What is Pizza Cornicione? The crusty, airy outer edge or raised rim of a pizza is referred to as cornicione. The cornicione (pronounced “corny-chone-A”)
A true authentic Neapolitan pizza will have a nice fairly thick cornicione that is crunchy on the outside and soft and chewy on the inside.
A Neapolitan pizza crust should have a thin, floppy base, a number of scorch marks (“leoparding”) and an airy cornicione. It should be chewy, not crunchy, and with a little charring — in taste, the Italian version of umami.
Neapolitan pizzas are hand formed on the work surface, working the dough from the middle out to the thicker rim and never spreading the sauce too far out so the edge can rise, leaving a thicker, airy, crispy well developed cornicione .
The pizza should be baked at around 800 degrees, this creates a really nice thick and puffy cornicione, that is crunchy on the outside, yet soft inside, and you will also get the nice black burn spots, called leopard spotting.
