Pizza: A (Personal) History

An ode to the many varieties of pizza in life

I am not a pizza snob; I love all kinds of pizza. Even a distinctly average pizza is better than most foods. Pizza is a tasty, marvellous idea at any time of day or life. And I love that it seems to loved by everyone; a shared joy for all. 

My mum used to make pizzas on Sunday nights. My sister and I would stay with my dad every other weekend and it always felt like there would be two oiled baking trays with stretched pizza dough hidden under a tea towel waiting on the kitchen counter when we walked through the door. Our pizzas were rectangular (to fit the baking trays), and the tomato sauce was always red pesto, and this is how I make them now when I want ease, nothing fancy. Two rectangular pizzas cut into rectangular slices with a red pesto base and whatever topping we liked, although my favourite was always tuna, sweetcorn and olives (feel free to judge me but I won’t be swayed; it’s a hill I’m willing to die on). They would sit on the chest in our living room, and we would eat them on the sofa whilst watching a film; everyone getting up frequently to slide another slice onto their plate.

At university, our takeaway of choice was Domino’s pizza complete with good-natured piss-taking of topping choices and sizes (the last one being a distinctly male competition). Domino’s pizzas – and that addictive garlic and herb dip so perfect for the crusts – used to taste like perfection but I find them disappointing these days. I think perhaps they can only taste as good as they used to when you’re eating them crammed in a student house with eight other people also balancing hot cardboard boxes on their laps and eating like they haven’t eaten properly in days. Whilst we’re in the university days, let us not forget the humble frozen pizza. Arguably the worst of the lot and yet, scoffed on the sofa at 3am with a brewing hangover and aching feet, there was always a real magic to them.

Franco Manca – the sourdough pizza chain that originated in Brixton Market – will always remind me of being in my early twenties and working in London. The quality of the pizzas combined with the astounding cheapness for central London always makes it a great choice for any age but particularly for the young and on-a-budget office workers. There was always a queue, the tables were always infringingly close, and the wine always served in a just-out-the-dishwasher warm tumbler. It’s hectic and noisy and it really shouldn’t work, but it does. I have eaten Franco Manca pizzas with most people in my life but more so with my friend Beth than anyone else. It was her that first took me there, a couple of months into our new friendship in London, and it is her I think of most of all; sat on those tiny tables plotting the future with warm wine tumblers in hand and flicking huge dollops of chilli oil over our plump sourdough pizzas.

On honeymoon in New York, we discovered that people queue round the block to get a slice of Prince Street Pizza’s square pepperoni pizza pie. The shop is tiny, covered in photos of famous visitors and run by no-nonsense staff. The pizza has a thick crust that treads the line between soft and crunchy perfectly, generous layers of melty cheese and tomato sauce and thick slices of pepperoni slices with a bit of a kick. We ate our slices in Elizabeth Street Garden just around the corner which is full of sculptures and, on that day, rays of sunshine pushing through the leafy trees.

One of the best pizzas I’ve ever had is from Peddling Pizza – a three-wheeled van that shows up on market day in St Albans City. When I lived there, during the summer I would nip out to get one of those pizzas for lunch and carry it back through town on a hot paper plate. It was a three-minute walk tops and I would spend three minutes every Wednesday worrying about someone bumping into me (a likely occurrence in St Albans on market day) and my pizza splattering on the floor. It never happened. I would always make it back to my flat to inhale the whole pizza directly from the paper plate. The crusts were always puffy and blistered, the centre always rich and tomatoey and the whole thing always covered, at my additional request, with chilli honey. Napkins were always required afterwards, and that is a true sign of an excellent pizza. This was my first introduction to chilli honey and it kickstarted a long-lasting love affair. It elevates pretty much any meal but none as much as a pizza. A bottle of chilli honey – or hot honey as it seems to be called these days – is now a permanent fixture in my kitchen cupboard.

Our local pizza truck these days is Gino’s pizza. During the spring and summer, despite being surrounded by a whole host of excellent food trucks, I can’t help but repeatedly head towards the smell of sourdough crusts and tomato sauce during the Sunday food market. I think eating pizza in the sunshine – with chilli honey obviously – in the shadow of our cathedral has got to be one of life’s best little pleasures.

These days, at home, when we decide it’s going to be a homemade pizza night, we have a penchant for Jamie Oliver’s sausage pizza from his 7 Ways cookbook. It’s sausage, red grapes, red onion and pine nuts – trust me, it works. But, even though I know many would dismiss them as not being ‘proper pizza’, I do still find myself drawn back to those square baking trays and red pesto pizzas. It gives me the comforting feeling of home.

Thanks for reading!