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Was pizza invented in the United States? Many people seem to think so, given its popularity across the fifty states. America has its own forms of pizza, but pizza’s clearest origins are in Italy, in one city in particular. Like many foods however, its deepest origins lie across many cultures. After all, the idea of baking flour and adding toppings to it is pretty straightforward. Some of the early recorded evidence for this comes from 6th century BCE Persian soldiers in the army of Darius the Great who mixed cheese and dates on baked flat bread. There are traces of Stone Age residents in the Italian peninsula baking bread beneath a fire, and then using it as a plate - something also common in ancient Greece. Certainly the close proximity and cross-conquests of people in the larger Mediterranean region meant that there was ample opportunity for the sharing of food ideas. The word “pizza” is said to have come from the word “pita” which describes a flat bread in many cultures around the Mediterranean.

There are traces of early forms of pizza in the ruins of Pompeii near the modern Italian city of Naples. Under the volcanic ash that covered the city in the first century CE, marble slabs for baking bread and other remnants of pizza production were found. Naples seems to be a focal point in the development of this foodstuff. A second major factor in the development of the pizza came with the “discovery” of the tomato in the Americas. Poor people in Naples were adding this fruit to their breads around the 1700s, and with that one of the key food pairings in what we call a pizza today was made. According to some accounts, this combination was so successful that 18th century tourists in Naples would go to the poor areas of town to taste pizza.

Many regard the Antica Pizzeria Port’Alba in Naples (shown above) as the world’s first pizzeria. It opened in 1830, after starting as a street stall. Pizza was baked in wood ovens at the time, although the Antica (Antique) Pizzeria still uses lava rocks that imbue the pizza with a special taste. The French writer Alexander Dumas, author of The Three Musketeers, describes pizza in Naples at the time as eaten by many of the poorer people in the city. It was often their only recourse when there was nothing else to eat. Places like the Antica Pizzeria had 8-day payment plans for the hungry, who were absolved of their debts if they died before settling on the 8th day. Dumas’s description of Neapolitian pizza seems very familiar; it included oil, cheese, tomato, and possibly anchovies. Pizza remains an inexpensive food, easily picked up at roadside stalls and eaten by hand. Its “ease of use” is clearly another feature that has endeared it to the masses, young and old. The most common type of pizza, the “Pizza Margherita,” topped with cheese and tomatoes, comes from the name of the Italian Queen in 1889. She is said to have greatly appreciated a pizza of this type made by a local vendor who named it after her. The European Union has granted Naples special safeguards over local Margherita and Marinara (tomato-sauce based) pizzas. In the story of pizza, all roads lead to Naples.

The spread of pizza throughout the modern world has been breathtaking. Pizza is gaining traction in the world’s largest countries, China and India. One reason is that it is easy to use local specialties as toppings. Pizzas are adaptable to whatever is at hand. The spread of multi-national pizza chains have also brought the product to every corner of the earth. In Korea, these chains compete against local pizza chains. The largest pizza in the world was baked in South Africa in 1990. It was 122 feet wide, more than the height of 20 people standing on each others heads!

Nowhere perhaps has the pizza become as popular as in the US, where it can be affectionately known simply as “za.” It vies with the hamburger and hot dog as the national food. Nearly one in five restaurants in the US is a pizzeria! Americans are said to eat 350 slices of pizza each second. Three billion pizzas are baked each year, or 10 pizzas for every American man, woman and child. Its popularity has led Americans to create their own types of pizza. The Chicago-style deep dish pizza (shown above) turns the usually flat pizza into a thicker pie-like construction that allows even more ingredients to be pulled together. Americans are also pioneering healthier forms of pizza, with whole-wheat bread crusts, less salt and low-fat toppings.

Whatever new forms and flavors the pizza takes, its future is undoubtedly bright. We can expect many more innovations, for few foods are as amenable to our increasingly fast, varied and international tastes and lifestyles. Chicken tikka masala pizza, anyone?