In their cookbook, The Joy of Pizza, chef Dan Richer and Rome-based food journalist Katie Parla share favorite recipes from the menu at Richer’s acclaimed Jersey City restaurant, Razza Pizza Artigianale. This one, the Di Natale, stems from a flavor combination they fell in love with while in Naples.

During a pizza tour of Campania — the region of southern Italy that includes Naples —Dan and Katie stopped at E’Curti in Sant’Anastasia, a beautiful town located inside Vesuvius National Park. We can’t imagine a better place to eat or source the ingredients that top this pizza. (The volcanic soil in Campania is part of what makes the produce grown there so special, and the resulting food so delicious.)

E’Curti serves up “trash can” — This sounds better in Italian, we swear! — a traditional Neapolitan pasta dish made from the scraps a Neapolitan family would have left over after preparing a Christmas (Natale, in Italian) meal: tomato sauce, olives, pine nuts, raisins, garlic, and chilies. At the trattoria, Dan and Katie first tasted this combination tossed with spaghetti, but they liked it so much, it got them thinking about pizza. Back in the States, Dan created the Di Natale pizza and put it on the menu at Razza, where it quickly became a hit.

Covered in raisins, small black olives, pine nuts, tomato sauce and mozzarella, this pizza is an excellent holiday treat, but it also tastes good year-round. In keeping with Dan’s larger philosophy around fresh, local and high quality ingredients, he advises using “the best raisins you can find.” When it comes to the olives, it’s more important to use whatever is fresh and good quality, rather than use a specific kind. That said, brine-cured Calletier olives, often called Niçoise, are a great place to start.

Excerpted from THE JOY OF PIZZA by Dan Richer with Katie Parla. Copyright © 2021 by Dan Richer. Photographs by Eric Wolfinger. Illustrations by Katie Shelly. Used with permission of Voracious, an imprint of Little, Brown and Company. New York, NY. All rights reserved.