Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
Definition: Pizza |
PizzaNoun1. Italian open pie made of thin bread dough spread with a spiced mixture of e.g. tomato sauce and cheese. Source: WordNet 1.7.1 Copyright © 2001 by Princeton University. All rights reserved. |
(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)
In its basic form, a pizza (alternatively pizza pie) is an oven-baked flat, usually circular bread covered with various toppings and baked. The usual toppings are cheese and a tomato-based sauce. The cheese is usually mozzarella or its commercial substitute, pizza cheese. Various other foodstuffs can be added to this design, most typically ground meats and sausages, such as salami and pepperoni, ham, bacon and also vegetables such as hot peppers and sweet bell-peppers (of the capsicum family), olives, onions, and mushrooms. The crust can be flavored with butter, garlic or sesame. Pizza can be eaten either hot (typically at dinner or lunch) or cold (typically at breakfast or on a picnic).
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Types of pizza
Authentic Neapolitan pizza ('a pizza Napulitana)
According to Associazione vera pizza napoletana, genuine Napolitan pizza dough consists of flour, natural yeast or yeast of beer and water. Further the dough must be kneeded by hand or with an approved mixer. After the rising process the dough must be formed by hand without the help of a rolling pin or any other mechanical device. Baking the pizza must take place on the surface of a bell shaped, wood fired, volcanic stone oven. The oven temprature is between 400°C and 450°C and the pizza is cooked for approximately 2 minutes. When eatean the following characteristics should be present: soft, well cooked, fragrant and enclosed in a soft edge of crust.The classic types include and their respective toppings are:
Basil leaves are optional.
- Marinara or Napoletana: tomato, olive oil, oregano, and garlic.
- Margherita: tomato, olive oil, grated parmesan cheese, and fior-di-latte (mozzarella made from cow's milk) or mozzarella di buffalo.
- Ripieno or Calzone: ricotta cheese, fior-di-latte or mozzarella di buffalo, olive oil, and salami.
- Formaggio e Pomodoro: tomato, olive oil, and grated parmesan cheese.
Others
Pizza has become an international food since the toppings can be extensively varied to meet local variations in taste. These pizzas consist of the same basic design, but include an exceptionally diverse choice of ingredients, such as anchovies, egg, pineapple, eggplant, lamb, couscous, chicken, fish and shellfish, meats done in ethnic styles such as Moroccan lamb and non-traditional spices such as curry and Thai sweet chili. A "white pizza" uses no tomato sauce, often substituting pesto sauce. Pizzas with "non-traditional ingredients" are known in the United States as "gourmet pizza" or California style.Pizza may be baked with thin bread bottom (Italian style) or with thicker bread (pan pizza). A Chicago style, or deep dish pizza contains a crust which is formed up the sides of a deep dish pan and reverses the order of ingredients, using crust, cheese, filling, then sauce on top. Some versions have two layers of crust with the sauce on top.
In restaurants it can be baked in a conveyor belt oven or in the case of more expensive restaurants, a wood fired brick oven.
History
Although the birthplace of modern day pizza is Naples it is believed to have originated from the flat breads of ancient Persia and was introduced to present day Italy by the way of Greece.In the 3rd century B.C., the first history of Rome, written by Marcus Porcius Cato, mentions a "flat round of dough dressed with olive oil, herbs, and honey baked on stones". Further evidence is found in 79 A.D. from the remains of Pompeii, archeologists excavated shops that closely resemble a present day pizzeria.
The tomato was first believed to be poisonous, when it came to Europe in the 16th century, but eventually the poor of the area around Napels added it as an ingredient to their yeast based flat bread and the dish gained in popularity. Pizza became a 17th century tourist attraction and visitor to Naples ventured into the poorer areas of the city to try the local speciality.
The earliest pizzeria opened in 1830 at Via Port'Alba 18 in Naples and is still in business today. Pizza was still considered "poor man's food" in 1889 when Rafaele Esposito, the most famous pizzaiolo of Naples, was summoned before King Umberto I and Queen Margherita to prepare the local speciality. It is said that he made two traditional ones and additionally created one in the colors of the Italian flag with red tomato sauce, white mozzarella cheese, and green basil leaves. The Queen was delighted and "pizza Margherita" was born.
The international breakthrough came after World War II. While the American troops involved in the Italian campaign took their appreciation for the dish back home, the millions of Italians called to help rebuild the damaged economy introduced their cuisine to rest of Europe.
With the rising popularity in the 1950s, especially in the US, several major corporations became chiefly engaged in the commercial production of pizza, notably Pizza Hut (owned by Yum Brands, Inc), Domino's Pizza, Little Caesar's, Round Table Pizza and Papa John's Pizza. These pizza chains often coexist with locally owned and operated pizza chains. Because pizzas can be made quickly and are easily transported, most pizza restaurants in the United States offer call-in delivery services. The lack of such delivery services at the time in England was the focus of an extended passage in Douglas Adams's novel The long Dark Tea Time of the Soul.
In most developed countries, pizza is also found in supermarkets as a frozen food. Considerable amounts of food technology has gone into the creation of palatable frozen pizzas. The main challenges include preventing the sauce from combining with the dough, and producing a crust that can be frozen and reheated without becoming rigid.
External links
- Associazione vera pizza napoletana -- US Chapter
- A more indepth history of the Pizza
Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Pizza."
Synonym: PizzaSynonym: pizza pie (n). (additional references) |
Crosswords: Pizza |
| English words defined with "pizza": anchovy pizza ♦ cheese pizza ♦ pepperoni pizza ♦ sausage pizza, Sicilian pizza. (references) |
| Specialty definitions using "pizza": BAKER, PIZZA ♦ COOK, SPECIALTY ♦ pizza box ♦ rotary debugger ♦ touchpad. (references) |
| Non-English Usage: "Pizza" is also a word in the following languages with English translations in parentheses. Czech (pizza), Dutch (pizza), Finnish (pizza), French (pizza), German (pizza), Hungarian (pizza), Italian (can, film can, pizza, reel), Portuguese (pizza), Spanish (pizza), Swedish (pizza), Turkish (pizza, tortilla). |
| Domain | Usage | |
Screenplays | Sex is kinda like pizza. When it's bad, it's still pretty good (Threesome; writing credit: Andrew Fleming.) Certainly there's nothing wrong with a little pizza on our time (Fast Times at Ridgemont High; writing credit: Cameron Crowe.) Hey Crazy Eyes, I got your pizza just how you like it. (Mr. Deeds; writing credit: Clarence Budington Kell; Robert Riskin) I say we stack ourselves up, push the intercom and pretend we're delivering a pizza. (Toy Story 2; writing credit: John Lasseter; Peter Docter) I like pizza. (Multiplicity ; writing credit: Lowell Ganz, Mary Hale, Babaloo Mandel, Chris Miller) | |
Lyrics | Dominoes' pizza in the candle light (Just Another Day In Paradise; performing artist: Phil Vassar) | |
Clever | We live in a society where pizza gets to your house before the police. (references; author: unknown) | |
Movie/TV Titles | Cold Pizza (1972) For the Love of Pizza (1972) Real Italian Pizza (1971) A Pizza Tweety-Pie (1958) Fat Pizza (2003) | |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | ||
| Domain | Title | ||
References |
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Books |
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Periodicals |
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Theater & Movies | |||
Music |
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Consumer Goods | |||
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |||
| Thumbnail | Description & Credit | Thumbnail | Description & Credit |
 | (2) color slides show single slice of pizza. (1) plain cheese, (1) sausage and cheese. Credit: Renee Comet (photographer). |  | It is now official. Pizza can be delivered virtually anywhere. Credit: Coast & Geodetic Survey Historical Image Collection. |
 | McARTHUR deck hand Mike Theberge and NOAA Corps Lieutenant Alex von Saunder preparing pizzas on McARTHUR Pizza Night. Credit: Sailing for Science - the NOAA Fleet Then and Now. |  | Pizza. P. Credit: USDA ARS News; photo by Scott Bauer.. |
 | Pizza. Credit: Rich Bjervig. | ||
Source: pictures compiled by the editor from various references; see picture credits. | |||
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| "Window Shopping" by Billy Fowks Commentary: "Two Boots Pizza, 4th and Ave A, NY I would love to know what my pictures are being used for. Please let me know. Thanks!." |
Source: photographs selected by the editor, with permission from the photographers. |
| Subject | Topic | Quote |
Health | Well-seasoned foods such as spaghetti, tacos, and pizza may seem especially good at times. (references) | |
Business | GIB originally owned the Pizza Hut master franchise. (references) | |
Pizza City is owned by an American formerly employed by Domino’s Pizza. (references) | ||
Tricon owns Pizza Hut, Taco Bell and KFC. Tricon Belgium is headquartered in Antwerp. (references) | ||
Economic History | Ecuador | Several U.S. franchise chains are now operating in Ecuador, including Tricon (Pizza Hut/Kentucky Fried Chicken/Taco Bell), Burger King, McDonalds, Domino's Pizza, and Blockbuster Video. (references) |
Ireland | A number of established U.S. franchise systems such as Burger King, Domino's Pizza and Subway have recently announced aggressive expansion plans in Ireland. (references) | |
India | Some of the major U.S. companies which are slowly spreading to these small cities include: GE Medical Systems, Johnson Controls, John Deere, Whirlpool, Frito Lay, Parametric Technology Solutions, Lucent Technologies, Cirrus Logic, Amphenol Amphetronix, AT&T, BPL US WEST, Babcox & Wilcox Pizza Hut, Domino's Pizza, McDonald's, Kimberley-Clark, Johnson Wax, and Schentedy Chemicals in Pune; Colgate Palmolive in Aurangabad; Elbee-UPS Courier in Nagpur; General Motors in Vadodara; Proctor & Gamble in Mandideep, near Indore. (references) | |
Human Rights | Algeria | At 1:00 a.m. on July 25, armed terrorists entered a pizza shop in the tourist town of Tipaza and opened fire with automatic weapons, killing two persons. (references) |
Travel | Bahrain | There is a wide range of restaurants available in all price ranges, from an array of international cuisine and ethnic restaurants to well-known U.S. chains such as McDonald's, Pizza Hut, Burger King, Kentucky Fried Chicken, Fuddruckers, Chili's, Ponderosa, Schlotsky's Deli, Hard Rock Café, Bennigan's, and Johnny Carino's. (references) |
Colombia | A variety of international restaurants can be found in most major cities, including American fast- food restaurants such as McDonald's, Pizza Hut, Jeno's Pizza and KFC. Colombian cuisine has been influenced by a combination of Spanish, African, and native traditions. (references) | |
Source: compiled by the editor from ICON Group International, Inc.; see credits. | ||
| "Pizza" is generally used as a noun (singular) -- approximately 83.06% of the time. "Pizza" is used about 425 times out of a sample of 100 million words spoken or written in English. Its rank is based on over 700,000 words used in the English language. Some parts-of-speech are not covered due to the samples used by the British National Corpus. (note: percents less than one-hundredth of one percent have been omitted) |
| Parts of Speech | Percent | Usage per 100 Million Words | Rank in English |
| Noun (singular) | 83.06% | 353 | 15,179 |
| Noun (proper) | 16.71% | 71 | 39,674 |
| Noun (common) | 0.24% | 1 | 339,140 |
| Total | 100.00% | 425 | N/A |
Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits.
| The following table summarizes the usage of "pizza" based on a population census conducted in the United States. Ranks and frequencies are based on all names reported and classified. |
| Name | Usage/Gender | Usage per 100 million Persons | Rank in USA |
| Pizza | Last name | 200 | 39,574 |
| Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits. | |||
| Country | Name | Country | Name |
| United Kingdom | Domino's Pizza UK & Irl PLC | USA | California Pizza Kitchen, Inc. |
| (more examples...) |
Source: compiled by the editor from Icon Group International, Inc.
Expressions using "pizza": anchovy pizza ♦ ANSI standard pizza ♦ cheese pizza ♦ pepperoni pizza ♦ pizza box ♦ pizza parlor ♦ pizza pie ♦ pizza shop ♦ sausage pizza ♦ sicilian pizza. Additional references. | |
| Hyphenated Usage | |
Beginning with "pizza": pizza-faced, pizza-munching, pizza-style. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| The following statistics estimate the number of searches per day across the major English-language search engines as identified by various trade publications. Hyperlinks lead to commercial use of the expression at Amazon.com. |
| Expression | Frequency per Day | Expression | Frequency per Day |
pizza hut | 10,691 | donatos pizza | 296 |
pizza | 4,887 | pizza picture | 272 |
dominos pizza | 3,544 | pizza coupon | 261 |
papa johns pizza | 1,777 | chicago pizza | 244 |
dominoes pizza | 1,020 | dominos pizza coupon | 243 |
domino pizza | 1,000 | little caesars pizza | 238 |
california pizza kitchen | 901 | a recipe for fruit pizza | 237 |
round table pizza | 612 | pizza hut.com | 225 |
pizza recipe | 577 | peter piper pizza | 214 |
pizza hut coupon | 504 | johns pappa pizza | 210 |
pizza oven | 450 | papa john pizza | 204 |
caesar little pizza | 438 | boston pizza | 181 |
fruit pizza | 407 | pizza inn | 173 |
peppes pizza | 397 | pizza crust recipe | 172 |
cicis pizza | 390 | pizza restaurant | 169 |
pizza stone | 373 | pizza delivery | 166 |
pizza dough recipe | 355 | az phoenix pizza | 156 |
pizza pizza | 347 | pizza tycoon | 149 |
godfathers pizza | 338 | pizza roundtable | 147 |
pizza dough | 312 | imos pizza | 146 |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |||
| Language | Translations for "pizza"; alternative meanings/domain in parentheses. | |
Albanian | pica. (various references) | |
Arabic | فطيرة من طماطم وجبن ولحم مفروم, فطيرة (cobbler, fritter, pancake, pasty, patty, pie), خبز بالجبن و الصلصة الحمراء, بيتسا. (various references) | |
Bulgarian | пица. (various references) | |
Chinese | 薄饼 (chapatti). (various references) | |
Czech | pizza. (various references) | |
Danish | pizza. (various references) | |
Dutch | pizza. (various references) | |
Esperanto | pico. (various references) | |
Finnish | pizza. (various references) | |
French | pizza. (various references) | |
German | Pizza. (various references) | |
Greek | πίτσα, πίτα με τομάτεσ και τυρί. (various references) | |
Hebrew | פיצה. (various references) | |
Hungarian | pizza. (various references) | |
Italian | pizza (can, film can, reel). (various references) | |
Japanese Kanji | ピストン輸送 (ice axe, period, periodic, PHS portable phone, piccolo, pick, picking, pickoff play, pickup service, pilaf, pile, Pilgrim Fathers, pill, pilling, pipette, piranha, pit, pit stop, pitch, pitcher, pitcher's mound, pitching, pitching machine, pitchout, Pithecanthropus erectus, pivot, pizzicato, Pulitzer, pure, pure malt, puree, purist, Puritan, pyramid, pyramid selling, pyrine, shuttle, splashing sound, stilt), ピサの斜塔 (Leaning Tower of Pisa, pidgin English, piste, pistol, piston, piston corer, pizza pie, plunger). (various references) | |
Japanese Katakana | ピッツア , ピッツァ , ピザ . (various references) | |
Korean | 피자. (various references) | |
Pig Latin | izzapay.(various references) | |
Portuguese | pizza. (various references) | |
Russian | пицца. (various references) | |
Serbo-Croatian | pica. (various references) | |
Spanish | pizza. (various references) | |
Swedish | pizza. (various references) | |
Turkish | pizza (tortilla). (various references) | |
Ukrainian | піца. (various references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various translation references. | ||
Derivations | |
Words beginning with "pizza": pizzalike, pizzas, pizzazz, pizzazzes, pizzazzy. (additional references) | |
| |
"Pizza" is suggested in spellcheckers for the following: Aitzaz, Bizzi, Iza, izza, Izzi, Izzz, Patzak, paza, pazz, pazza, Pazzia, Pazzo, pezzo, phizzog, piaza, piazi, piazo, pieze, piiz, Pinzgau, Piozzi, pissa, pitztal, piz, piza, pizazz, pizda, pize, pizel, pizo, pizzo, Pizzy, pliza, Pozza, prizzi, puzo, puzz, Rizza, Zizzo. (additional references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references). | |
Scrabble® Enable2K-Verified Anagrams | |
| Words within the letters "a-i-p-z-z" | |
-2 letters: pia, zap, zip. | |
-3 letters: ai, pa, pi. | |
| Words containing the letters "a-i-p-z-z" | |
+1 letter: piazza, piazze, pizazz, pizzas. | |
+2 letters: palazzi, piazzas, pizazzy, pizzazz. | |
+3 letters: pizazzes, pizzazzy, pizzeria. | |
+4 letters: paparazzi, pizzalike, pizzazzes, pizzerias, pizzicati, pizzicato. | |
+5 letters: pozzolanic. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. SCRABBLE® is a registered trademark. All intellectual property rights in and to the game are owned in the U.S.A and Canada by Hasbro Inc., and throughout the rest of the world by J.W. Spear & Sons Limited of Maidenhead, Berkshire, England, a subsidiary of Mattel Inc. Mattel and Spear are not affiliated with Hasbro. | |
| 1. Definition 2. Synonyms 3. Crosswords 4. Usage: Modern | 5. Usage: Commercial 6. Images: Slideshow 7. Images: Photo Album 8. Images: Digital Art | 9. Quotations: Non-fiction 10. Usage Frequency 11. Names: Frequency 12. Names: Company Usage | 13. Expressions 14. Expressions: Internet 15. Translations: Modern 16. Derivations | 17. Anagrams 18. Bibliography |
Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
