{"id":4528,"date":"2016-07-04T03:35:08","date_gmt":"2016-07-04T07:35:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/language-news\/?p=4528"},"modified":"2020-10-01T13:59:59","modified_gmt":"2020-10-01T17:59:59","slug":"devils-seasons-and-queens-whats-in-an-italian-pizza-name","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/language-news\/2016\/07\/04\/devils-seasons-and-queens-whats-in-an-italian-pizza-name\/","title":{"rendered":"Devils, Seasons and Queens: What’s in an Italian Pizza Name? (Corrected!)"},"content":{"rendered":"

There’s pizza, and then there’s la pizza<\/em>. From the simple\u00a0margherita<\/em> to the robust\u00a0quattro stagioni<\/em>, there’s more than meets the eye – or taste buds –\u00a0in\u00a0the names of Italy’s favorite children.<\/p>\n

\"Itchy<\/a><\/p>\n

Update: I’ve been schooled! Our resident Italian bloggers, Geoff and Serena, read this post and have a few choice corrections to make. I’ve updated this post with their comments, in italics. Thanks guys!<\/em><\/p>\n

Italians take their pizza very seriously. This we know. They make the finest pizza in the world (although one of my all-time favorite pizzas was in Croatia…shhhhh!), and if you’ve ever been to a pizzeria in Italy, you know there are several “standard” pizzas with special names. Although there are slight regional variations to each type, standards are standards. You’re not likely\u00a0to find Hawaiian maple syrup chicken blue cheese alfredo lime peanut butter pizza among them.<\/p>\n

And this, if I may be honest with you for a moment, is my only gripe with Italian pizza. In America, land of the free and home of the brave, we list the possible toppings, so that you, an individual agent with free will, may decide how to decorate your pie. Not in Italy. In Italy, if you want toppings other than what’s standard, or want to change a standard pizza to fit your own personal (i.e., inferior) standards, you get at best an eye-roll and an internal sigh from the waiter (“tourists…”), and at worst outright refusal. Can’t I decide what’s best for my meal?!<\/p>\n

This is inaccurate. It may have been vaguely true 20 years ago, but is absolutely not the\u00a0case today.\u00a0By law, the ingredients of each pizza must be listed on the menu, especially if it contains\u00a0possible allergens.\u00a0We have never been to a pizzeria where it wasn\u2019t possible to adjust a pizza to your\u00a0requirements, in fact, our local pizzeria will even do a half and half pizza for two people\u00a0with different tastes to share. Obviously, no pizzaiolo (pizza maker) is going to completely\u00a0reinvent the pizza for every customer, but that would be the same of any traditional dish in\u00a0any country.<\/em><\/p>\n

Anyway, I’ll just get down off my soap box – that’s what the comic above was for, after all. I’ve since learned to trust Italian tradition and agree to their rules of pizza engagement. Less is more. It’s better for everyone involved. So\u00a0let’s\u00a0get back to the point: the three most famous pizzas, what their names mean, some interesting stories\u00a0behind them, and some delicious Italian food vocab along the way.\u00a0Buon appetito!\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

Pizza Margherita <\/strong>(mozzarella and basil)
\n<\/strong>If ever there was a poster child for both pizza itself and Italy as a country, this simple dish would be it. No, the name has nothing to do with margarita cocktails, which is a Mexican concoction.\u00a0Rumor has it<\/a> that after Italy’s reunification, Queen Margherita of Savoy visited Naples, where she was baked a pizza with the colors of the new Italian flag: green (basil, basilico<\/em>), white (mozzarella), and red (tomato sauce, salsa pomodoro<\/em>). Since then this has become the<\/em> classic.<\/p>\n

Grammatically, salsa pomodoro<\/span> is incorrect. It should be salsa di pomodoro<\/span>. However,\u00a0<\/em>salsa di pomodoro, which is a cooked tomato sauce, is not used in pizza Margherita.\u00a0<\/em>The correct ingredient is passata di pomodoro<\/span>, uncooked minced tomatoes.<\/em><\/p>\n

Pizza Diavola<\/strong> (spicy salami)
\nMy personal favorite. The full name,\u00a0pizza alla diavola<\/em>, literally translates to “pizza in the devil’s style.” The devil and I both like things spicy, apparently.\u00a0A\u00a0diavola<\/em>\u00a0is technically the Italian pizza closest to the classic American pepperoni pizza –\u00a0however,\u00a0do not<\/em> go to Italy and order a “pepperoni” pizza! In Italian,\u00a0peperoni<\/em>\u00a0(notice just one p<\/em>)\u00a0is the word for bell peppers<\/em>, so the pizza you receive<\/a> will disappoint you greatly. If you want salami slices on pizza, you’d better order the diavola<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Quattro Stagioni<\/strong>\u00a0(artichokes, olives, prosciutto, mushrooms)
\nLiterally, the “four seasons” pizza. Presumably the ingredients correspond to seasons of the year, though it’s not clear which are which – artichokes (carciofi<\/em>) could be spring, mushrooms (funghi<\/em>) winter, olives (olive<\/em>)\u00a0fall and summer, I suppose, would be prosciutto\u00a0(pronounced “pro-shoot-toh,” please. An American friend once called it “pro-skweeto” and it took me forever to figure out what on earth she was saying). Unlike in the USA, Italians put the quattro stagioni<\/em>\u00a0toppings in four distinct quadrants on the pizza. If you want the\u00a0quattro stagioni<\/em> with the toppings all strewn about and mixed together, you’re going to have to order the\u00a0capricciosa<\/em> (“capricious” or “chef’s whim”)\u00a0– literally the exact same pizza, but not so neat and tidy. Did they really need another name for that?<\/p>\n

Incorrect. The most important pizza has been omitted from the list: la pizza Napolitana<\/span>. In\u00a0fact, la pizza Napolitana is the only DOC pizza in Italy, rendering it the true classic.<\/em><\/p>\n

Well, those are the Big Three.\u00a0Now, as the Italians say, ho tanto fame –<\/em>\u00a0I’m really hungry!<\/p>\n

Grammatically incorrect: fame<\/span> is a feminine noun, therefore it should be \u201cho tanta<\/strong> fame<\/span>!\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\"\"

There’s pizza, and then there’s la pizza. From the simple\u00a0margherita to the robust\u00a0quattro stagioni, there’s more than meets the eye – or taste buds –\u00a0in\u00a0the names of Italy’s favorite children. Update: I’ve been schooled! Our resident Italian bloggers, Geoff and Serena, read this post and have a few choice corrections to make. I’ve updated this…<\/p>\n

Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":115,"featured_media":4530,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":""},"categories":[542801],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4528","post","type-post","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-archived-posts"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/language-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4528","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/language-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/language-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/language-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/115"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/language-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4528"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/language-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4528\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8180,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/language-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4528\/revisions\/8180"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/language-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4530"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/language-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4528"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/language-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4528"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/language-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4528"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}