Old Forge-style pizza is a regional favorite from a small town in Northeastern Pennsylvania (NEPA) that loves its pizza.

Coming to us from Jim Mirabelli, the owner and chief pizza officer of the NEPA Pizza Review (a guide to all things Northeastern Pennsylvania-style pizza) this sauce is no wallflower.

Because the sauce is so simple, ingredient quality matters.

While this sauce is great for recreating Old Forge-style Cheese Pizza at home, it’s also delicious on lots of other types of pizzas.

This recipe appears in A Love Letter to Northeastern Pennsylvania-style Pizza by Jim Mirabelli and Old Forge-style Cheese Pizza.

Northeastern Pennsylvania (NEPA) has its own thriving pizza scene.

When creating our go-to NEPA-style dough recipe, we turned to Jim Mirabelli, the owner and chief pizza officer at NEPA Pizza Review, a guide to all things Northeastern Pennsylvania-style pizza.

Jim’s recipe calls for General Mills Full Strength Flour, a bread flour (12.6% protein content) that comes in 50-pound bags, typically used in professional settings and pizzerias that make this regional style, but you can use King Arthur Bread Flour (12.7%), Ceresota (12%) or another bread flour with a comparable protein content (11 to 13%) for similar results.

This recipe appears in A Love Letter to Northeastern Pennsylvania-style Pizza by Jim Mirabelli.

Old Forge Pizza is a unique regional style that’s largely served only in the coal mining region of Northeastern Pennsylvania (NEPA).

Old Forge, the town where this pizza gets its name, has one of the highest number of pizzerias per capita in the world.

Enter Jim Mirabelli, owner and chief pizza officer of the NEPA Pizza Review, a guide to all things Northeastern Pennsylvania-style pizza.

“The process involves what I call a ‘layered bake,’ which means assembling the pizza in stages and baking after each ingredient layer is added,” Jim says, noting this helps to “attain a crispy bottom on this medium-thickness pan pizza.”

The melty, stringy cheese blend is a signature of Old Forge pizza.

Don’t have access to white American cheese at all?

In that situation, havarti is a good match (it's typically mild and creamy).

While Old Forge pizzas come in two major varieties, “Red” and “White,” this recipe specifically covers the “Red” variety.

If you’re interested in making the white pizzas noted above, finely chop, season and sauté the broccoli or spinach, reserve, and top the pizzas prebake.

If you really feel like going native, try sautéed shrimp and peppers (Old Forge-ians go with everything from sweet to hot to dried), a delightfully idiosyncratic NEPA topping combination applied pre-bake over the cheese.

Whatever you choose, this recipe’s a delicious “cut” from one of the most pizza-loving parts of the US.

This recipe appears in A Love Letter to Northeastern Pennsylvania-style Pizza by Jim Mirabelli.

Specially made to serve as the base for Pan-fried Sicilian Pizza, a Northeastern Pennsylvania (NEPA) regional specialty, this dough recipe makes enough for two large pizzas — or ”trays” in the local vernacular.

Formulated by Jim Mirabelli, the owner and chief pizza officer at NEPA Pizza Review, this dough mimics the many pan-fried Sicilians he’s had in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, the birthplace of this particular pizza style.

Jim’s recipe calls for General Mills Full Strength Flour, a bread flour (12.6% protein content) that comes in 50-pound bags, typically used in professional settings and pizzerias that make this regional style, but you can use King Arthur Bread Flour (12.7%), Ceresota (12%) or another bread flour with a comparable protein content (11 to 13%) for similar results.

This recipe appears in A Love Letter to Northeastern Pennsylvania-style Pizza by Jim Mirabelli and Pan-fried Sicilian Pizza 

Pan-fried Sicilian pizza is a Wyoming, Pennsylvania invention that combines the crunch of pizza fritta with the chew of a classic New York City Sicilian.

This pizza sauce was created by Jim Mirabelli, the owner and chief pizza officer at NEPA Pizza Review, a guide to all things Northeastern Pennsylvania-style pizza, to mimic his favorite peanut oil pan-fried pies.

Because it’s so simple, quality matters.

This sauce was designed with a particular pizza style in mind, but it works well whenever you’re looking for a fresh sauce option.

This recipe appears in A Love Letter to Northeastern Pennsylvania-style Pizza by Jim Mirabelli.

This crispy pan-fried Sicilian pizza from Luzerne County, Pennsylvania is a regional recipe that involves cooking pizza dough in a layer of peanut oil to create a generously crunchy crust with a pillowy interior.

Originally invented by Victory Pig Pizza and BBQ in Wyoming (the Luzerne County town, not the state), this pizza’s beloved in its particular corner of Northeastern Pennsylvania (NEPA).

We asked Jim to share his recipe for re-creating this pizza at home.

This recipe appears in A Love Letter to Northeastern Pennsylvania-style Pizza by Jim Mirabelli.