Learn & Understand

A Slice of History: How Pizza Conquered the World

Pizza is so universal today that it is easy to forget it began as humble street food for the poor of one Italian city. Its journey from the back streets of Naples to nearly every corner of the globe is one of the great stories of food — and it explains why a party pizza comes round, sliced, and made to share.

Born in Naples

Flatbreads topped with oil and herbs are ancient, but pizza as we know it took shape in Naples, where the poor topped cheap dough with tomatoes — then a novel New World import many feared was poisonous. It was fast, cheap, filling food sold by street vendors, looked down upon by the well-off as a dish of the lower classes.

The Queen's Pizza

Legend tells that a Neapolitan pizzaiolo created a pizza for a visiting queen in the colors of the Italian flag — red tomato, white cheese, green basil — and named it Margherita in her honor. Whether or not the tale is exact, it captures pizza's rise from peasant food toward respectability and national symbol.

Crossing the Ocean

Pizza traveled with Italian emigrants, who opened pizzerias in their new countries. For decades it remained a mostly immigrant dish, but after the mid-twentieth century it exploded into the mainstream, reinvented in countless local styles — thin and thick, folded and deep, topped with everything imaginable. Pizza proved endlessly adaptable, taking on the flavors of every place it reached.

Made to Share

Part of pizza's genius is that it is inherently communal. A round pie cut into wedges is designed to be divided among many hands, which is exactly why it is the default food of parties, gatherings, and celebrations. Ordering enough comes down to simple arithmetic: how many slices each guest will eat, and how many slices a pie yields.

Ordering for the Party

To work out how many pizzas to order, use the Pizza Party Calculator. Round out the menu with the Party Drink Calculator and the Cake Slice Calculator.