Wednesday, May 10, 2006
Pizza History - in Italy,
in the US
Sure the
birth of "Pizza" is traced baked to BC times, when Virgil's "Aeneid" mentions flat flour cakes, and evidence of the
same was also found in the ashes of Pompeii. But then again many other
Civilizations had evidence of flat flour cakes.
It was the
importation of the tomato to Naples from Columbus' New World (Peru) in 1522,
that got the pizza rolling. Known as "pizzaioli,"
it was a peasant dish, until King Umberto I (1844-1900) took a liking to it. In
order to duplicate the colors of the Italian flag, it was fashioned out of
mozzarella, tomatoes and basil, taking it one step closer to the dish we know
today.
A
Pizza History
Charting the rise
of Chicago's pie
Taylor
Street, the late 1890s. The neighborhood of Italian immigrants,
largely from Naples, is packed with handcarts and
makeshift stands selling fruit, vegetables, olive oil and bread. Speaking
mostly in Italian, they buy, sell, argue and barter, when suddenly a man walks
onto the street pushing a cart holding two copper washtubs. Their bottoms are
packed with charcoal, keeping round pies of bread, tomato, spices and cheese
hot. Walking near Taylor and Racine, he sells these pies for two cents each,
and the people seem to like them. Little does he know that he is America's first pizza vendor, and in a
hundred years those few cents would turn into a multi-billion dollar industry.
Pizza migrated from Naples to America via Chicago and Taylor Street, but according to "The History
of Pizza," that was just one in many Chicago events that shaped the round pie. Chicago also claims to be the birthplace of
both the deep dish and stuffed pizza.
Pizza itself goes back as
far as to BC times, when Virgil's "Aeneid"
mentions flat flour cakes, and evidence of the same was also found in the ashes
of Pompeii. But pizza did not really get
rolling until 1522, when tomatoes were brought to Naples from Peru. Known as "pizzaioli,"
it was a peasant dish, until King Umberto I (1844-1900) took a liking to it. In
order to duplicate the colors of the Italian flag, it was fashioned out of
mozzarella, tomatoes and basil, taking it one step closer to the dish we know
today.
The honor of the first
American pizza parlor goes to Gennaro Lombardi's "Patraca
dela Pizza" on New York's Spring Street, which is still
open today. Not integrated into the American mainstream, the tomato pie
remained as an ethnic enclave until 1943. That's when Chicagoan Ike Sewell
opened Pizzeria Uno at 29 East
Ohio. The key to this recipe was the
crust. Baked in thick cast-iron pans in giant ovens, Uno's
deep-dish crust revolutionized pizza. Sixty-five years later, Uno's, with its dark cavernous booths, is a landmark.
Other surviving pioneer
pizza parlors in Chicago include the Home Run Inn.
Originally started as a bar at 31st and Kildare in 1923, Nick Perrino, the son-in-law of the original owners, came up
with an idea and started serving a medium-crust pie in 1947. Times were good
and the small bar became crowded. Eventually demand got to the point where Perrino introduced another concept to the Chicago area--frozen pizzas.
The 1950s and early sixties
were the glory days for the nationwide expansion of pizza. At that time,
Italian-Americans were the rage, and stars like Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin
("the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie") ruled Hollywood and Las Vegas while Sophia Loren and Gina Lollobrigida rivaled Marilyn Monroe with their exotic
beauty. Pizza was the new and trendy dish. A novelty like the hula-hoop or
yoyo, its ease of cooking and the fact that you could eat it without utensils
made it ideal for parties. Also, unlike hot dogs and hamburgers, pizza tastes
good cold.
As a child in the 1970s, I
grew up next to Franks Pizzeria on North Clark Street. I can still remember the smell of
the pizzas blowing from the exhaust fan into my room in hot summer nights.
Frank's was like hundreds of corner joints throughout Chicago selling pizza, chicken, ribs,
Italian beef, frozen raviolis, etc. In order to break this pattern, the owners
of Nancy's Pizza took the recipe from an
Easter pie called Scarciedda and introduced another Chicago first, the stuffed pizza, in 1971.
Today Chicago has pizza any way you want it. Thick, thin, greasy, stuffed, wood-oven-baked, topped with
vegetables, smoked meats, exotic cheeses and, of course, the old standbys
mozzarella, pepperoni and sausage. If only the pushcart vendor on Taylor Street was alive to see it all
today. (2006-05-09)
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