We’ve all heard of alchemy, the medieval pursuit of transforming base metals into silver and gold. While that sounds all very well and good, what Tommy Tomato is doing week in, week out, with flour, water and yeast is much more impressive than such simple acts of hocus pocus.

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Tommy Tomato – real name Tom Kirton – is a man who, from a young age, recognised in himself a capacity for obsession. Growing up, this manifested in what he calls a hustle mentality: at the age of 15 he was selling apricots on the side of a road, bringing in a couple of hundred bucks a week; later it was importing DJ gear from USA; then, at university, his meticulously kept lecture notes found a market with those who had perhaps been less diligent in their studies.

Fast forward to 2007 and he found himself living in Canada. From Montreal and his first kitchen job, he would take frequent trips across the border to New York City. One fateful day on Coney Island, a couple of performers from the pier show told him he had to go to Totonno’s pizzeria, as apparently that was the best in town. And they were not wrong. It was there, back in 2007 while sitting on the beach and looking across the Lower Bay, that Tommy realised his true obsession: pizza.

In 2008, Tommy and his brother opened NYPD, a trailer with a wood-fired pizza oven that they would pitch each weekend at Wellington’s Harbourside Market. It was during this time that he moved back and forth between his home in New Zealand and the States, working stages at iconic pizza joints Paulie Gee’s and Pulino’s in New York and A16 in San Francisco where he honed his skills. In 2012 he finally moved to bricks and mortar in Wellington, opening iconic joint Tommy Millions on Courtenay Place with supportive partners. It was a hit and it spawned more stores on Willis Street and Featherston Street.

But by 2022 he was done. He was tired and needed a break from it all. He took the decision to step back from pizza, close the shops and regroup.

And regroup he has. He’s back with his dough and delivering the kind of pizza that any city in the world would be proud to call their own. Under the alias of Tommy Tomato he masterminds a secret pizza club that operates out of a shared kitchen space every Friday in the heart of Wellington. No storefront. No signage. Just him. Menus drop on Instagram on Tuesday and often sell out within hours of going live. Free from bricks and mortar and the trappings of a traditional venue, his menu is constantly evolving. His relentless drive and love for the form means that while some pizzas stick around, more often than not there is a new style on the menu – one that he has been researching and wants to try his hand at instead.

For a while it was all about the New-Haven-style pizza: a super-thin base and charred crust. Then it was tavern-style pies, which are rolled out thin and the bases cured over three days. There were the thicker, square Roman-style beasts and even a week of calzone. Every week is an education.

The beauty of his story is just how excited Tommy is to experiment and play in order to grow and evolve. Tommy’s patrons are on the journey with him and they are willing him to push the boundaries. One thing he is clear on is that he is not a great pizza maker, just eternally curious and he claims that he has yet to truly master any of these styles. Perhaps it is this drive for perfection that makes him a true creative. For Tom does not see himself as a chef. No, to him a chef is someone who has toiled and trained for years in dark, hot kitchens with arms decorated with burns. Perhaps a better way to think of Tom is as a craftsman, artisan or even mad scientist. He is continually consuming every single jot of knowledge about the world of contemporary pizza, processing it and then applying it to everything he does. His process is meticulous, knowing that a set of ingredients is only the beginning to understanding pizza. He talks of the variables he is controlling each week, such as the hydration and fat levels, the fermentation time and temperature balance, and then the tangible variables such as the physical manipulation applied to each pie. He knows there is no such thing as a Holy Grail of a recipe: pizza is about constantly responding to the variables.

Tommy is much more than just a guy making pizza: he is an obsessive. It is easy to feel somewhat far away from the rest of the world when living in Aotearoa but, lucky for us, we have Tommy as our lightning rod, connecting us to the vibrant and ever-changing world of pizza and putting us all on the international stage. tommytomato.nz NICK ILES

TOM KIRTON’S PIZZA TIPS

  • Get yourself a digital scale and probe thermometer. These are more important than fancy imported ingredients and expensive ovens.
  • Pizza making is a practice and you won’t be a maestro on day one. Ugly pizza is, more often than not, still delicious!
  • Be flexible: ovens, climates, flours and hands all vary.
  • Work in grams and baker’s percentages for scaling, accuracy and tracking experiments.
  • Aim for finished dough temperatures between 21-25°C. Adjust your water temperature to figure out what works in your kitchen.
  • There is no magic recipe, ingredient or piece of equipment. There is only repetition.
  • It’s OK to use a rolling pin while you’re learning.
  • Make extra dough to practice your peel launching with undressed bases.
  • ‘Mise en place’ is key. Prep your setup before starting.
  • Don’t overthink it. Don’t over-research it. Just start. The best method is the one that (eventually) works for you.