How do you format a blank DVD-R disk for the Apple Super Drive?

The DVD discs you are referring to about continued burning are DVD-RW or DVR+RW. The original Apple Superdrive used

DVD-R only. DVD+R were used in Windows burners or external burners.

it's been many years since I last worked with optical discs but my impression is you don't format blank dvd-r

disks you burn on them

and you can continue to burn on them until you finalize them, in which case one can't burn on them anymore

and many a dvd player require a disc to be finalized before they can play the video footage burned on the disc.

no, DVD-+RW would let me format what I had written making the disc blank once more

writing over several burns and was possible with normal dvd r or at least it was with windows and linux never burned dvds on mac

https://www.cdrom2go.com/how-to-finalize-a-disc

https://www.quora.com/How-do-I-finalize-a-DVD-from-my-computer?share=1

https://diyvideoeditor.com/step-by-step-guide-dealing-with-unfinalized-dvd-discs/

did that with both - and + but as stated not on a Mac would expect any usb burner would work on Mac too though as the interface is generic

If it wasn’t a RW disk, it would finalize after the first burn thereby rendering it non-reusable. The first Apple SuperDrives were very picky about which DVD’s would work. Verbatim was the general consensus winner. There were many discussions back then about which discs would work.

no, DVD-+RW would let me format what I had written making the disc blank once more

You could erase an RW disk completely and then write to it again. Macs did not allow incremental writing to a disk, it wasn't even doable using Roxio Toast.

And, a regular +/- R disk could only be written to once; it was "finalized" automatically - that term was never used for disks that were written to on a Mac except for the RW disks. Those are disks that were created on a Mac; there was a difference in finalization if you recorded disks using a DVR recorder - then you could only play them on other players if they were finalized although you could play them on the device that was used to record them.

A short answer:

you do not (and cannot) format a blank DVD. It will depend on what you are putting on it - the files' format will be the deciding factor. And that is determined by the files and how they are encoded.