I was on a street-playing tour through Scandinavia and Helsinki was my final stop before heading back to Prague. Hesse is a friend who hosted me there, and another co-hunter Johanna joined us from Turku, where she hosted me through Couchsurfing. A great company guaranteed, hungry we were: they could serve us defrosted Tesco value product and I'd be happy :-)
Skiffer is a small place, with tables tightly packed one next to each other, which is a typical atmosphere promising a good pizza hunt. The decoration does not point much to pizzas, but was definitely very fitting and underlined the location in Helsinki, presence of sea and its thousands of lakes, which perhaps subconsciously led me to choose a pizza called Lakes of Finland. Johanna went for some vegetarian pizza and Hessinho chose Formaggio. We then waited about 20 minutes, not the shortest time ever, but manageable, considering the place had only one pizzaiolo working behind the counter. Now I guess you have imagined a tanned mid-age Italian with a curled moustache and a hat. Haha! Nothing can be further from truth! Our pizzas in Skiffer were actually made by a young pretty Finnish lady with long red hair. I went to have a look at her, I mean at her pizza making process (:-P), but soon felt like I was disturbing and rather let her cope with the busy work. But from the little I found out, the pizzas are made in deck ovens on about 350 degrees. That sounds like a typical american pizza with crispy and firm dough!
Beeep! Wrong again. The pizzas arrived, and the difference was clear. In Skiffer, the dough is crispy and firm, but it is also very thin. It is therefore quite dry and the bubbles et the edges often break upon a bite. I find it fun and enjoyed it all the same, but some people leave those dry pieces of crust at the plate, which is a shame.
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| Lakes of Finland. Did you know there's almost 200 000 lakes in the country? |
But that's not the only thing that differs Skiffer pizzas from the mainstream. The pies came in unsliced and for a good reason - the ingredients were put mostly in the middle, forming a little hill that, I must say, looked great and tasted even better. My "Lakes of Finland" had not only the promised smoked roach, poached egg, fish eggs (roe) and fennel, but also carrots, cucumber, onion, scallion and linseeds. All of these combined to a very enjoyable taste and it was the only shame there was not more of it - although the pizzas were large in area, they were very thin, and I felt like I could eat more. But then - I normally do :)
Hesse and Johanna were satisfied as well, saying it was among the best pizzas they'd ever had. And it was not a coincidence - Skiffer pizzas are really good and the restaurant shows at the top positions when googling for best pizza in Helsinki for a reason. Too bad, however, that they cost as if we really were in Helsinki (I know, we really were there). I paid 17 euros for mine, and I wouldn't stop by every day for a meal. But as a pizza hunt with my Finish friends - totally worth it! Thanks, and I'll come back to check out with you the other one we talked about. And if it's not good, we'll have pickquant sausages, baguettes and a chilli sauce!
;-)
Dough - 7/10
Ingredients - 10/10
Sauce - 7/10
Atmosphere - 8/10
Service - 8/10
