Chapter Text
“Allora, Benito, I will first show you the most important component of the sourdough. It is the starter. A powerful sourdough starter is the heart of a great pizza. As long as the starter lives, we have hope. Kill the starter and fall down to the level of a frozen pizza from the supermarket, capisce?”
“Si, Maestro.”
Benito can hardly believe his eyes when he sees how Luca opens a worn out wooden lid on a glass jar, puts his hand inside and pulls out a small handful of light brown paste. His nose catches the yeasty smell of age-old legacy.
“Is this the Skywalker Starter?” His hazel eyes open wide and shine of wonder. He is still trying to process the fact that this is really happening to him, when Luca presses the starter chunk into his hand. He feels the weight and the dampness of the paste on his fingers and the power of the micro-organisms inside.
“Esattamente, Benito. This is the Skywalker Starter. The most powerful sourdough starter in whole Naples.”
Luca leans his elbow on the table, looking like he is about to start recounting the full history of this starter. Benito has of course heard it before, several times. Everybody knows it in the culinary schools of Naples. But he never gets tired of hearing it, so he lifts his eyes to meet his Maestro’s, ready to absorb every word.
“My grandmother worked on this starter for years. She had a job in a mediocre pizzeria on Via Tattoina, where she was treated practically as a slave. But she never let go of her dream of one day starting her own pizzeria. And she used all her free time developing her own sourdough starter. She put her whole heart into it, kneaded it with her bare hands, spoke to it, encouraged the most powerful microbes to stay and destroy the weak and harmful ones. She even slept with the starter in its jar in her bed. And every few days she baked a pizza with it, examining the development of the taste, until she was sure of its power. Then, in a quiet ceremony that only she witnessed, she named it Skywalker.”
Benito counts the years in his head. His Maestro looks already pretty old, and this starter has been created by his grandmother. Very probably, at least hundred years of history is contained in this humble-looking paste.
“But by that time, my grandmother was already exhausted after the long years of exploitative working conditions. Instead of starting her own pizzeria, she gave the starter to her son, who would later become my father. First, everything seemed to be going great. My father opened a pizzeria that quickly rose into fame. The Skywalker starter gave his sourdough a superior taste and consistency. People queued behind his door every lunch and dinner time. But then, everything changed.”
Benito feels a shudder of excitement pass through his spine, even though he knows very well what happens next. This is just always such a cliff-hanger that gets him every time.
“My mother was pregnant with me and my twin sister, when they heard from the doctor that something was wrong with the structure of her hips and she would most likely not survive childbirth. My father loved her more than anything, so these news broke his heart. He searched everywhere for any cure that could save his beloved. One evening at the opera, he opened his heart to his friend who had an idea. He knew about a rare spice, palpattina root, that could be added to a dough starter. The one who would eat a pizza made with a starter containing palpattina root would be protected from death for the following 24 hours.”
Tears start to creep into Benito’s eyes, because he knows what happens next but almost does not want to hear it.
“The successful pizzeria had made my father rich enough that he could afford mafia’s help to smuggle him a little vial of palpattina root. On the day when they started to see clear signs that we were about to be born, he sent his wife to the hospital and went himself to the kitchen of his pizzeria. His plan was to separate a little bit of the Skywalker starter and only mix the palpattina into that portion, just enough to make one life-saving pizza for his beloved. But since he was terribly nervous, he forgot to close the lid on the main starter jar. When he opened the palpattina vial with shaking hands, its cork came out with a plop and caused the powder inside to fly out as a cloud, a bit of it landing inside the jar. At that moment, he did not care about it, just finished mixing most of the palpattina in the portion he was working on. Then, he quickly baked a pizza with it and rushed to the hospital carrying it. It was difficult for him to get my mother to eat it, because it tasted horrible and she was already having strong and frequent contractions, but he begged her to do it and slice by slice she finished it. But it did not help. It only made her weaker. In the end, it was a miracle that even me and my sister survived. She died just minutes after they got us out.”
“What happened to the Skywalker Starter?” Benito asks, not because of not knowing it but rather to distract himself before he would openly cry.
“It was forever contaminated. The pizzas made with it started to taste horrible. And many customers developed allergic reactions that caused their throats to swell. When one elderly signore died choking, the pizzeria was forced to close. But some of the employees had been wise and prepared. When watching the heartbreak of their chef, they had sensed how desperate he was and were afraid that he might do something reckless that could damage the starter. So already well in advance before our birth, they had taken portions of Skywalker and taken them to other pizzerias – to one on Via Tattoina, next to where my grandmother had worked, and to another one on Via Alderone. There the mighty starter was cultivated under low profile. These pizzerias did not advertise themselves, just waited for a day when the heir of the starter would return to claim it. Only a small group of loyal customers knew that they were making the best pizza of Naples.”
“How did it come to you then?” This part of the story Benito is particularly excited to hear directly from the person who is so involved in the legacy of the legendary starter.
“After my mother was gone and his pizzeria closed, my father gave up everything. With some childcare help from the neighbours, he managed to raise us. But he never baked another pizza and never told us anything about his past. We only ate microwave food at home. Our childhood was void of joy or dreams or anything fun. But one day, when I was already a young man, I met one of my father’s old employees. His name was Benito, just like you, and he was among the ones who organized the hiding of the Skywalker portions. He told me who I was and what legacy our family carried. Benito helped me get into the culinary school, and when I graduated, he came with me to the still small pizzeria on Via Tattoina. He told them who I was and that it was the time when I had come to retrieve the starter that was rightfully mine. And they gave it to me in this very jar.”
He strokes the glass surface of the jar from which he has just given Benito a chunk.
“And from then on I have been growing this place. It started small, but I did not have to advertise a lot before the word about the best pizza of Naples started to go around like thunder. Always remember, Benito, pizza is not a food that humans make. It is the micro-organisms in the starter that give it its soul, that bind everything together, the taste, the softness, the crunch, the warmth, the toppings… And the microbes are strong in Skywalker. As long as Skywalker lives, we are the best pizzeria of Naples. Are you ready to start?”
“Si, Maestro.”