Il Canale

Il Canale at 1065 31st Street NW is a certified Neapolitan pizzeria holding the VPN Americas certification from the Associazione Verace Pizza Napoletana, the Neapolitan association founded in 1984 to establish and protect the standards of authentic Neapolitan pizza. The VPN certification is among the most rigorous in the pizza world: it requires specific flour, the 24-hour minimum dough fermentation, the San Marzano or Campanian tomatoes, the mozzarella from fresh milk, the wood-fired dome oven reaching at least 800 degrees Fahrenheit, and the 60-90 second cook time that the temperature produces.

The 24-hour fermentation that the VPN standard requires is the step that most distinguishes a certified Neapolitan dough from the quick-rise doughs that most American pizza uses. The extended fermentation allows the natural yeasts in the dough to develop complex organic acids and flavor compounds that the short-fermented dough does not have time to produce. The result is a dough that has the tangy, complex flavor that slow fermentation produces, and that extends more evenly under the baker’s hand without tearing because the gluten has had time to relax.

The 31st Street address at 1065 places Il Canale on the Georgetown canal-area block that has become one of the more concentrated dining addresses in the neighborhood. The restaurant’s name, which means “the canal” in Italian, references the C and O Canal that runs alongside this section of Georgetown and gives the restaurant a geographic connection to its address.

The menu at Il Canale covers the Neapolitan pizza tradition from the Margherita, which the VPN organization considers the canonical Neapolitan pizza, through the Marinara and the white-sauce variations. Reservations are recommended, particularly on weekends.

Hours run from dinner Tuesday and from lunch Wednesday through Sunday. The VPN Americas certification that Il Canale holds is the North American chapter of the Associazione Verace Pizza Napoletana, which certifies restaurants in the Americas that meet the Neapolitan standards. There are fewer than one hundred VPN Americas-certified restaurants in the United States, which makes the Il Canale certification a meaningful distinction in a pizza market that uses the Neapolitan label freely without always meeting the technical standards that the certification requires. The 31st Street Georgetown address at 1065, on the block with Bar a Vin, Chez Billy Sud, and Flavio, gives Il Canale a position in one of Georgetown’s more concentrated dining corridors. Reservations are recommended; full menu available at ilcanale.com. The 31st Street Georgetown block where Il Canale operates at 1065 is shared with some of the neighborhood’s most praised dining addresses: Bar a Vin, Chez Billy Sud, and Flavio are all on or adjacent to the same block. The Neapolitan pizza restaurant occupies the Italian slot in a block that otherwise focuses on French and contemporary Italian dining, providing the specific VPN-certified Neapolitan preparation that the other restaurants in the cluster do not serve. The canal towpath is accessible from the 31st Street block, which makes Il Canale a natural dinner address for the Georgetown resident who walks from the waterfront. Hours run dinner Tuesday through Sunday and lunch Wednesday through Sunday.