#1 – Pizza School

By Oran Rankin, July 15, 2025

In 2005 I was hired to open a bakery and pizzeria in Grand Rapids, Michigan called the Nantucket Baking Company. It was attached to a high-end gourmet deli and wine store. I had known the owner for many years, and I knew that this represented a huge opportunity for me professionally. At the time I was the head bread baker for a fancy bakery in a newly gentrifying neighborhood just a mile or so away. It was a pretty good job but the pay was terrible. I had asked for a raise and was told that I would be getting another 25 cents per hour…. by the end of the year! When I told them about my new opportunity I was suddenly offered another $6.00 per hour and vacation time. Somehow, that made it even easier to leave.

I was already good at making bread, by then, but pizza was new for me. Situated in the historic Heritage Hill area of Grand Rapids, Nantucket Bakery was in a lovely location; away from other commercial sites but seeming right at home among the many beautiful houses and apartments in the area. Martha’s Vineyard, occupying most of the 1905 built structure, had become one of the best delicatessen and specialty grocery stores in the entire state. The owner demanded excellence, expected high volume, and trusted me to make it happen.

I was not privy to the budget, and was allowed to buy pretty much whatever I needed for the bakery. Space was very limited, but a highly performing oven good for both bread and pizza was essential. I chose a five deck German made Miwe Ideal oven. Gorgeously built with deep but narrow stone decks it was perfect for the new bakery. It would also take at least three months for this custom oven to ship from Germany; not to mention the rest of the build-out and licensing, etc. So I had a lot of time to learn all about pizza.

And where is a great place to learn? The library! I knew what I was after. Growing up in San Fransisco I remember the times when we got to eat-out at great little pizza restaurants. They were the kind of places with deep booths, those bumpy glass candles flickering, and of course cigarette smoke. But the pizza was so good. The sauce was spicy and rich, the crust thin but not super-thin. There just seemed to be some alchemy in how the elements came together to create those long cherished  memories of what great pizza could be.

So I learned all about pizza by reading books at the library, trying to find clues into what creates the perfect pizza. I did indeed find those clues. My sauce us a blend of twelve essential ingredients added to two types of tomato sauce. The pizza dough is the same formula that has been used in at least one international pizza competition. Essential tips and techniques are complements of Big Dave Ostrander; a New York pizza guru. The resulting pizza helped propel the success of the Nantucket Baking Co. to the powerhouse that it is today and can now be sampled at our very own Button Bakery in Evanston, IL.