Sarah Minnick

Sarah Minnick not only makes excellent pizza, but gelato too: Lovely's Fifty Fifty her restaurant in Portland, Oregon, is indeed beloved for both these specialties strongly linked to Italian tradition.

Sarah knows and loves Italy and recently visited the country thanks to Identità Golose so as to meet her “colleague” pizzaiolo Franco Pepe, with whom she shared the stage at Identità Milano 2017.

Yet it is not in Italy that she learnt her job. It actually happened a bit by chance, when around 15 years ago her boyfriend was a chef with whom she opened a restaurant. At the time, she took care of the dining room.

Over the years she grew more and more passionate about this work, so much so she moved to the kitchen (this was also due to the fact the person who was there before moved elsewhere). Here she explored local raw materials and tested her skills making gelato, until a few years ago when she decided to open a place of her own. She studied bread making at length. She then moved to dough for making pizza.

She interpreted both “subjects” with great rigour, researching the best types of flour, working with mother yeast, until she perfectly dominated her dough to made a soft, fragrant, pizza, which she seasons with creativity, great attention to aesthetics and colours, and absolute respect for seasonality. And standing out as the best pizzaiola in Portland.