L'arte della pizza napoletana

To understand Naples, one must understand the its pizza. It is not is only a dish: it is an identity, a philosophy, a religion secular that the Neapolitans practice for centuries. UNESCO, not by chance, has declared the art of the pizza-maker heritage cultural of humanity.

The story begins in the 1700s, when Naples was one of the cities most populous in Europe. The people was poor and needed need of a food that was cheap, filling and fast. It was discovered that a flatbread round, topped with the tomato newly arrived from the Americas, satisfied all these needs.

The legend has it that in 1889, the pizza-maker Raffaele Esposito have prepared three pizzas for the Queen Margherita of Savoy. One of them three, with tomato, mozzarella and basil, recalled the colors of the flag Italian. The queen it loved immediately, and Esposito decided to give it her her name. Even if some historians doubt whether the story is true, the name remained.

A real pizza Neapolitan must respect rules very precise. The dough must rise at least eight hours, but the pizza-makers best it leave to rise even twenty-four or forty-eight hours. The oven must be made of wood, with a temperature that reaches the four hundred eighty degrees. The cooking lasts only sixty or ninety seconds, no of more.

Gianni Russo has been making the pizza-maker for thirty-two years. He works in a pizzeria in the Quarters Spanish, one of the neighborhoods most ancient of the city. His father was a pizza-maker, his grandfather as well, and even his great-grandfather. « My father used to say that the pizza is not is a recipe, but a feeling », he says.

Every morning, Gianni arrives at the pizzeria at six. He prepares the dough of the day after, because the rising is everything. He uses only flour Italian, water, salt sea and yeast fresh. Nothing oil, nothing sugar. « If someone to you says that in it you must put the sugar, do not believe him », he says laughing.

The hands of the pizza-maker work fast. He takes a ball of dough, it stretches with his fingers in a few seconds. He adds the tomato San Marzano, crushed by hand, a few cubes of mozzarella from buffalo, a leaf of basil, a drizzle of oil extra virgin. Then, with a peel of metal, he pushes the pizza into the oven.

While the pizza cooks, Gianni it turns two or three times, so that it cooks in a way uniform. The fire of the oven lights up his his face, red and sweaty. When the he pulls it out, the crust is tall and spotted with spots dark, as must be. He cuts it into slices and it sends to the dining room.

The customers, often, wait in line outside even for an hour. There are tourists American, families from the North, but also old Neapolitans who return every week. A Margherita costs five euros, not of more. One must that everyone be able to afford it », explains Gianni. « Pizza pizza is of the people. The day that it becomes luxury, is not is any more pizza ».

When you leave the pizzeria, with the belly full and your lips still warm from the tomato, you understand something of Naples that you cannot can learn elsewhere. It is a city that knows how to transform the things simple into art. A handful of flour, a pinch of salt, a tomato red: and an entire world in it stands inside.