Alexander Lee, writing “A History of Pizza” for “History Today” tells a great story:
“People have been eating pizza, in one form or another, for centuries. As far back as antiquity, pieces of flatbread, topped with savouries, served as a simple and tasty meal for those who could not afford plates, or who were on the go. These early pizzas appear in Virgil’s Aeneid. Shortly after arriving in Latium, Aeneas and his crew sat down beneath a tree and laid out ‘thin wheaten cakes as platters for their meal’. They then scattered them with mushrooms and herbs they had found in the woods and guzzled them down, crust and all, prompting Aeneas’ son Ascanius to exclaim: ‘Look! We’ve even eaten our plates!’”
We are still eating our plates all these years later.
Another website discussing the history of pizza, “Today I Found Out,” offers the fact that in the ruins of Pompeii, destroyed by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in August, 79 A.D., archeologists discovered shops containing equipment and tools consistent with those used in pizzerias.
That site also informs us that in the early 1500s, citizens of Naples started topping their flatbreads with not only cheese but tomatoes. Eating “pizza” when in Naples became a “must-do” activity for tourists. [And still is!] In 1889, when Italian royalty King Umberto I and Queen Margherita were vacationing in Naples, they tried pizza and loved it, with the queen especially enjoying the pizza with mozzarella, basil, and tomatoes. The pizza maker thereafter dedicated it to her, calling it “Pizza Margherita.”
King Umberto I of Italy and Queen Margherita of Italy
When Italian immigrants came to America at the beginning of the 20th Century, they brought pizza with them. The first known pizzeria in the U.S. (or one of the first) was opened in New York City. Time Magazine reports:
“Lombardi’s is widely accepted as the first pizzeria in the U.S., when Gennaro Lombardi began selling coal-oven pizza out of his grocery store in Manhattan’s Little Italy in 1905. Before then, pizza was available in many Italian neighborhoods, but mainly it was homemade in kitchens or sold through unlicensed vendors. The word pizza (or “pizze” as it was then spelled) appears in Boston newspapers as early as 1903. Lombardi’s proved to be enormously influential pizza force, serving as the training grounds for cooks who went on to open celebrated pizzerias such as John’s and Totonno’s.”
Outside Lombardi’s Pizzeria in New York City
[It should be noted however that pizza researcher Peter Regas has found evidence from 19th-Century Italian-American newspapers in New York that there were actually other pizzerias on the scene before Lombardi’s came along. They were started by Filippo Milone, who sold off one of them to Gennaro Lombardi.]
In 1943, Chicago began over a half-century of rivalry with “New York style” pizzas when Ike Sewell opened Pizzeria Uno’s which served the “deep-dish” pie.
Still, pizza didn’t really “take off” until the 1950’s, when celebrities such as Joe DiMaggio, Jimmy Durante and Frank Sinatra, who all had Italian roots, were publicly seen enjoying pizza, according to “Today I Found Out.”
They add that the 1952 song “That’s Amore” sung by Dean Martin, which included the line “When the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie – that’s amore,” “did more for the popularity of pizza than a thousand ad campaigns could have done.”
Pizza Magazine (yes, there is a Pizza Magazine) reported that as of December, 2017, the world pizza market topped $134 billion, with the U.S. pizza market at over $45 billion. A pizza market analysis for 2023-2027 predicts that the overall pizza market size is projected to increase by USD 56.85 billion between 2022 and 2027. It suggests:
The increasing consumption of pizza in developing countries is driving market growth. In developing countries such as China, India, Brazil, South Africa, and Indonesia, consumer per capita income and urbanization are increasing, leading to lifestyle changes and increased consumption. There has also been a shift towards a preference for European food products such as pizza among the middle class in the countries.”
On average, every person in the U.S. consumes around 23 pounds of pizza each year. That adds up to over 3 BILLION pizzas, not counting frozen pizzas. The top 5 pizza sales days are Super Bowl Sunday, New Year’s Eve, Halloween, the night before Thanksgiving, and New Year’s Day.
Pepperoni is the most popular pizza, making up 36% of all pizzas ordered, but these days, you can get almost any topping conceivable. Sometimes we spring for “artisanal” pizza. But we have never gone so far as to order any pizza like the ones on this list of “The Most Expensive Pizza Slices in the World.” With toppings like “caviar that is pre-soaked in Dom Perignon,” “sprinkling of gold flakes,” or even “sprinkles of diamonds,” it doesn’t even appeal to us, to be honest. Seriously, what would you rather eat: cheese, or gold flakes?
Still, even “normal” pizzas vary around the country. As OpenCulture notes, for example:
In Buffalo, New York, pizzas are sauced right up to their circumference, leaving very little crusty handle for eating on the fly. . . .
Sauce can also swing pretty wildly – sweet, spicy, prepared in advance, or left to the last minute – but cheese is a much hotter topic.
Detroit’s pizza is distinguished by the inclusion of Wisconsin brick cheese.
St. Louis is loyal to Provel cheese, a homegrown processed mix of cheddar, Swiss, and provolone and liquid smoke.
Miami pizzas cater to the palates of its Cuban population by mixing mozzarella with gouda, a cheese that was both widely available and popular before 1962’s rationing system was put in place.
Rhode Island’s aptly named Red Strips have no cheese at all…which might be preferable to the Altoona, Pennsylvania favorite that arrives topped with American cheese slices or – the horror – Velveeta.
You can see “The most popular pizza style in every state, mapped” in this September 2023 news story, here.
And where do people get their pizza? Chains still dominate, according to Pizza Media.
We also consume a great deal of pizza, and the more cheese on it, the better. The fact is, pizza tastes great. The American Chemical Society explains the “profound beauty” of the “chemical symphony” of pizza in this entertaining and informative video. The key to great pizza, you will learn, is the “Maillard Reaction.”
Before you watch this short video, I suggest ordering a pizza so you can conduct your own research on the appeal of pizza as it is explained….
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