The Overlooked Cheese That Adds Depth Of Flavor To Pizza

A simple comfort food that allows you to choose your favorite sauce, toppings, and cheese, pizza is a delight for the senses. If you're looking to break out of the standard combination of red sauce and mozzarella, there's a wonderful world of underrated cheeses you should consider for your pizza. Though typically overlooked, the most interesting cheeses worth adding to your pizza are those with bloomy rinds and veining, such as blue cheese.

During the cave-aging process for these types of cheeses, an edible mold forms on the outside, creating a rind that's characterized by intense and pungent flavors. As such, it's important to use any kind of blue-veined cheese minimally and thoughtfully to accentuate the overall flavor of your pizza and avoid eclipsing it. Used sparingly, bloomy rind cheese will add depth to your pizza — but it should by no means make up the entire base.

When adding blue cheese to frozen pizza, timing is everything, and so, too, with a freshly made pie. Crumble this cheese on top of a warm pizza that's just been taken out of the oven, and the rich and full-bodied taste will be present and pleasant in every bite. Using such a unique cheese to finish off your pizza also opens up the possibilities for getting creative with your choice of sauce and other complementary toppings.

There are so many lovely cheeses sporting bloomy rinds and complex flavors that your choices are nearly limitless. For example, if you've grabbed a wedge of Humboldt Fog at the grocery store on impulse and are wondering the best way to enjoy it, why not add it to your next pizza? When working with any new toppings, it's essential to take a small taste first before dressing your pie. But given the intensity of bloomy rind cheeses, you'll want to have a good understanding of how the flavors will play with the other toppings, sauce, and cheese.

Even a small crumble of blue-veined gorgonzola will help to elevate your pizza. Try it atop a basic pepperoni pizza and taste how the saltiness of the cheese co-mingles with that of the earthy and rich rounds of cured pork. You don't have to limit yourself to the basics, though. Try using a garlic cream or pesto sauce as the base of your pie, covering this with a mild mozzarella, and then topping everything off with caramelized onions, roasted beets, and slices of green pears. This will provide a sweet counter to crumbles of a pungent cheese, such as Roquefort, added on top. 

For even more fun with taste and texture, carefully take a brûlée torch to your topping to give the pungent blue cheese the sweet crème brûlée crust it deserves. A little bit goes a long way for an unforgettable pizza.