Pizza

Lore & Background

Pizza is a baked dish of Italian origin, consisting of a flat, leavened wheat dough base topped with tomato, cheese, and other ingredients, traditionally cooked at high heat in a wood-fired oven. Its defining characteristic is this combination of a crisp yet chewy crust with a savory, often melted-cheese topping. The modern version of pizza is widely attributed to Raffaele Esposito in late 19th-century Naples, though flatbreads with toppings have existed since antiquity; ancient Persian soldiers baked cheese and dates on flatbreads, and Greeks added oils, herbs, and cheese to their bread. The word "pizza" itself first appears in a Latin notarial document from Gaeta, Italy, dated AD 997, which records a payment of twelve pizzas as part of a yearly rent.

The dish evolved from Neapolitan street food, sold from open-air stands and bakeries, before sit-down pizzerias emerged around 1830. Neapolitan pizza was granted European Union Traditional Speciality Guaranteed status in 2009, and the art of making it was inscribed on UNESCO’s Intangible Cultural Heritage list in 2017. Pizza is now among the world’s most popular foods, sold in pizzerias, via delivery, as street food, and in frozen or self-assembly kits for home ovens. In Italian restaurants, it is served unsliced and eaten with knife and fork; in casual settings, it is cut into hand-held slices.

Reader's Guide

Pizza is an Italian dish built from a flat base of leavened wheat dough, topped with tomato, cheese, and other ingredients, then baked at high heat, traditionally in a wood-fired oven. The word “pizza” first appeared in a Latin manuscript from the southern Italian town of Gaeta in the year 997, where it was listed as part of a payment due to the local bishop. Several origins for the term have been proposed: it may derive from the Byzantine Greek or Late Latin “pitta,” a round flatbread; from the dialectal “pinza,” meaning clamp; or from a Lombardic word for “mouthful.” A person who makes pizza is called a pizzaiolo.

Modern pizza as it is known today evolved in Naples during the late 19th century, with Raffaele Esposito often credited for its creation. In 2009, Neapolitan pizza was registered as a traditional speciality guaranteed dish by the European Union, and in 2017 the art of making it was added to UNESCO’s list of intangible cultural heritage. Pizza and its many variants are among the world’s most popular foods. It is sold in pizzerias, Mediterranean restaurants, as street food, and via delivery.

In Italian restaurants, pizza is served whole and eaten with a knife and fork; in casual settings it is sliced and eaten by hand. Grocery stores offer frozen pizzas and self-assembly kits for home oven cooking. The global pizza market was valued at US$128 billion in 2017, with the United States accounting for $44 billion across 76,000 pizzerias; on any given day, 13% of the U.S. population aged two and older consumes pizza.