Secret to making perfect pizza revealed by scientists after ‘12,000 pie test’

THANKS to science, making the perfect pizza pie is now easier than ever before.

What do you get when you team up a professional chef and an ex-executive? The secret to flawless pizza, apparently.

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Acclaimed chef Francisco Migoya, and Nathan Myhrvold, a former Microsoft exec who holds a Ph.D. in theoretical and mathematical physics, spent three years breaking down the pizza-cooking process.

And after making more than 12,000 pizzas and performing over 500 science experiments, the two think they have nailed it.

“We didn’t eat 12,000 pizzas, but believe me, there was a lot of pizza eaten during that time,” said Migoya in an interview. “There is no such thing as too much pizza.”

The fruits of their labor resulted in a new three-volume book titled “Modernist Pizza”, which goes for $300.

Included in the 1,700-page kitchen manual are both a history of pizza and the key to serving up a perfect pie.

“The most important objective is for people who love pizza to have a deeper understanding of it, to learn ways of making it better, to – I guess you could say – perfecting it,” Migoya said.

He now works as the head chef at Modernist Cuisine, which was founded by Myhrvold initially as a passion project.

Still, what started out as sheer love of pizza quickly developed into something larger as the restaurant now hosts a state-of-the-art research kitchen, visual engineering studios, and a full machine shop.

“Continuous improvement is what brings you things that are just fantastically delicious,” Myhrvold said.

Inside the Modernist Cuisine kitchen, both chefs and scientists research things like pizza dough and tomato sauces to develop new methods of making pizza, per ABC News.

Using a 3D scanner, the experts accurately measure the volume of a pie and assess ingredient interaction.

The research data, some of which was gathered from more than 250 pizzerias around the globe, has also generated over 1,000 pizza recipes.

“We are unapologetic about loving pizza, and part of that says, hey, you can make a very traditional one. But if you want to step out a little bit on the wild side and try some stuff that might seem crazy, you might find you like it,” Myhrvold said.

And while the experts have indeed gotten a little crazy with their toppings, they say that nothing everything works on a pizza.

Specifically, a pizza with bananas, pizza cheese, and tomato sauce, which was served to them in an Argentinean pizzeria.

“It’s as bad as you think it is, maybe worse,” Migoya said.