Pizza napoletana STG: what the EU rules actually require

A pizza baked in Bangkok can carry the Pizza Napoletana STG mark, and a pizzeria a hundred metres from Via dei Tribunali in Naples (Napoli) can be superb without qualifying for it. That is not a loophole. The European Commission states that a traditional speciality guaranteed "highlights the traditional aspects, such as the way the product is made or its composition, without being linked to a specific geographical area", which is exactly what separates it from a PDO or PGI (Geographical indications and quality schemes explained, European Commission, checked 15 September 2026). The registration is a recipe with a legal wrapper, and knowing what is inside it changes how you read a pizzeria window in Naples.

What the EU actually registered

The EU registered the name in two stages, and the second stage is the one most summaries miss. Commission Regulation (EU) No 97/2010 of 4 February 2010 entered "Pizza Napoletana" in the register of traditional specialities guaranteed, and its recital 9 records that "the protection referred to in Article 13(2) of Regulation (EC) No 509/2006 has not been requested" — in other words, registration went ahead without reservation of the name (Commission Regulation (EU) No 97/2010, EUR-Lex, checked 15 September 2026). For twelve years the specification existed but the words themselves were not locked.

That changed with Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2022/2313 of 25 November 2022, which states that Italy submitted the name under Article 26 of Regulation (EU) No 1151/2012, that no statement of opposition was received, and that "the name 'Pizza Napoletana' (TSG) is hereby entered in the register with reservation of name". The regulation entered into force on the twentieth day following its publication in the Official Journal on 28 November 2022 (Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2022/2313, EUR-Lex, checked 15 September 2026). Since Regulation (EU) 2024/1143 replaced the 2012 framework, registered traditional specialities guaranteed are protected against "any misuse, imitation or evocation, even if the protected name is translated" (Regulation (EU) 2024/1143, Article 68, EUR-Lex, checked 15 September 2026).

The registration was contested, which tells you what the scheme is for. Germany objected that its wheat flour was disadvantaged because only one type of flour, available in Italy, was authorised, and Poland objected that the name was not specific in itself. Italy and Germany settled by lifting the flour restrictions; no agreement was reached with Poland, so the Commission decided the case (Regulation (EU) No 97/2010, recitals 3 to 8).

The dough, minute by minute

The specification does not describe a style; it prescribes a timetable. Its basic raw materials are common wheat flour, brewer's yeast, drinkable natural water, peeled tomatoes and/or small fresh tomatoes, sea or kitchen salt and extra virgin olive oil, with garlic, oregano, fresh basil, Mozzarella di Bufala Campana PDO and Mozzarella TSG as the only other permitted ingredients. The flour must sit between W 220 and W 380 with a P/L ratio of 0.50-0.70 and protein of 11-12.5 g per 100 g.

Shaping is where the rule becomes visible to a customer. Working from the centre outwards with the fingers of both hands, the pizzaiolo drives the air in the dough towards the edge, forming the raised rim — the cornicione — while the centre is pressed to no more than 0.4 cm with a tolerance of ten per cent. The specification is explicit that "no other type of preparation is authorised", naming the rolling pin and the mechanical press-type disc machine in particular, because those flatten the air pockets instead of displacing them and the pizza comes out of the oven without its rim.

One clause almost never gets quoted and has real consequences. The preparation "exclusively comprises the phases of work described below, to be carried out in a continuous cycle on the same commercial premises", and a pizza not eaten where it was made cannot be frozen, deep frozen or vacuum packed for later sale.

Why the oven decides everything

The oven is the only piece of equipment the specification refuses to compromise on. Pizza Napoletana TSG "is baked exclusively in wood-fired ovens with a baking temperature of 485 °C, which is essential for producing the 'Pizza Napoletana' TSG", with the dome at roughly 430 °C and a baking time of 60 to 90 seconds. Inside that window the dough itself only reaches 60-65 °C, the tomatoes 75-80 °C and the mozzarella 65-70 °C.

Those numbers explain the texture you are served. Ninety seconds is not long enough to dry the base, so the finished pizza is "tender, elastic and easily foldable into four" and the tomatoes lose only their excess water; the char spots on the rim come from the dome heat, not from long baking. It also explains why the pizza arrives wet in the middle and why nobody in Naples treats that as a fault.

The specification describes the oven as a physical object, not a category: a base of tuff bricks, a circular cooking floor of four refractory areas, and a refractory dome to stop heat dispersing. The pizzaiolo slides the pizza in with a flick of the peel held at 20-25 degrees, turns it about 180 degrees, then returns it to the same spot, because that patch has cooled as the pizza absorbed its heat and fresh floor would burn the base. A gas or electric deck oven can produce a very good pizza, and many Naples pizzerias use one, but it cannot produce a certified Pizza Napoletana TSG.

Only three garnishes are covered

The specification permits exactly three garnishes, and everything else on a Naples menu sits outside it. The table compares the three, with the quantities the text prescribes.

All three finish the same way: 4-5 g of extra virgin olive oil, with a tolerance of plus 20 per cent, dispensed from the centre outwards in a spiral. On a Naples menu the first row is what you will see called marinara and the other two are the two versions of margherita, one with buffalo mozzarella and one with fior di latte. The specification's historical section dates the Marinara to 1734 and the Margherita to 1796-1810, and records that the latter was presented to the Queen of Italy on her visit to Naples in 1889.

What UNESCO listed instead

UNESCO did not list pizza; it listed the craft of the Neapolitan pizzaiuolo. The element was inscribed in 2017, at the twelfth session of the intergovernmental committee, on the Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity, and UNESCO describes it as "a culinary practice comprising four different phases relating to the preparation of the dough and its baking in a wood-fired oven, involving a rotatory movement by the baker" (Art of Neapolitan 'Pizzaiuolo', UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage, checked 15 September 2026).

The same entry states that the element originates in Naples, "where about 3,000 Pizzaiuoli now live and perform", and describes transmission through the bottega, where apprentices watch masters work, alongside annual courses run by the association of Neapolitan pizzaiuoli and specialised academies in the city. Nothing in the inscription sets a recipe, a temperature or a diameter, and nothing in it certifies an individual restaurant. A window sticker reading "UNESCO" on a pizzeria in Naples is a reference to the craft's listing, not a licence granted to that address.

Three rulebooks, one name

Three different sets of rules circulate under the word "napoletana", and they disagree with each other on purpose. The table sets out what each one actually does.

The AVPN disciplinare is the one most visitors actually meet, because its plaque hangs in pizzeria doorways worldwide. Associazione Verace Pizza Napoletana dates it to 1984, when Antonio Pace and Lello Surace gathered leading pizzaioli to codify rules previously passed on orally, and its current text sets 40-60 g of salt and 1.6-1.8 kg of type 00 or 0 flour per litre of water, dough balls of 200-280 g giving a pizza of 22-35 cm, and total fermentation of 8 to 24 hours (Il disciplinare dell'Associazione Verace Pizza Napoletana, AVPN, checked 15 September 2026). Those figures are deliberately not the EU ones: thinner centre, longer maturation, a wider weight band.

Both documents can be right at once, because they are different instruments. The EU specification is a registered legal text enforced through control bodies, and the version published in 2016 names Certiquality, DNV Det Norske Veritas Italia and ISMECERT of Naples as the bodies verifying compliance. The AVPN text is a private association standard; AVPN's own certifications page describes its role in supporting the STG mark and the 2017 UNESCO candidacy, and separately lists its ISO certifications and its accreditation by the Campania Region for training (Certificazioni, AVPN, checked 15 September 2026).

Choosing a pizzeria in Naples

Certification is not the variable that will decide your dinner, and treating it as one will send you to the wrong places. Pizza Napoletana is one of only four Italian traditional specialities guaranteed listed by the Italian agriculture ministry, alongside Amatriciana tradizionale, Mozzarella Tradizionale and Vincisgrassi alla maceratese (Elenco e disciplinari STG prodotti agricoli, Masaf, checked 15 September 2026). Holding the certification is voluntary, it costs money and paperwork, and a great many long-established Naples pizzerias have never bothered.

If you do want the marked product, look for the registered logo rather than the word alone: a white oval plate carrying "PIZZA NAPOLETANA STG" in a red rounded rectangle, with "Traditional Speciality Guaranteed" and "Produced in the Neapolitan tradition" translated into the language of the country of production. Since December 2022 the name itself is reserved.

The honest ordering advice is narrower than it looks. Order a marinara if you want to taste what the dough and the oven do, because there is no cheese to hide behind; order a margherita with fior di latte rather than buffalo mozzarella if you dislike a wet centre, since the specification permits both. Eat it immediately, fold it, and do not expect a knife to be the intended tool.

What this guide does not settle

This guide explains the registered specification and the two other rule sets that share the word, and stops there. We found no official published list or count of pizzerias currently certified to the Pizza Napoletana TSG specification on the EU or Italian ministry pages we read, so we make no claim about how many exist in Naples. If a particular pizzeria's certification matters to you, ask which body certifies it and check with that body.

Three further things are outside scope. This guide names no restaurants and ranks none, because the specification does not. It does not cover pizza fritta, pizza a portafoglio or pizza al taglio, which are different products with no claim under this registration. And it does not cover price, which is set by each business and regulated by none of the three documents described here.

Carry the distinction with you instead of a shortlist. The EU mark answers "was this made by the registered method"; the UNESCO listing answers "is this craft recognised as heritage"; neither answers "is this pizzeria good tonight". In Naples the ovens give you more to go on than the stickers do.