The wild pizzas of southern Italy(bloomberg.com)
bloomberg.com
The wild pizzas of southern Italy
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2018-03-15/the-wild-pizzas-of-southern-italy-have-to-be-seen-to-be-believed
80 comments
https://archive.is/k5rfX
> There’s no tomato sauce atop the dough, no mozzarella, no onion. It’s just crushed tomato with salt, oregano, and olive oil.
Looks at picture to make sure he's not misunderstanding, sees that, no, it's that
What does the author think pizza sauce usually is?
Looks at picture to make sure he's not misunderstanding, sees that, no, it's that
What does the author think pizza sauce usually is?
Everyone here is trying to be way too literal to "gotcha" about what sauce is.
I am Italian, and you need to define these things way more off feel and appearance than some scientific definition of "sauce" that you just made up.
Regardless of whether "pizza sauce" is cooked or not, you look at and you know it's sauce. It's near-puree consistency, with all the ingredients having been blended together, you could spread it easily with a spoon.
Look at that picture, those are clearly crushed tomatoes that were very recently a full tomato, not like a canned "crushed tomato" you would get in a store that's already like 95% of the way to sauce consistency. You could not spread those around evenly or easily with a spoon. It's not a sauce. It's crushed tomatoes, with salt, oregano, and olive oil.
If you want to "gotcha" go with the fact that the vast majority of these would not be called "pizzas" by anyone in Italy - as mentioned by @elrond89. Again by feel - you look at a big piece of woven/folded bread with some other ingredients - does it feel like pizza to you? Probably not. Most of those would be called "focaccias" or similar.
I am Italian, and you need to define these things way more off feel and appearance than some scientific definition of "sauce" that you just made up.
Regardless of whether "pizza sauce" is cooked or not, you look at and you know it's sauce. It's near-puree consistency, with all the ingredients having been blended together, you could spread it easily with a spoon.
Look at that picture, those are clearly crushed tomatoes that were very recently a full tomato, not like a canned "crushed tomato" you would get in a store that's already like 95% of the way to sauce consistency. You could not spread those around evenly or easily with a spoon. It's not a sauce. It's crushed tomatoes, with salt, oregano, and olive oil.
If you want to "gotcha" go with the fact that the vast majority of these would not be called "pizzas" by anyone in Italy - as mentioned by @elrond89. Again by feel - you look at a big piece of woven/folded bread with some other ingredients - does it feel like pizza to you? Probably not. Most of those would be called "focaccias" or similar.
Looks similar to a standard, default-toppings New Haven style pizza, to me, which also features a coarse-crushed-tomato sauce and not much else. In either case I think you point at one and tell the average person on the street—especially among an English-speaking audience, as I suppose this article is aimed at—"look, this pizza has no sauce" and they'll look at you funny and think you're playing some kind of joke on them, because it sure looks like it only has sauce. Listing the ingredients the way the article does just makes that seem to be even more true, since it's practically a recipe for pizza sauce.
For the second time on this thread, its because it’s not blended up into sauce! The ingredients are placed on separately and the consistency is not that of sauce! Any more than a bag of sugar next to a carton of eggs is a cake batter!
> practically a recipe for pizza sauce
You're saying it yourself but not absorbing it. The ingredients themselves do not make a final product, in the same way that a fajita plate is not a burrito which is not a quesadilla.
> practically a recipe for pizza sauce
You're saying it yourself but not absorbing it. The ingredients themselves do not make a final product, in the same way that a fajita plate is not a burrito which is not a quesadilla.
I'm looking at the picture, and that sure looks like a valid sauce consistency to me. A coarse sauce, but a sauce. Again, it looks like (I mean, exactly like) what's on other sauce-mostly pizzas that people definitely say have sauce on them. shrug
Also: so you're telling me they put the crushed tomato on, then put salt and oregano on top of it, rather than stirring those into the crushed tomato? I guess if the oregano is fresh and goes on after the bake, but I'm not seeing that in the photo. One way or another, it's settling in to the sauce.
Pizza sauce, being (in its minimum form) so very simple and uncooked, is a weird case. The ingredients themselves do make the final product, for that. I'd still call that a pizza sauce, and again, I think you'd get a lot of weird looks showing that photo to people and telling them it lacks sauce. If it's not sauce, then lots of more-normal pizzas "don't have sauce" either. Like, if you just had salted crushed tomato, not even any oregano, on a pizza, I would absolutely say it's got pizza sauce on it. Oregano's common, but not required. It'll taste weird enough without any salt that I might start to reconsider then, but only then.
Also: so you're telling me they put the crushed tomato on, then put salt and oregano on top of it, rather than stirring those into the crushed tomato? I guess if the oregano is fresh and goes on after the bake, but I'm not seeing that in the photo. One way or another, it's settling in to the sauce.
Pizza sauce, being (in its minimum form) so very simple and uncooked, is a weird case. The ingredients themselves do make the final product, for that. I'd still call that a pizza sauce, and again, I think you'd get a lot of weird looks showing that photo to people and telling them it lacks sauce. If it's not sauce, then lots of more-normal pizzas "don't have sauce" either. Like, if you just had salted crushed tomato, not even any oregano, on a pizza, I would absolutely say it's got pizza sauce on it. Oregano's common, but not required. It'll taste weird enough without any salt that I might start to reconsider then, but only then.
the separate ingredients are quite different from them as a sauce. you'd never call a bowl of flour, water, salt, and yeast "pizza dough".
Well, 1) that sure looks like a tomato sauce on top of that bread, and 2) all you do to turn crushed tomato + salt + oregano into pizza sauce is stir slightly.
[EDIT] I'm not trying to be a dick about this, I was just really surprised to read that description, coupled with the photo above it. "no tomato sauce" goes on to describe its toppings as exactly what one might mix to get a pizza sauce
[EDIT] I'm not trying to be a dick about this, I was just really surprised to read that description, coupled with the photo above it. "no tomato sauce" goes on to describe its toppings as exactly what one might mix to get a pizza sauce
Tomato sauce also generally cooked down for hours as well, which again makes it taste way different than the ingredients being baked on fresh as-is.
EDIT: see my comment on the grandparent and stop being so pedantic
EDIT: see my comment on the grandparent and stop being so pedantic
You don't need to (pre-)cook pizza sauce, though. The thing that struck me was this article about pizza claiming that the exact things you put in pizza sauce, being practically the only things on a piece of flatbread that the article is claiming counts as a style of pizza, is compatible with the article's claim that it doesn't have tomato sauce on it. I mean, either most pizza doesn't feature tomato sauce (because pizza sauce doesn't count, for some reason), in which case why mention it, or otherwise I'm pretty sure this does too.
"Tomato sauce" is a very ambiguous term, and pizza sauces are not necessarily cooked. Just open a can of crushed tomatoes (or crush them yourself) and stir in some salt, olive oil and whatever other seasonings you want (garlic, oregano, etc.). That is pizza sauce. That's what it looks like in the picture being talked about.
Yes because it's missing olive oil ^^.
Italian here. Of those in the pictures only a couple are really considered pizza by us.
Pizza must always be a dough with a raised border and something on top. Also we really care about how you cook it. Real good pizza is only cooked in a brick oven with timber, everything else is good but not real pizza (is usually lower quality)
Pizza must always be a dough with a raised border and something on top. Also we really care about how you cook it. Real good pizza is only cooked in a brick oven with timber, everything else is good but not real pizza (is usually lower quality)
After seeing the rather click-baity title, I've now got visions of seeing wild pizzas roaming the plains of Italy waiting to be plucked.
That headline reminded me of the old BBC prank:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tVo_wkxH9dU
The spaghetti tree hoax is a famous 3-minute hoax report broadcast on April Fools' Day 1957 by the BBC current affairs programme Panorama. It told a tale of a family in southern Switzerland harvesting spaghetti from the fictitious spaghetti tree, broadcast at a time when this Italian dish was not widely eaten in the UK and some Britons were unaware that spaghetti is a pasta made from wheat flour and water. Hundreds of viewers phoned into the BBC, either to say the story was not true, or wondering about it, with some even asking how to grow their own spaghetti trees. Decades later CNN called this broadcast "the biggest hoax that any reputable news establishment ever pulled."
Or the Pizza Farm from Funny or Die!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0weSjPKi4cs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tVo_wkxH9dU
The spaghetti tree hoax is a famous 3-minute hoax report broadcast on April Fools' Day 1957 by the BBC current affairs programme Panorama. It told a tale of a family in southern Switzerland harvesting spaghetti from the fictitious spaghetti tree, broadcast at a time when this Italian dish was not widely eaten in the UK and some Britons were unaware that spaghetti is a pasta made from wheat flour and water. Hundreds of viewers phoned into the BBC, either to say the story was not true, or wondering about it, with some even asking how to grow their own spaghetti trees. Decades later CNN called this broadcast "the biggest hoax that any reputable news establishment ever pulled."
Or the Pizza Farm from Funny or Die!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0weSjPKi4cs
The Guardian had a similar April fool about the island of San Serriffe [0], “a small archipelago, its main islands grouped roughly in the shape of a semicolon, in the Indian Ocean”, which was apparently celebrating 10 years of independence.
But coming back to roaming Pizzas. Another anecdotal food myth (in the UK) is the haggis that roam the Scottish highlands. They allegedly have shorter legs on one side so that it is easer to go round and round the hills.
[0] https://www.theguardian.com/gnmeducationcentre/archive-educa...
But coming back to roaming Pizzas. Another anecdotal food myth (in the UK) is the haggis that roam the Scottish highlands. They allegedly have shorter legs on one side so that it is easer to go round and round the hills.
[0] https://www.theguardian.com/gnmeducationcentre/archive-educa...
Hey, San Serriffe is not to be taken lightly. It even has a central bank; you can check the current balances here:
https://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/boss.html
https://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/boss.html
Or the episode of the original Dangermouse where herds of bagpipe were stolen: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ln4JOPb20l0
Do not feed the house hippo: https://youtu.be/NBfi8OEz0rA
There are even restaurants called “Spaghetti Tree” named after this ancient joke
[deleted]
And they are not anyway pizzas (unless you stretch the definition of pizza to "anything that has a layer of bread at the bottom").
Not so casually the only actual pizza in the list is the one that is called pizza (pizza al taglio[1]) all the others are different specialities that may (or may not) be overall similar to a pizza.
In Italy there are tens or hundreds of regional variations of "focaccie" (that are not pizza) or similar "bread with something", the traditional diets all revolve around bread or pasta (i.e. flour+water), (olive) oil, vegetables and cheese, i.e. the most economical ingredients, more or less always the same and people had centuries to invent variations on the same theme.
[1] which is common enough, literally "pizza for cut", it is actually a "normal" pizza cooked in largish rectangular pans that is sold in rectangular slices.
Not so casually the only actual pizza in the list is the one that is called pizza (pizza al taglio[1]) all the others are different specialities that may (or may not) be overall similar to a pizza.
In Italy there are tens or hundreds of regional variations of "focaccie" (that are not pizza) or similar "bread with something", the traditional diets all revolve around bread or pasta (i.e. flour+water), (olive) oil, vegetables and cheese, i.e. the most economical ingredients, more or less always the same and people had centuries to invent variations on the same theme.
[1] which is common enough, literally "pizza for cut", it is actually a "normal" pizza cooked in largish rectangular pans that is sold in rectangular slices.
Dunno - my Italian partner refers to fresh thick focaccia when we're in Italy as 'pizza', so I think there's a little missing from the translation into English.
Suffice to say, I think Italians have a wee bit more of a right to define the word than I do.
Suffice to say, I think Italians have a wee bit more of a right to define the word than I do.
In some parts of central Italy, including Rome, the soft focaccia is called _pizza bianca_ (white pizza) and it’s eaten as-is or sliced in half and filled with charcuterie, typically mortadella.
Source: am Italian too.
Source: am Italian too.
Are pepperoni pizzas valid dishes?
What do you mean by "valid"?
I've heard that Italians frown on pizzas that has toppings like pineapple (yuk!) on it. What pizzas would be authentic Italian?
Sure, pineapple (and any other fruit) is no-no.
There are two main school of thoughts.
The first one has a limited number of "coded" pizza's:
Margherita
Napoletana
Marinara
Prosciutto
Prosciutto e funghi
Capricciosa
and a few others.
The second one is whatever floats your boat or "everything goes", normally there are some 10-15, maybe 20 "standard" pizza types in the menu of a pizzeria, but you can usually ask (within reason) to add or remove any ingredient, basically anything that is edible (and salted, NOT sweet) can be used.
Pizza with peperoni (peperoni are "sweet peppers") is "border line", though what in the US is called pepperoni pizza (i.e. with salame piccante, no peperoni anywhere):
https://www.innaturale.com/la-pizza-pepperoni-non-e-con-i-pe...
is usually "accepted" (IF the salame piccante is available, which depends on where in Italy you ask for it, you will always find it in the south, not so commonly in center/center-north)).
Also it depends on the integralism of the pizzeria personnel.
As an unrelated note, in any "normal" bar you would be frowned upon if asking for a cappuccino any time past - say - 11 AM.
Of course this does not apply in cities where there are many tourists, where it is not so rare to see people eating a pizza while drinking a cappuccino. (personally the mere thought of this sends shivers down my spine)
There are two main school of thoughts.
The first one has a limited number of "coded" pizza's:
Margherita
Napoletana
Marinara
Prosciutto
Prosciutto e funghi
Capricciosa
and a few others.
The second one is whatever floats your boat or "everything goes", normally there are some 10-15, maybe 20 "standard" pizza types in the menu of a pizzeria, but you can usually ask (within reason) to add or remove any ingredient, basically anything that is edible (and salted, NOT sweet) can be used.
Pizza with peperoni (peperoni are "sweet peppers") is "border line", though what in the US is called pepperoni pizza (i.e. with salame piccante, no peperoni anywhere):
https://www.innaturale.com/la-pizza-pepperoni-non-e-con-i-pe...
is usually "accepted" (IF the salame piccante is available, which depends on where in Italy you ask for it, you will always find it in the south, not so commonly in center/center-north)).
Also it depends on the integralism of the pizzeria personnel.
As an unrelated note, in any "normal" bar you would be frowned upon if asking for a cappuccino any time past - say - 11 AM.
Of course this does not apply in cities where there are many tourists, where it is not so rare to see people eating a pizza while drinking a cappuccino. (personally the mere thought of this sends shivers down my spine)
Salami piccante, that's the one thanks. And yes, absolutely no coffee with pizza, it just doesn't feel right. A decent lager, on the other hand, does go down well with it.
Not to nitpick, only FYI, in Italian, one salame (piccante), two salami (piccanti).
Sure, that is Rome (and posssibly Lazio) only and the same thing (more or less) is called elsewhere focaccia, schiacciata or schiaccia (or many other names)
https://www.treccani.it/vocabolario/pizza/
https://www.treccani.it/vocabolario/schiacciata/
https://www.treccani.it/vocabolario/focaccia/
https://www.treccani.it/vocabolario/pizza/
https://www.treccani.it/vocabolario/schiacciata/
https://www.treccani.it/vocabolario/focaccia/
I don’t think that qualifies as click bait lol
A sufficiently pedantic reading of any headline will reveal that it does not capture the nuance writ plain in the linked article.
(except when the title is the full contents of a solitary linked tweet)
(except when the title is the full contents of a solitary linked tweet)
Arguably, even that can be construed as clickbait since it hides the metadata that the full article is the full article ;)
Upon review of my tautology, I've realized that some might interpret the existence of a headline as an indication that there's something of more substance behind the headline. I deduce that all headlines are clickbait.
Reading this while happening to be on vacation in Calabria... I accept this quest!
Food blog please!
In other news: bloomberg don't understand Italian pizza.
Anyway most of them are "focaccia" we use pizza to mean a lot of different things, it also means "slap in the face" in roman slang, so don't take everything literally, sometimes pizza means the same thing americans are used to, the only difference, except maybe raw materials, is that we make them of the correct size (enough to feed only one person), sometimes it's not, it's simply "pizza shaped"
We also use the same Italian word used for cake to mean this, it's obviously not a cake (anglophones call them pies) and you can call it pizza as well (stuffed pizza to be precise)
https://www.tavolartegusto.it/wp/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/...
they are simply baked in a cake pan
Anyway most of them are "focaccia" we use pizza to mean a lot of different things, it also means "slap in the face" in roman slang, so don't take everything literally, sometimes pizza means the same thing americans are used to, the only difference, except maybe raw materials, is that we make them of the correct size (enough to feed only one person), sometimes it's not, it's simply "pizza shaped"
We also use the same Italian word used for cake to mean this, it's obviously not a cake (anglophones call them pies) and you can call it pizza as well (stuffed pizza to be precise)
https://www.tavolartegusto.it/wp/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/...
they are simply baked in a cake pan
These sound great but are quite tame in terms of pizza.
South Korea takes the idea of pizza into downright absurdity. Imagine corn, squid, blueberry, garlic, sweet potato, and mayonnaise on a single pie together.
South Korea takes the idea of pizza into downright absurdity. Imagine corn, squid, blueberry, garlic, sweet potato, and mayonnaise on a single pie together.
Korean Pizza is great! I like that they don't shy away from experimenting with food in general
I recall reading the definition of the Italian Cuisine as "Cooking with whatever you have at hand" somewhere. Their stuff is good because they use top quality ingredients, it's not about some weird trick or ancient technique.
They take pride in producing and obtaining the good quality ingredients and I see Italians conservatively sticking to the basics.
On the other hand, in other countries where the produce quality is not exactly on the level of the ones in Italy, they tend to experiment with different techniques or ingredients. I would say that often the succeed in coming up with good combinations.
They take pride in producing and obtaining the good quality ingredients and I see Italians conservatively sticking to the basics.
On the other hand, in other countries where the produce quality is not exactly on the level of the ones in Italy, they tend to experiment with different techniques or ingredients. I would say that often the succeed in coming up with good combinations.
This seems pretty accurate; the quality of the flour, tomatoes, and other ingredients just can't match up in Korea.
There are some Korean dishes which do rely on ingredients and simplicity, thinking of a dish like mulhwae, but pizza is kind of a novelty. And if it's going to be a novelty, it might as well be a bit of a spectacal.
Personally, I love exploring both sides!
There are some Korean dishes which do rely on ingredients and simplicity, thinking of a dish like mulhwae, but pizza is kind of a novelty. And if it's going to be a novelty, it might as well be a bit of a spectacal.
Personally, I love exploring both sides!
I think exploring both sides is essential. I bet pizza was the result of exploring multiple cuisines once upon a time. Exploration is why we have so many awesome foods.
To say that technique isn't part of what makes Italian cuisine good is a bit inane, many pasta dishes are just plain bad without good technique, e.g. spaghetti aglio e olio becomes an oily mess, the cheese in caccio e peppe breaks, the eggs break in carbonara.
Would rather not. However, KBBQ with banchan is another favorite meal.
Ugly Delicious covers this subject pretty well.
https://www.netflix.com/title/80170368
the most incredible thing to me about Italian cruisine is the fact that the tomato is not even native to Italy.
I think about that anytime someone says something like "American food is so unoriginal, everything good there is stolen from immigrants" ... well sure, we're all ancestrally from somewhere else, and we brought lots of food traditions with us ... why do people say that like it's an insult? But really the same goes for the whole world on a long enough time scale. Heck, Italy wasn't even a thing when the Medicis were enjoying their imported tomatoes.
This.
No tradition or culture can claim to be purely from one place. Everything has mixed in the world by now. All of us are immigrants.
No tradition or culture can claim to be purely from one place. Everything has mixed in the world by now. All of us are immigrants.
most dishes in europe would be plain boring without the columbian exchange. except for bread and fish/meat, you have very little staple foods left. Mainly beets and variants of it.
Potatoes are another great example. Being the staple food for most people since atleast the 1700's.
It's about giving credit where credit is due.
Failing to do so often and on an industrial scale quickly becomes cultural appropriation.
In HN terms: it's like systematically violating FOSS licenses that require attribution.
Also, about not butchering something and/or making false claims its originality.
Failing to do so often and on an industrial scale quickly becomes cultural appropriation.
In HN terms: it's like systematically violating FOSS licenses that require attribution.
Also, about not butchering something and/or making false claims its originality.
That's an interesting comparison - I've never thought of cultural appropriation along the lines of FOSS licenses before (I guess because the rules for borrowing from other cultures are unwritten). I wonder what compliance should look like in this case - is it enough for the borrower to treat the borrowed dish with care and make an earnest attempt to create something that respects the culture of origin (E.g., don't make steak tikka masala)? Should there be a note on the menu "this dish is inspired by the traditional food X, from culture Y"?
Just like for books, music, software, movies:
- if it's an exact copy, give attribution
- if it's inspired-by but different, say it
- if it's a new thing, don't give false attribution (e.g. with a misleading name)
- if the origin is forgotten or unclear, don't claim ownership
- if it's an exact copy, give attribution
- if it's inspired-by but different, say it
- if it's a new thing, don't give false attribution (e.g. with a misleading name)
- if the origin is forgotten or unclear, don't claim ownership
So what should we call spaghetti with a marinara? Chinese noodles with crushed American nightshades?
I think it'd be easy to take goodpoint's brief post to the point of absurdity, but I'm trying to give it a more productive reading.
The Culinary Cultural Appropriation Police are not going to come after anyone for not explaining spaghetti or tacos to an American audience. Everyone knows what those are even if they don't know every bit of the history of those items.
But if you're going to introduce a lesser-known dish, it'd be better to provide some context. When a white chef puts his twist on Ghanaian groundnut soup on the menu, that's ok - but don't just call it "Tim's Tasty Nut Soup" without referring to what it was inspired by. Give credit to the culture that invented the thing (and no, I don't think your menu needs to dive into the fact that it contains tomatoes which aren't native to Ghana, etc).
The Culinary Cultural Appropriation Police are not going to come after anyone for not explaining spaghetti or tacos to an American audience. Everyone knows what those are even if they don't know every bit of the history of those items.
But if you're going to introduce a lesser-known dish, it'd be better to provide some context. When a white chef puts his twist on Ghanaian groundnut soup on the menu, that's ok - but don't just call it "Tim's Tasty Nut Soup" without referring to what it was inspired by. Give credit to the culture that invented the thing (and no, I don't think your menu needs to dive into the fact that it contains tomatoes which aren't native to Ghana, etc).
Spot on.
Also don't slap the name of a food that people heard about on something very different.
Also don't slap the name of a food that people heard about on something very different.
Tomatoes have been grown in Italy since at least 1550, plenty of time to be firmly accepted in the food culture.
Edit: Come to think about it, tomatoes in Italy have existed longer than Italy itself.
Edit: Come to think about it, tomatoes in Italy have existed longer than Italy itself.
by about 400 years at that!. (if we take into concept the first foundation of the italian state, and not its predecessors. A common heritage of the italian peninsula is ofcourse far, far older).
They'll be claiming fish & chips isn't an English dish next!
Fried fish was originally Spanish/Portuguese possibly brought by Jewish immigrants to the UK
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pescado_frito
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pescado_frito
Aye, very few things we think as traditionally of one place actually originated there. Turns out I'd have liked the past Spanish fort as much as the more modern one works for me!
(Specifically in the post above I was referring to the chip, on the basis that the potatoe "came" to England in a similar timeframe to the quote of the tomato beginning commonplace in Italy from.)
(Specifically in the post above I was referring to the chip, on the basis that the potatoe "came" to England in a similar timeframe to the quote of the tomato beginning commonplace in Italy from.)
Or Curry!
Durum wheat was likewise introduced to Italy in the 9th or 10th century AD, if I recall correctly as a consequence of the Muslim conquest of Sicily. Interesting to think that those iconic elements of their modern cuisine were introduced "recently" in the historical sense.
Lots of other European countries also radically changed their diets, some as recently as 300 years ago
Yup, really interesting. Chile's aren't native to India or Thailand either.
There are many examples of that. Hungarian paprika made of peppers that are originally from the Americas. Same for Indian cuisine. Read The Columbian Exchange: Biological and Cultural Consequences of 1492 by Alfred W. Crosby
My understanding is that pizza maybe originally from Italy, but it was popularized in the US by Italian-Americans. When American tourists started traveling in Europe in large numbers, they wanted "authentic" pizza, so Italians obliged by serving them a reinvented pizza.
My understanding is that pizza maybe originally from Italy, but it was popularized in the US by Italian-Americans. When American tourists started traveling in Europe in large numbers, they wanted "authentic" pizza, so Italians obliged by serving them a reinvented pizza.
> but it was popularized in the US by Italian-Americans.
Sweden and Southern Germany had pizzerias before WWII. Same for São Paulo (Brazil) and Buenos Aires (Argentina), both cities with a big Italian immigration on the 19th century.
The town of Nice, in southern France, has pissaladiere as a local dish since the end of 19th century.
And then there are the hundreds of different versions of flat-breads from Asia to North Africa.
Sweden and Southern Germany had pizzerias before WWII. Same for São Paulo (Brazil) and Buenos Aires (Argentina), both cities with a big Italian immigration on the 19th century.
The town of Nice, in southern France, has pissaladiere as a local dish since the end of 19th century.
And then there are the hundreds of different versions of flat-breads from Asia to North Africa.
That may be true, but no one spends like American tourists :-) asking for local "authentic" experiences. Also, I love pissaladière and have made it many times.
Isn't that true of a lot of old world cuisines? Potatoes, tomatoes, and chiles are native to the Americas so a lot of it didn't get introduced to Europe and Asia until the 1600/1700s.
Nor potatoes (gnocchi), corn (polenta), zucchini, prickly pear, peppers...
I think peppers are the one that blows my mind the most. They're centered in quite a few food cultures, and I got quite far into life not realizing how relatively new that phenomenon is.
I think peppers are the one that blows my mind the most. They're centered in quite a few food cultures, and I got quite far into life not realizing how relatively new that phenomenon is.
Nor pasta. So what did Italians actually eat? I've always wondered.
Fish, bread, olive oil, beef, pork, wine, basically the ancient roman diet continued until the crusades at least.
I recall that when I was in Chiavenna (in the north, bordering Switzerland) there is a valley with a large chestnut forest. Chestnuts used to be a staple in that region.
You can also read up on the ancient roman diet, there are many sources on that.
You can also read up on the ancient roman diet, there are many sources on that.
Aye, chillies and peppers generally are the one that blows my tiny little mind - to think of all the cultures, spanning right around the world, almost back to the Americas again - whose cuisine relies so much on those delicious things.
Basically none of the vegetables we eat are 'native' but have been bred for centuries to be what they are today
Interesting thing is that is quite big range of foods.
Otherwise it is quite common to have just one 'national dish' that is originated elsewhere (like Hungarian Goulash) or use relatively new ingredients (like potatoes in Slovak Halusky).