Increasingly, from hot Calabrian

Increasingly, from hot Calabrian ’nduja sausage and honey (“sweet and spicy is an amazing combination. A lot of New York pizzerias use Mike’s Hot Honey, a chilli-infused condiment,” says Yung) to pear and blue cheese pudding pizzas, all bets are off. Or on. Depending how you look at it.

This does not mean pizza perfectionists are throwing ingredients on willy-nilly. There is still broad agreement that three or four toppings is optimal. These should be thinly sliced, in part to ensure they cook thoroughly. Delicate items should be layered under cheese or oiled for protection (undressed kale will easily turn to blackened ash); those you want to crisp up should be placed on top.

To ensure a good balance and interaction of flavours, even distribution of ingredients is essential. “I’m anal about this,” says Graham Faragher from Bertha’s Pizza, Bristol. “If each slice doesn’t have a bit of everything, we’re missing the mark.”

Pre-cooking ingredients, particularly those that have a lot of water (peppers, mushrooms, spinach etc) is increasingly common, both to intensify flavours and ensure the base doesn’t become too wet. New Yorkers talk of “good grease”, says Heyes. But again, you want grease spots, not quagmires. Do not add olive oil if using fatty cured meats. “Think about the amount of sauce and how, when they pool and cool, some cheeses do not have a pleasant texture,” says Yung.

Should you even be cooking cured meats? “An underexplored avenue is adding ingredients after the oven,” says Gleave. “Hard cheeses are more noticeable. Herbs have different qualities.” Adding items post-cook also helps facilitate good texture variation, rather than toppings becoming a poorly differentiated mush. Roast lamb on a pizza, says Richards, needs “those delicious gnarly bits”.

Increasingly, there are no verboten toppings. It is all about how you treat that ingredient. For instance, Richards is developing a Korean-influenced chicken pizza. Crucially, the fried chicken is added just before serving to retain its glassy crunch. “We don’t go crazy-crazy, but I think, go for it,” she urges. “I am not a pizza snob.”