PIZZA
Facts About Toppings
Around the world, toppings vary greatly to reflect regional preferences. In Japan, for instance, eel and squid are favorites. In Pakistan, curry is a big seller and Australians enjoy shrimp and pineapple on their pies as well as barbecue toppings. Costa Ricans favor coconut.
According to Domino's, some of the more popular international toppings also include pickled ginger, minced mutton and tofu in India and squid with green peas in Brazil. In Russia, they serve pizza covered with mockba, which is a combination of sardines, tuna, mackerel, salmon and onions. In France, a popular combo is called the Flambée, with bacon, onion and fresh cream. In the Netherlands, the "Double Dutch" is a favorite, with double cheese, double onions, double beef.
Pizza lovers in the UK are experimenting with gourmet toppings by ordering oysters, bacon and eggs and mashed potatoes, game meats like venison or duck or Canadian-style bacon as well as eggplant, artichoke hearts and even dandelions.
Women are twice as likely as men to order vegetable toppings on their pizza.
Pizza History
Basic pizza most likely began in prehistoric times, with bread cooked on flat, hot stones.
Roughly 1,000 years ago herb-and-spice-covered circles of baked dough grew exceptionally popular in Naples, Italy. Known as focaccia, these rounds were served as an appetizer or a snack.
Pizza developed in Italy in pre-refrigerator times. After focaccia, its most direct ancestor was "Casa de nanza," which means "take out before." Housewives would pound out dough into a thin crust and place leftovers on to bake. Pizza was a peasant food designed to be eaten without utensils and, like the French crepe and the Mexican taco, was a way to make use of fresh produce available locally and to get rid of leftovers.
But pizza as we know it could not have evolved until the late 1600s when Old World Europeans overcame their fear of a New World discovery - tomatoes. Native to Peru and Ecuador, a plant which produced yellow or red fruit (later called tomatoes) was introduced to Europe in the early 1500s. Brought back by Conquistadors to Spain, the tomato was thought to be poisonous and was viewed with suspicion. It wasn't until the late 1600s that Europeans began to eat the tomato.
The peasants of Naples, Italy, who lived mostly off of bread and little else, were the first to add tomatoes to their focaccia bread rounds.
In 1830 pizza truly began with the opening of the world's first pizzeria. Named Port'Alba, the pizzas were cooked in an oven lined with lava from Mount Vesuvius, a volcano located on the Bay of Naples.
Modern pizza was born in 1889 when Queen Margherita Teresa Giovanni, the consort of Umberto I, king of Italy, visited Naples. Don Raffaele Esposito, who owned a tavern-like place called Pietro Il Pizzaiolo, was asked to prepare a special dish in honor of the Queen's visit. Esposito developed a pizza featuring tomatoes, mozzarella cheese (a never before used ingredient made from the milk of water buffalo) and basil - ingredients bearing the colors red, white and green for the Italian flag. He named it the Margherita Pizza, after the guest of honor. Thus, the modern-day tomato-and-cheese pizza was born..
The popularity of pizza exploded throughout the country when World War II servicemen returning from Italy began opening pizzerias and raving about that "great Italian dish.".
About Today's Pizza
Three of the top 10 weeks of pizza consumption occur in January.
Over the past five years, pizza has outpaced the growth rate of all other food service items.
Americans eat approximately 100 acres of pizza each day, or 350 slices per second.
Pizza Hut is the largest pizza purveyor in the world, with 12,583 total restaurants.
Pizza has played a major role in television and in the movies, with appearances in such films as Splendor in the Grass, The French Connection, Mystic Pizza, Do the Right Thing, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Multiplicity, Lover Boy, Nightmare on Elm Street, The Caddy (featuring Dean Martin's song "That's Amore"), Homeward Bound II: Lost in San Francisco, Spaceballs, Toy Story, Delivery Boys, Free Willy III and I Love You to Death.
Around the world, toppings vary greatly to reflect regional preferences. In Japan, for instance, eel and squid are favorites. In Pakistan, curry is a big seller and Australians enjoy shrimp and pineapple on their pies as well as barbecue toppings. Costa Ricans favor coconut.
According to Domino's, some of the more popular international toppings also include pickled ginger, minced mutton and tofu in India and squid with green peas in Brazil. In Russia, they serve pizza covered with mockba, which is a combination of sardines, tuna, mackerel, salmon and onions. In France, a popular combo is called the Flambée, with bacon, onion and fresh cream. In the Netherlands, the "Double Dutch" is a favorite, with double cheese, double onions, double beef.
Pizza lovers in the UK are experimenting with gourmet toppings by ordering oysters, bacon and eggs and mashed potatoes, game meats like venison or duck or Canadian-style bacon as well as eggplant, artichoke hearts and even dandelions.
Women are twice as likely as men to order vegetable toppings on their pizza.
Pizza History
Basic pizza most likely began in prehistoric times, with bread cooked on flat, hot stones.
Roughly 1,000 years ago herb-and-spice-covered circles of baked dough grew exceptionally popular in Naples, Italy. Known as focaccia, these rounds were served as an appetizer or a snack.
Pizza developed in Italy in pre-refrigerator times. After focaccia, its most direct ancestor was "Casa de nanza," which means "take out before." Housewives would pound out dough into a thin crust and place leftovers on to bake. Pizza was a peasant food designed to be eaten without utensils and, like the French crepe and the Mexican taco, was a way to make use of fresh produce available locally and to get rid of leftovers.
But pizza as we know it could not have evolved until the late 1600s when Old World Europeans overcame their fear of a New World discovery - tomatoes. Native to Peru and Ecuador, a plant which produced yellow or red fruit (later called tomatoes) was introduced to Europe in the early 1500s. Brought back by Conquistadors to Spain, the tomato was thought to be poisonous and was viewed with suspicion. It wasn't until the late 1600s that Europeans began to eat the tomato.
The peasants of Naples, Italy, who lived mostly off of bread and little else, were the first to add tomatoes to their focaccia bread rounds.
In 1830 pizza truly began with the opening of the world's first pizzeria. Named Port'Alba, the pizzas were cooked in an oven lined with lava from Mount Vesuvius, a volcano located on the Bay of Naples.
Modern pizza was born in 1889 when Queen Margherita Teresa Giovanni, the consort of Umberto I, king of Italy, visited Naples. Don Raffaele Esposito, who owned a tavern-like place called Pietro Il Pizzaiolo, was asked to prepare a special dish in honor of the Queen's visit. Esposito developed a pizza featuring tomatoes, mozzarella cheese (a never before used ingredient made from the milk of water buffalo) and basil - ingredients bearing the colors red, white and green for the Italian flag. He named it the Margherita Pizza, after the guest of honor. Thus, the modern-day tomato-and-cheese pizza was born..
The popularity of pizza exploded throughout the country when World War II servicemen returning from Italy began opening pizzerias and raving about that "great Italian dish.".
About Today's Pizza
Three of the top 10 weeks of pizza consumption occur in January.
Over the past five years, pizza has outpaced the growth rate of all other food service items.
Americans eat approximately 100 acres of pizza each day, or 350 slices per second.
Pizza Hut is the largest pizza purveyor in the world, with 12,583 total restaurants.
Pizza has played a major role in television and in the movies, with appearances in such films as Splendor in the Grass, The French Connection, Mystic Pizza, Do the Right Thing, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Multiplicity, Lover Boy, Nightmare on Elm Street, The Caddy (featuring Dean Martin's song "That's Amore"), Homeward Bound II: Lost in San Francisco, Spaceballs, Toy Story, Delivery Boys, Free Willy III and I Love You to Death.
posted by Brindle | 9:45 PM
3 Comments:
It has to be siad, an Italian pizza is hard to beat.
It has to be siad, an Italian pizza is hard to beat.
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