.”
To keep every pizza consistent, they even weigh all the ingredients. Holzman noted that his fine dining background helped shape this precision even in pizza.
“I want to make it as perfect as I possibly can every single time. I prefer a scientific approach,” he said.
Holzman explained that the crust should blow up and have bubbles because it’s “the way that the actual gluten forms and traps the yeast and creates a crispy crunch to alliterate.”
Any New York pizzeria has to have garlic knots, but usually they're afterthoughts — not at Danny Boy’s.
“We wanted to push the limits of garlic knots. We are like the space exploration of garlic knots,” Holzman joked.
Holzman's humor is infectious, even when asked about the secret to the garlic recipe.
“Come and work here because I am short staffed. You can find out for yourself,” he said with a laugh.
Holzman couldn’t open a restaurant without having his signature meatballs — this time on a hero. It all starts with a soft roll, and slices of provolone are placed on top to prevent the bread from getting soggy. Next, the meatballs are ripped up to soak up the sauce — another secret.
“We put ricotta, bread crumbs, parsley and herbs. We pack our meatball full of other stuff, and that’s what makes it light and fluffy,” he said.
Holzman added that just because the food is casual or inexpensive, that doesn’t mean you can’t put the same time and care into it as you do to fine dining.
"That’s like kind of the whole point. You can put the same passion into a slice of pizza as you would a filet mignon and you get extraordinary results," he said.
Taste the extraordinary results at Danny Boy’s located in the Halo dining hall at 330 S. Hope St. in Los Angeles.