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This weeks-old Bed-Stuy spot gives the lie to the idea that making great pizza requires a lifetime of practice and a Neapolitan ancestry. Not that those things hurt. But judging by the Saraghina model, all that may be required, it seems, is commitment, passion, and a friend with a good dough recipe. Saraghina’s owners, Edoardo Mantelli and Massimiliano Nanni, have all that. “I’ve been obsessed with pizza all my life,” says Mantelli, the pizzaiolo of the pair, who also co-owns the clothing brand Tocca. After years of stubbornly refusing to follow his bliss, he finally apprenticed himself to his pizza hero, Michele Iuliano of Luzzo’s, and, while it’s too soon to say that the student has surpassed the master, he’s already come pretty close. It’s certainly helped that Iuliano was willing to give up his top-secret flour-mixture formula and adapt it to Saraghina’s wood-burning oven. Now, Mantelli’s pies are more classically Neapolitan in style than Luzzo’s, with a puffier cornicione, good hole structure, and a moist crumb. The tomato sauce is sweet and vibrant, the buffalo mozzarella is first-rate, and the joy that the city’s newest pie guys take in their fledgling profession is palpable. — Rob Patronite and Robin Raisfeld

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