I was looking for the type(s) of cheese to use on a homemade NY style pizza and came across this treatise on pizza-making:

http://www.varasanos.com/PizzaRecipe.htm

Wow. Not impressed by anything there...

Some of the best pizzas I've had used ordinary tortillas as the crust. For me, it's the spices and toppings that make the pizza.

The crust is just a vehicle, although it can be driven down the wrong roads. :)

In my experience, making a great pizza in a conventional oven is pretty challenging. The ovens pizza restaurants use commonly heat up to a 50% hotter temperature than conventional ovens. To help address that, I once took an old Fiesta propane BBQ grill, removed the sheet metal "flame tamer" and replaced it with a correct size lava rock grate and covered the grate with a layer of Grill Greats ceramic tiles: http://www.grillparts.com/fiesta/allparts.asp?product_id=196... The grill then was capable of heating up to around 750 degrees F - The heat broke a 550 degree thermometer that came with the grill. I obtained the 750+ degree temperature reading with an inexpensive high temp candy thermometer. I let the grill cool down, added a decent 1/2" thick pizza stone and brought the heat back up. A pizza cooks in about 3 minutes at the right temperature, about the same temp and time as a commercial pizza oven. Note: It's important to let the ceramic pizza stone heat up with the oven/grill to avoid its breaking.

it is commonly suggested to use as high a temperature as possible when making pizza, sometimes the traditional wood-fired brick ovens of pizzerias, reaching 600 F or more, are mentioned. But how, exactly, does temperature affect the pizza, and why are higher temps better? E.g., why is 3 minutes at 600F different than, say, 15 minutes at 500F... http://chowhound.chow.com/topics/849806

I think that the reason that the restaurant owner had a problem with baking a pizza in a conventional oven in the clip was that he didn't use a pizza stone. A 1/2" thick pizza stone tends to hold heat well, much better than the air inside an oven.

Oops, it looks like he did use a pizza stone... but he had problems with heating the oven/stone to the right temp, and holding it.

http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php

http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php

Already visited that one (before finding the one I posted). Here is what I found on the cheese issue (iow no definitive answer--though 'scott r' probably comes closest in the last message):

http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php?topic=18419.0

I know it's not just mozzarella....

Some of the best pizzas I've had used ordinary tortillas as the crust. For me, it's the spices and toppings that make the pizza.

The crust is just a vehicle, although it can be driven down the wrong roads. :)

I like margherita and cheese pizzas, so for me the crust is a major component of a "good" pizza. Different strokes and all...

I like margherita and cheese pizzas, so for me the crust is a major component of a "good" pizza.

When using a tortilla for the crust, that would just be an elevated version of a cheese quesadilla or tostada. :)