In June of 1889, Queen Margherita of Italy visited the southern reaches of her realm. After arriving in Naples, she requested to eat a food enjoyed by her country’s commoners. When summoned, pizzaiolo Raffaele Esposito prepared his queen three different pies, one topped with tomato, cheese and basil, mirroring the colors of the Italian flag. She loved that pizza so much that a royal representative sent a letter to Pizzeria Brandi that hangs on its wall to this day. Esposito named the pie Margherita in the queen’s honor, and, more importantly, the modern pizza was born.
Or was it?
That origin story has persisted through pizza’s expansion beyond Italy’s borders and rise in popularity around the globe during the late 20th century. “The hamburger is the quintessential American fast food, but pizza is the quintessential global fast food,” says Carol Helstosky, an associate professor of history at the University of Denver and author of Pizza: A Global History. “There’s a version of pizza just about everywhere.”
But with pizza’s ubiquity comes half-truths, fables and hard-nosed opinions. From its history (were pizza-hungry GI’s responsible for its America popularity post-WWII?), to how make it (San Marzano tomatoes?), to the proper way to eat it (knife and fork allowed?), there are countless stories and customs surrounding pizza. Any of which can get people heated.
“With other types of food, people are willing to break with their conceptions and preconceived ideas and be really into challenging them,” says Steve Samson, chef-owner of Rossoblu and Sotto, home of one of L.A.’s best pizzas. “But with pizza, everyone has their own idea of what it should be like.”
With ample misinformation out there, we wanted to separate truth from tall tale about the world’s favorite flatbread. Here, we called upon Helstosky, Samson, pizza scholar Scott Wiener, and The Sporkful’s Dan Pashman to debunk eight prevailing pizza myths.
Myth: Italians invented pizza.
Image via Getty/Pacific Press
While the flatbread-sauce-cheese version of pizza most likely originated in Naples, Italy can’t quite take credit for inventing pizza. “The broadest definition of pizza is a yeasted flatbread with ingredients baked into it. That had its origins with the Greeks,” Helstosky says. “There’s archaeological evidence of bread ovens and pictorial and visual evidence of what appears to flatbreads with spots on them. The ancient Greeks’ bread, called plakuntos, became a meal in and of itself.” Because Naples was founded as a Greek port city, the pizza that developed there may be part of the lineage of Greek flatbreads, but pizza had a history preceding its rise to popularity in Italy.
Myth: You need San Marzano tomatoes to make a great sauce.
Image via Flickr
“People treat San Marzano tomatoes like it’s some name brand, but that wording on the cans means nothing,” Wiener says. “San Marzano is the name of a seed. You can grow it well or grow it poorly. Now, in the European Union, San Marzano is a protected mark that has to be grown in a predicted region. If you grow your tomato in that region, you can get DOP certification. Where people in America get confused is think they all San Marzanos are those special Italian kind. When you go out shopping for a San Marzano, there’s a good chance that’s a tomato from China that’s packaged in Italy. I tell people to go buy three cans of tomatoes and taste them side-by-side to see which you like the best, whether it says San Marzano or not. For me, Trader Joe’s canned plum tomato is usually the best one.”
Myth: Servicemen returning from WWII spread pizza’s popularity in the U.S.A.
Image via Getty/Bettmann
“It’s our assumption that pizza had its origins in Italy and hopped over to America sometime in the 20th century. Around 1945 is when pizza went global,” Helstosky says. “But there’s a belief that pizza became popular in the United States post WWII because troops came home from war and wanted it. But I wasn’t about to find that in my research.” Helstosky says some basic facts about the war contradict the returning-GI theory of pizza’s spread. “The invasion of Italy was a limited number of U.S. troops. There were more soldiers in England, France, and Western Europe. And at the time, pizza was still a regional dish confined mostly to Southern Italy and Naples, so not many would have seen it. Also, when troops would have arrived near the end of the war, Naples was destitute. Neapolitans had become so desperate, they actually emptied out the city’s aquarium and ate all the fish in it. So I doubt soldiers would have said after being there ‘I had this great food in Naples.’”
Myth: You should never eat pizza with a knife and fork.
Image via Getty/AFP
When New York City mayor Bill DeBlasio was spotted eating his pie with a knife and fork, he was pilloried. But Pashman takes umbrage with the umbrage. “A politician eats the pizza with a fork and knife and then comedians mock the politician,” Pashman says. “If politicians got it all over their face or dripped sauce on their shirt, the comedians would make fun of them worse. I can’t blame a politician for being careful around a slice.” But it’s not just elected officials who need not refrain from cutlery. “I interviewed Patsy Grimaldi, the 80-year-old who is the last pizzamaker in America to train under someone who trained under Lombardi, our closest link to America’s original pizzeria,” Pashman says,“And he told me he will use a knife and fork when the slice is too hot to pick up. So by all means, be like Patsy and eat pizza with a knife in fork.” Wiener largely concurs. “When you’re mayor of New York, you shouldn’t eat it with a fork and knife,” he says. “But the whole point of pizza is that it’s casual and the moment you put rules to pizza you violate what it is and that’s just lame.”
Myth: Mozzarella di Bufala is required for a great pie.
Image via Getty/Marka
Pizza purists may argue that fresh mozzarella made with the milk of a water buffalo is the superior cheese for your pie, but even a self-described traditionalist like Samson agrees that the best cheese to use depends on the style of pizza you’re making. “The part-skim mozzarella, those individually wrapped logs of cheese like you see in Brooklyn—that’s the cheese to use in a true New York-style pizza,” Samson says. “Mozzarella di Bufala has more water in it and so it would make a soupier pie. So you want to make a big New York pizza with drier cheese.”
Myth: Fresh dough is better.
Image via Getty/Carlos Osorio
“It comes up on my tours all the time, and people are surprised that pizza places we visit don’t use dough made that day,” Wiener says. “If I give them the option of having dough made that day and dough that’s a day or two old, they pick the one made today. It may seem obvious to some people to want the older dough, but people think fresher is better. Why you want that older dough is that the process of proofing is more than just the physical rising. You can let dough sit out all day and it will rise, but if you drop the temperature, and let the dough rise slowly, it allows time for fermentation, which really develops flavor.”
Myth: You can order pepperoni pizza in Italy.
Image via Arthur Bovino
You can order pepperoni pizza—you just won’t get anything with meat on it. “There is no such thing as a pepperoni sausage in Italy. It doesn’t exist there,” Samson says. “If you were to order it in Italy, you’d get peperoni, which literally means bell peppers. Pepperoni is an American thing. It’s a mix and beef and pork that’s smoked and they don’t do that in Italy. You could salame piccante in Italy, which is a spicy pork sausage. That’s the closest you’d get to pepperoni. But really, they don’t do much smoked meat in Italy; it’s usually cured, fermented, and aged.”
Myth: Queen Margherita ate and approved of the pizza that bears her name.
Image via Getty/Bettmann
Back to that famed origin story we mentioned in the opening. That oft-repeated tale is dubious for many reasons. “Do I think that happened? Probably not,” Helstosky says. “Back then, people were disgusted by pizza. And it’s not like Italians thought after 1889 that pizza was great. It remained a regional dish for decades. Italy doesn’t have a long history of cookbooks, but when I studied ones from the 1920s and ‘30s, there was hardly any mention of pizza. It was not considered an important or classic Italian dish even then.”
One could argue that just because pizza didn’t immediately spread after 1889 that Margherita still may have eaten and liked the pizza. That myth is built upon the very official-looking letter from the queen’s representative that hangs in Pizzeria Brandi. With some deep historical digging, Zachary Nowak has cracked that foundation. Through studying the seal on the letter and comparing the handwriting to other documents written by the letter’s supposed author, Nowak concludes the letter is a forgery. Also, fully six years before the supposed meeting with the queen, Esposito was already petitioning the police to let him call his restaurant “Pizzeria della Regina d’Italia” or “Pizzeria of the Queen of Italy.” Getting people to think royalty ate his food seemed to be a long-term hustle by Esposito, and it looks like his persistence allowed him to eventually pull one over on the world.
Looking for the ultimate party comfort food? Then this recipe for Tomato Soup Shooters is just the thing you need to try! Whether you make it for a light dinner or a party appetizer, it’s sure to please. Try serving it alongside a grilled cheese for the ultimate combo!
Tomato soup is a classic go-to but it’s even better when you make it yourself, because it’s just so easy! With simple ingredients and pantry staples, you can whip up this old-fashioned tomato soup recipe in no time. Best of all, the ingredients for this recipe are easy to keep on hand, such as onions, canned tomatoes, vegetable broth, and dried herbs, making it a go-to recipe to whip up any night of the week.
This tomato soup is rich in the hearty flavors of tomatoes, which are packed with fiber, vitamin C, and lycopene—an antioxidant compound with cancer-fighting properties, as well as heart-health activity. The lycopene content found in canned tomatoes allows this ingredient to be one of the most useful, healthy additions to just about any meal. Since canned tomatoes have even MORE nutritional value than fresh tomatoes, they provide a powerful impact on human health. So, what are you waiting for? Get your soup on this week and try these Tomato Soup Shooters out!
Tomato Soup Shooters with Mini Grilled Cheese
Prep Time5 minutes
Cook Time35 minutes
Total Time40 minutes
Ingredients
1 Tbsp. olive oil
½ large yellow onion, chopped
2 garlic cloves, minced
8 basil leaves, chopped
24 oz. tomato sauce
½ cup vegetable stock
1 tsp. kosher salt
¼ tsp. black pepper
10 slices white bread
4 Tbsp. unsalted butter, melted
8 oz. sharp white cheddar cheese
Instructions
In a large sauce-pot, heat the olive oil over medium heat. Add in the onion and garlic and sauté until the onion turns translucent.
Then mix in the chopped basil leaves, tomato sauce, vegetable stock, salt, and pepper. Bring the mixture to a boil then lower the heat so that it is simmering, Simmer for 30 minutes. Transfer the soup into a blender and blend until smooth. Adjust the seasoning with salt and pepper if necessary.
Butter one side of five slices of bread. Flip them over so that the buttered side is facing down. Add a layer of the cheese on top then stack the remaining slices of bread on top. Butter the tops of the bread.
Heat a large pan over medium-low heat. Add the sandwiches to the pan and cook until each side is golden brown and the cheese has melted.
Remove the grilled cheeses from the pan. Cut off the crusts then cut each sandwich into 4 triangles.
Pour the tomato soup into shot glasses and top with a mini grilled cheese. Enjoy!
For other delicious soup recipes, check out some of our favorites:
Who doesn’t love a big warm pan of comfort food on a cool and dreary day? This Creamy Tomato Baked Mac and Cheese is a new twist on an old classic. There are a lot of different variations of Mac and Cheese, but this is one that is sure to please even the pickiest eaters.
The secret to this recipe is the delicious creamy cheesy tomato sauce–not only does it taste great, but it has hidden nutrition powers thanks to canned tomatoes. These are a pantry superpower, and are teeming with vitamin C, fiber, potassium, and lycopene, an antioxidant with anti-inflammatory and anti-cancer properties. Plus, canned tomatoes actually have a higher lycopene content than fresh, as the cooking and canning process enhances the availability of the nutrient, making it easier for your body to absorb. Additionally, tomato products are great shelf-stable products that are affordable and also good for the environment. What’s not to love about that?!
Creamy Tomato Baked Mac and Cheese is perfect for all occasions: from a quick family dinner, to a work potluck, it’s sure to be a crowd favorite.
Creamy Tomato Baked Mac and Cheese
Who doesn’t love a big warm pan of comfort food on a cool and dreary day? This Creamy Tomato Baked Mac and Cheese is a new twist on an old classic. There are a lot of different variations of Mac and Cheese, but this is one that is sure to please even the pickiest eaters.
Prep Time15 minutes
Cook Time40 minutes
Total Time55 minutes
Ingredients
1 ½ cups elbow macaroni
3 Tbsp. unsalted butter
3 Tbsp. all purpose flour
2 cups milk
½ tsp. salt
¼ tsp. pepper
1 (14 oz.) can stewed tomatoes with juice
2 cups shredded cheddar cheese
¾ cup plain panko breadcrumbs
Instructions
Preheat the oven to 350˚F.
Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Add a sprinkling of salt to water and add in the macaroni pasta. Cook until it is a few minutes away from becoming al dente, about 5 minutes. Drain the pasta and set it aside.
Heat a medium-sized oven safe skillet over medium heat. Add in the butter and allow it to melt. Then mix in the flour until combined. Cook the flour for about 1 minute then, while whisking, pour in the milk. Heat the milk for about 5 minutes then mix in the salt, pepper, and tomatoes.
Bring the sauce to a simmer while stirring constantly. Cook for 5-6 minutes until it has thickened. Add in the cheese and mix until fully melted. Then add in the pasta and mix until well combined.
Top the mac and cheese with the breadcrumbs and transfer the pan into the oven. Bake for 35-40 minutes until the top is golden brown and bubbling. Enjoy!
For other delicious comfort food recipes, check out some of our favorites:
Pizza soup is one of those recipes that is even more delicious than it sounds! All of the best ingredients of pizza combine to make this cozy and filling soup. Plus, it takes hardly any time to put together, making this an ideal recipe for any night of the week.
This recipe is a great way to utilize pantry staples like canned and dried goods, as these ingredients are shelf stable and affordable. Canned tomatoes are one of these canned goods that are easy to use while being extremely nutritious, which is why adding them to soups is a simple way to boost the nutrition content. They are also rich in lycopene, an antioxidant that has been found to reduce the risk of cardiovascular diease, as research shows that tomato products play an important role in preventing platelet aggregation (i.e. reducing the amount of blood clots that can lead to cardiovascular diseases). Additionally, tomato products can improve cholesterol by improving lipid profiles, as studies have found that consumption has lead to a significant decrease in cholesterol and triglyceride levels, as well as body weight and fat percentage.
So, what are you waiting for? Pull out the crockpot and cozy up to this delicious pizza soup.
Pizza Soup
Pizza soup is one of those recipes that is even more delicious than is sounds! All of the best ingredients of pizza combine to make this cozy and filling soup. Plus, it takes hardly any time to put together, making this an ideal recipe for any night of the week.
Prep Time10 minutes
Cook Time6 hours
Total Time6 hours10 minutes
Ingredients
1 ½ lbs. ground italian sausage
1 (5 oz.) bag mini pepperonis
1 Tbsp. minced garlic
1 Tbsp. dried minced onion
1 Tbsp. Italian seasoning
1 Tbsp. granulated sugar
1 (6 oz.) can tomato paste
1 (8 oz.) can tomato sauce
1 (15 oz) can diced tomatoes
2 (14.5 oz) cans beef broth
1 (24 oz.) jar spaghetti sauce
8 oz. onion and chive cream cheese, softened
Breadsticks, for serving
Mozzarella cheese, for serving
Instructions
Heat a pan over medium high heat. Add in the Italian sausage. Cook and crumble the sausage until it is fully cooked then transfer it into a crock pot.
Add the pepperonis, garlic, minced onion, Italian seasoning, sugar, tomato paste, tomato sauce, diced tomatoes, beef broth, and spaghetti sauce into the crock pot. Mix to combine then cover and cook on low for 6 hours.
Uncover the crock pot and mix in the cream cheese until well combined.
To serve, top with mozzarella cheese and enjoy with breadsticks.
For other delicious soup recipes, check out some of our favorites:
Toasted ravioli is a versatile dish that can be enjoyed as an appetizer, side dish, or the main course. Whip up this decadent and creamy Vodka Dipping Sauce, and it will taste just like going to a fancy restaurant, but from the comfort of your own home!
As with most Italian sauces, the main flavor comes from tomatoes. Not only do tomatoes offer sweetness and acidity to this recipe, they have important health benefits. Cooked tomato products (found in canned tomato products) contain an ingredient called lycopene, which is a powerful antioxidant that has been proven to protect the body against many chronic diseases. Similar to most nutrients, it’s more natural to obtain lycopene from foods rather than supplements. In order to achieve maximum health benefits associated with lycopene, it is recommended to consume tomato products with a heart healthy fat, such as olive oil or avocado. That’s why we recommend enjoying lycopene and its health benefits through delicious foods such as this recipe. So, what are you waiting for? Enjoy some canned tomato products today with this tasty recipe for Toasted Ravioli!
Toasted Ravioli with Vodka Dipping Sauce
Toasted ravioli is a versatile dish that can be enjoyed as an appetizer, side dish, or the main course. Whip up this decadent and creamy Vodka Dipping Sauce, and it will taste just like going to a fancy restaurant, but without the added cost.
Prep Time10 minutes
Cook Time30 minutes
Total Time40 minutes
Ingredients
1 (19 oz.) package four cheese ravioli
1 Tbsp. olive oil
1 shallot, minced
1 garlic clove, minced
1 ¼ tsp. red chili flakes
2 Tbsp. vodka
¾ cup tomato paste
½ cup tomato sauce
1 Tbsp. heavy cream
1 Tbsp. butter
salt and pepper, to taste
2 eggs, beaten
1 ½ cups Italian breadcrumbs
vegetable oil, for frying
Instructions
Heat the olive oil in a pan over medium heat. Add in the shallot, garlic, and ¼ teaspoon of the red chili flakes.
When the shallots turn translucent, mix in the tomato paste and tomato sauce. Cook down for 5-10 minutes. Then add in the vodka and cook for another 5-10 minutes until the alcohol reduces. Mix in the heavy cream, butter, and salt and pepper to taste. Set the sauce aside.
Fill a pot with a few inches of vegetable oil. Heat it to 350˚F.
Add the beaten eggs and breadcrumbs into separate dishes. Dip the raviolis into the egg and allow any excess liquid to drip off. Then place them into the breadcrumbs. Fully coat the raviolis in breadcrumbs then gently place them into the hot oil. Fry until golden brown and toasted. Remove the raviolis from the oil and onto a baking sheet lined with paper towels to drain. Sprinkle them with salt.
Serve the toasted raviolis with the vodka dipping sauce and enjoy!
For other delicious pasta recipes, check out some of our favorites:
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