Pizza, the queen of Naples

Who has visited Naples knows very well that here eating pizza is, first of all, a piece of lifestyle, a very important custom, a collective behavior.

Neapolitan pizza is one of the oldest kinds of fast and street food !

Here, buying pizza at the outside banquets of the pizzerias is common and normal as well as eating it suddenly folded up in four parts like a paper page, to taste it better.

Voices, atmospheres, colours and humors of Naples central and pictoresque lanes are the setting of pizza .

Pizzerias are generally very simple places, with essential furniture. People often eat their pizza seated around long tables, while other people are waiting for their turn outside.

Two are the types of real and original neapolitan pizza: Marinara, with tomato, garlic and oregano, and Margherita, with tomato, fresh mozzarella and basil .

The rules to prepare a real neapolitan pizza are written in a special document called Disciplinare which establishes the quality of ingredients, times of natural rising; times of baking into wood-burn ovens built by tuff, eathenware, gypsum, lime and sea sand.

Come with us and discover some of the most traditional and characteristic pizzerias in Naples, like Pizzeria Da  Michele, in Cesare Sersale Street, where Condurro family has been baking pizzas for five generations using original ingredients like San Marzano quality tomatoes, fresh basil and mozzarella Flower of Milk (Fior di Latte in Italian language), best quality.  Condurro family also uses the traditional criscito, a type of mixture prepared the day before baking, which rises naturally.

Few minutes by foot and we reach Spaccanapoli, another popular and characteristic area of Naples, full of life and colours, where Port’Alba, the eldest pizzeria of the town, born in 1738 lies. It has been serving itinerant sellers since then. It’s a very busy place: in the morning, people buy here takeaway pizzas; at lunch or dinner, people seat at the restaurant tables and eat big and dressed pizzas. And so on, until deep night .

Let’s go to Chaia Street, a very posh place, shopping area, the glamour and elegant heart of Naples, to try Brandi’s Pizza or Ancient Pizzeria of Italian Queen since 1780. This place has an important history, because Margherita Pizza was invented here in 1889 to satisfy Margherita Savoia Queen of Italy. This is the reason why pizza with tomato, mozzarella and basil is called Margherita.

Last but not the least, Starita Pizzeria, in Materdei area, between narrow lanes and small squares, is a very traditional place, where in 1954, a famous movie intitled L’Oro di Napoli (Naples’ Gold) was settled, with a young and fantastic Sofia Loren interpreting a young and adulteress pizza maker. Starita Pizzeria is a small but very pleasant place, courtesy, fast service and several awards also in USA. Here pizza is very good due to high quality of ingredients, respect of raising times (8 hours al least) and oven temperatures.

For more informations: Associazione Verace Pizza Napoletana .