Italy Is Up in Arms over This New Pineapple Pizza
Does pineapple belong on pizza? A question that can stir up quite a lot among people, and certainly among Italians — or so you would think. Because pizza is sacred in Italy. A Hawaiian pizza, of course, is sacrilege. So you get it: when a new pineapple pizza is introduced, in Italy!!, the whole country is up in arms.
My first job was as a pizza maker at New York Pizza, and I had to make creations there that still give me nightmares. Anchovies with pineapple, for example — someone actually ordered that once. Work there for a month, and pineapple on a pizza suddenly no longer sounds all that strange.
Margherita con Ananas
Gino Sorbillo, a Neapolitan pizzaiolo (pizza maker in Dutch), has his own restaurant, pizzeria Sorbillo, on Via dei Tribunali in Naples. This is the city’s most famous street when it comes to pizza. And since the beginning of this year, Gino has had a very special pizza on the menu, causing quite a stir in Naples. Seriously: for now, the Margherita con Ananas is here to stay on Gino Sorbillo’s menu. And you can imagine that the Italians there — to put it mildly — need a little time to get used to it.
It isn’t an ordinary Margherita, by the way, but a pizza bianca. That’s right: a pizza without tomato sauce, but topped with cheese and, of course, pineapple. Quite a bold move by Sorbillo, especially in this location. This pizzaiolo has 21 restaurants worldwide, with locations in Miami and Tokyo, and a 22nd one opening soon on the Amalfi Coast. But why put this controversial pizza on the menu דווקא in the city that revolves around pizza?!
‘No More Food Judgments’
According to Sorbillo, he is fed up with the fact that ‘people unfortunately follow the crowd and teach themselves to adopt other people’s opinions and views.’ Putting a pizza with pineapple on the menu is therefore, according to him, a way to eliminate prejudices about food: ‘in recent years, I have noticed that many people criticized ingredients or methods of preparation simply because things were done differently in the past, so I wanted to put these controversial ingredients — they are treated as if they were poison — on a Neapolitan pizza, to make it delicious.’
The choice of Naples as the location to introduce this pizza was therefore no coincidence. But his pizza bianca really is one of a kind. The pineapple is first baked in the oven. Once the pineapple has cooled, he adds provola, extra-virgin olive oil and fresh basil before putting the pizza dough in the oven. When the pizza is ready, he shaves two types of Cacioricotta cheese (one made from goat’s milk, one from buffalo’s milk) over the edge.
Well, honestly: this sounds pretty delicious…
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Source: CNN
