Slice Of Heaven
By Todd Plitt, USA TODAY
Exclamation marks dangle in the air like strands of melted mozzarella whenever food writer Ed Levine dives into a pizza that's to his liking. It's part of his chowhound nature. And who can blame him? The slice he has just devoured at Di Fara pizzeria is shout-from-the-rooftops delicious — expertly baked and laden with meaty artichokes and the genuine mozzarella di bufala cheese that only fanatics use. It's a profound creation made by Di Fara's flour-dusted savant, Domenico DeMarco, who has toiled Michelangelo-like in his cramped, oven-side workspace since 1964. "It takes a certain talent, mind-set and temperament to get up every day for 40 years and regard it as a noble endeavor to make pizza," marvels Levine, who enshrines DeMarco and other peerless piemakers in his provocative new book,
Pizza: A Slice of Heaven (Universe, $24.95).
As America observes the 100th anniversary of its first licensed pizzeria, Lombardi's in New York, Levine says it's time to review our love affair with the ancient dish brought here by southern Italian immigrants. Though pizza often is described as the perfect food, it has been stretched and pulled in so many directions that the scarfing masses may have lost sight of what constitutes a superior pie. Levine aims to remind us of why we were originally smitten and identify today's masterful versions so that we can recalibrate our standards. He asserts that "transcendent" pizza is possible only when it's delivered by passionate artisans such as DeMarco — and not by pimply-faced kids working for tips. His approach is heartfelt, but it carries a topping of tough love that might cause heartburn in some corners. "It kills me when people say Pizza Hut's great," Levine, 53, says during a recent visit to several of his favorite yeasty haunts in Brooklyn. "In certain cities across the country, Papa John's would win the readers' survey for best pizza! And I'm thinking, 'Oh, my God, what have we come to?' "
One year and 200 pizzerias later And so Levine, a native New Yorker whose New York Eats books established him as an authority on the city's food treasures, knew he had to accept when a book publisher asked him to search out prime pies and critique the field. He spent a year visiting nearly 200 pizzerias across 20 states, Canada and pizza's ancestral home of Naples, Italy, and rated the best ones. He ate more than 1,000 slices, including frozen versions and ones from every major chain. He consulted with food writers in every region, many of whom contributed essays to the book. "I may have missed an idiosyncratic personal pizza style somewhere, but I would be surprised if there was a great pizza in America that I missed," Levine says. (When prodded, he reveals that he gained only 6 pounds, "because I was fanatical about working out.") Sounds like a dream job, and it was. But from a cultural perspective, it was no trivial pursuit, given how pizza has become such a psychological and economic force. "People's taste memories about pizza are so vivid, so incredibly personal," Levine says. "It's one of those foods you associate with freedom, because it's one of the first things you ate without your parents being there."
Just as important, pizza has mushroomed into a $32-billon-a-year industry and accounts for 10% of all food purchases, according to the trade magazine Pizza Today. As a nation, we inhale at the rate of 350 slices a second, with the bulk of them being supplied by one of the 63,000-plus pizzerias that dot most towns. Even though the chain pizzeria boom in the 1980s and early 1990s has saturated the American market, the overall industry still grows at an annual rate of about 4%, says Pizza Today editor in chief Jeremy White. "A lot of people were worried to death by the low-carb phenomenon, but most places just weathered the storm," White says. "Pizza is kind of like ice cream — no matter what the diet trend out there, they still order." But what does Levine think of what is really being served these days, after a century of Americanizing the traditional Neapolitan model? His survey of the pizza landscape finds it predictably mottled:
•Chicago's deep-dish pizza. "At best, a casserole." (I disagree strongly)
•The famous gourmet pizzas at Wolfgang Puck's Spago in Beverly Hills. "They use great ingredients, but because of the nature of the restaurant, pizza will always be an afterthought."
•Frozen pizza. "I wanted to see if the category had been reinvigorated by all the new technological advancements I had been hearing about. It hasn't." (A noteworthy exception, he says, is American Flatbread.)
•Chain pizza. "Rough. Really rough."
Pizza by the numbers
America's pizza industry has so many distinct branches chain restaurants, independent operators, restaurants where pizza is a sidelight, street vendors, frozen pizzas sold in groceries that accurate statistics on consumption are hard to come by. Here are some of the most recent estimates, drawn from trade magazines, producers and the restaurant industry:
63,800 pizzerias in the USA
2,750 pizzerias in New York
$32 billion: Money spent annually on pizza
3 billion: Pizzas eaten annually. That equals 100 acres of pizza a day or 350 slices a second.
94%: percentage of the population who eat pizza
62%: percentage who prefer meat toppings. Pepperoni is America's favorite topping (36% of all orders). Americans eat about 251.8 million pounds of pepperoni a year.
He guesses that perhaps only 1,000 pizzerias out of 63,000 serve something better than mediocre, and only a handful of those are truly exceptional. Most common sins of the also-rans: "Cut-rate ingredients, too much cheese, cooked tomato sauce and undercooked dough. That gray, gummy stuff." But he also found that "in a surprising number of cities, people are beginning to take pizza more seriously. We're seeing more fresh mozzarella, more wood-burning ovens (which are hotter than most gas ovens and produce a crispier crust). That's a start, but it's not the be-all and end-all. It's not enough to have the oven." No, there also must be "skill, intelligence and obsession," along with superior raw materials. Levine most often found those elements in what he calls the "pizza belt" — a series of enclaves with strong southern Italian traditions that begins in Philadelphia and extends north through Boston. (Though the vast majority of Levine's favorite pizzerias are in the Northeast, he insists he's not biased: "I would have been thrilled to find that West Virginia had an amazing pizza place or North Dakota or whatever, but the belt is where the Neapolitans settled. It's no accident.") The belt is home to such famous places as Totonno's in Brooklyn's Coney Island section, which has been run by four generations of one family since its founding in 1924. During that span, Totonno's has served only pizza, baked in a coal-fired oven that has been replaced only once — a textbook example of the single-minded approach that Levine favors. "We're stubborn," says Louise "Cookie" Ciminieri, who runs the place (and three branches) with son Lawrence. "Pizza is what we know. There has never been a temptation to change." A crust 'like a cloud!' Though some of the old classic parlors are holding steady, Levine also found extraordinary quality in a few newer places run by chefs who, for various reasons, have chosen to focus almost exclusively on pizza. They are creating pies that barely resemble the traditional Neapolitan model. Among them are Andrew Feinberg, 30, of Franny's in Brooklyn ("his crust is gossamer, like a cloud!") and Bronx-born Chris Bianco, 42, of Pizzeria Bianco in Phoenix, who for a decade has made what Levine says is the best pizza he has ever tasted. Chris makes and smokes his own mozzarella every morning. He has a pizza with red onion, pistachios and rosemary that's one of the most intensely flavored things you can imagine. Whew! It's serious! And Phoenix doesn't have a rich pizza culture, so he has created something from nothing, which is cool." Levine can cite a half-dozen other examples of notable chefs who are getting serious about pizza, and he predicts they'll carry on the legacy of quality into the next century. And if that doesn't pan out, there's always the pizza lover's fallback position: "Even if pizza is bad," Levine says, "it's still fresh bread with melted cheese on it, which is still a pretty good thing, isn't it?"
What a dream job. Pizza is my favorite food. The Chicago area has to have the best pizza of any in the world. I'm biased and I had to include this in my blog.
Exclamation marks dangle in the air like strands of melted mozzarella whenever food writer Ed Levine dives into a pizza that's to his liking. It's part of his chowhound nature. And who can blame him? The slice he has just devoured at Di Fara pizzeria is shout-from-the-rooftops delicious — expertly baked and laden with meaty artichokes and the genuine mozzarella di bufala cheese that only fanatics use. It's a profound creation made by Di Fara's flour-dusted savant, Domenico DeMarco, who has toiled Michelangelo-like in his cramped, oven-side workspace since 1964. "It takes a certain talent, mind-set and temperament to get up every day for 40 years and regard it as a noble endeavor to make pizza," marvels Levine, who enshrines DeMarco and other peerless piemakers in his provocative new book,
Pizza: A Slice of Heaven (Universe, $24.95).
As America observes the 100th anniversary of its first licensed pizzeria, Lombardi's in New York, Levine says it's time to review our love affair with the ancient dish brought here by southern Italian immigrants. Though pizza often is described as the perfect food, it has been stretched and pulled in so many directions that the scarfing masses may have lost sight of what constitutes a superior pie. Levine aims to remind us of why we were originally smitten and identify today's masterful versions so that we can recalibrate our standards. He asserts that "transcendent" pizza is possible only when it's delivered by passionate artisans such as DeMarco — and not by pimply-faced kids working for tips. His approach is heartfelt, but it carries a topping of tough love that might cause heartburn in some corners. "It kills me when people say Pizza Hut's great," Levine, 53, says during a recent visit to several of his favorite yeasty haunts in Brooklyn. "In certain cities across the country, Papa John's would win the readers' survey for best pizza! And I'm thinking, 'Oh, my God, what have we come to?' "
One year and 200 pizzerias later And so Levine, a native New Yorker whose New York Eats books established him as an authority on the city's food treasures, knew he had to accept when a book publisher asked him to search out prime pies and critique the field. He spent a year visiting nearly 200 pizzerias across 20 states, Canada and pizza's ancestral home of Naples, Italy, and rated the best ones. He ate more than 1,000 slices, including frozen versions and ones from every major chain. He consulted with food writers in every region, many of whom contributed essays to the book. "I may have missed an idiosyncratic personal pizza style somewhere, but I would be surprised if there was a great pizza in America that I missed," Levine says. (When prodded, he reveals that he gained only 6 pounds, "because I was fanatical about working out.") Sounds like a dream job, and it was. But from a cultural perspective, it was no trivial pursuit, given how pizza has become such a psychological and economic force. "People's taste memories about pizza are so vivid, so incredibly personal," Levine says. "It's one of those foods you associate with freedom, because it's one of the first things you ate without your parents being there."
Just as important, pizza has mushroomed into a $32-billon-a-year industry and accounts for 10% of all food purchases, according to the trade magazine Pizza Today. As a nation, we inhale at the rate of 350 slices a second, with the bulk of them being supplied by one of the 63,000-plus pizzerias that dot most towns. Even though the chain pizzeria boom in the 1980s and early 1990s has saturated the American market, the overall industry still grows at an annual rate of about 4%, says Pizza Today editor in chief Jeremy White. "A lot of people were worried to death by the low-carb phenomenon, but most places just weathered the storm," White says. "Pizza is kind of like ice cream — no matter what the diet trend out there, they still order." But what does Levine think of what is really being served these days, after a century of Americanizing the traditional Neapolitan model? His survey of the pizza landscape finds it predictably mottled:
•Chicago's deep-dish pizza. "At best, a casserole." (I disagree strongly)
•The famous gourmet pizzas at Wolfgang Puck's Spago in Beverly Hills. "They use great ingredients, but because of the nature of the restaurant, pizza will always be an afterthought."
•Frozen pizza. "I wanted to see if the category had been reinvigorated by all the new technological advancements I had been hearing about. It hasn't." (A noteworthy exception, he says, is American Flatbread.)
•Chain pizza. "Rough. Really rough."
Pizza by the numbers
America's pizza industry has so many distinct branches chain restaurants, independent operators, restaurants where pizza is a sidelight, street vendors, frozen pizzas sold in groceries that accurate statistics on consumption are hard to come by. Here are some of the most recent estimates, drawn from trade magazines, producers and the restaurant industry:
63,800 pizzerias in the USA
2,750 pizzerias in New York
$32 billion: Money spent annually on pizza
3 billion: Pizzas eaten annually. That equals 100 acres of pizza a day or 350 slices a second.
94%: percentage of the population who eat pizza
62%: percentage who prefer meat toppings. Pepperoni is America's favorite topping (36% of all orders). Americans eat about 251.8 million pounds of pepperoni a year.
He guesses that perhaps only 1,000 pizzerias out of 63,000 serve something better than mediocre, and only a handful of those are truly exceptional. Most common sins of the also-rans: "Cut-rate ingredients, too much cheese, cooked tomato sauce and undercooked dough. That gray, gummy stuff." But he also found that "in a surprising number of cities, people are beginning to take pizza more seriously. We're seeing more fresh mozzarella, more wood-burning ovens (which are hotter than most gas ovens and produce a crispier crust). That's a start, but it's not the be-all and end-all. It's not enough to have the oven." No, there also must be "skill, intelligence and obsession," along with superior raw materials. Levine most often found those elements in what he calls the "pizza belt" — a series of enclaves with strong southern Italian traditions that begins in Philadelphia and extends north through Boston. (Though the vast majority of Levine's favorite pizzerias are in the Northeast, he insists he's not biased: "I would have been thrilled to find that West Virginia had an amazing pizza place or North Dakota or whatever, but the belt is where the Neapolitans settled. It's no accident.") The belt is home to such famous places as Totonno's in Brooklyn's Coney Island section, which has been run by four generations of one family since its founding in 1924. During that span, Totonno's has served only pizza, baked in a coal-fired oven that has been replaced only once — a textbook example of the single-minded approach that Levine favors. "We're stubborn," says Louise "Cookie" Ciminieri, who runs the place (and three branches) with son Lawrence. "Pizza is what we know. There has never been a temptation to change." A crust 'like a cloud!' Though some of the old classic parlors are holding steady, Levine also found extraordinary quality in a few newer places run by chefs who, for various reasons, have chosen to focus almost exclusively on pizza. They are creating pies that barely resemble the traditional Neapolitan model. Among them are Andrew Feinberg, 30, of Franny's in Brooklyn ("his crust is gossamer, like a cloud!") and Bronx-born Chris Bianco, 42, of Pizzeria Bianco in Phoenix, who for a decade has made what Levine says is the best pizza he has ever tasted. Chris makes and smokes his own mozzarella every morning. He has a pizza with red onion, pistachios and rosemary that's one of the most intensely flavored things you can imagine. Whew! It's serious! And Phoenix doesn't have a rich pizza culture, so he has created something from nothing, which is cool." Levine can cite a half-dozen other examples of notable chefs who are getting serious about pizza, and he predicts they'll carry on the legacy of quality into the next century. And if that doesn't pan out, there's always the pizza lover's fallback position: "Even if pizza is bad," Levine says, "it's still fresh bread with melted cheese on it, which is still a pretty good thing, isn't it?"
What a dream job. Pizza is my favorite food. The Chicago area has to have the best pizza of any in the world. I'm biased and I had to include this in my blog.
posted by MaximumBob | 12:30 PM
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