Endless Pizza Possibilities

February 2005

Endless Pizza Possibilities

By Cindy HazenContributing Editor

In 1889, Italy's Queen Margherita was served a simple pie made with fresh tomatoes, mozzarella and basil. Pizza Margherita, as it was named in her honor, remains a popular menu item worldwide.

More common today are the Americanized versions -- crusts slathered with thick tomato sauce, imitation mozzarella and various toppings. Dining in, carryout or delivered, frozen or home prepared, pizza is a part of our culture. It's synonymous with family nights, high school dates and quick airport dining.

According to Pizza Marketing Quarterly, the three top-selling pizzas for Louisville, KY-based Papa John's and Ann Arbor, MI-based Domino's are pepperoni, cheese and sausage. Yet while bold sauces, meaty toppings and thick cheeses are the blueprint for traditional American pizzas, many chefs are striving toward simpler topping combinations. Others are trying more-unique blends. The beauty of pizza is that there really are no hard-and-fast rules. It is as much a concept -- flavorful toppings sprinkled atop a crust -- as a product, so imagination might be the only limiting factor.

Thinking outside the circle Scott Adair, executive chef and director of culinary sales for foodservice, SupHerb Farms, Turlock, CA, credits pizza's creative resurgence to Wolfgang Puck, who opened the door with an Asian-inspired product. Also, East Coast restaurateur Todd English has worked creative magic with olives and flatbreads. Indeed, mention the word "pizza" to a chef, and one senses the crust is as open to artistic expression as a blank canvas.

Why not a basil-sorrel pesto sauce pizza, Adair muses, topped with seafood or shrimp? "The sorrel has nice hints of lemon," he notes. "Come up with a Creole shrimp pizza, or make a rotisserie-grill-chicken pizza with sweet red peppers, sage, roasted onions and Gouda cheese." He mentions one customer using ginger purée with teriyaki chicken and roasted onions: "It's an incredible product."

Mark Hill, corporate executive chef, Simplot Food Group, Boise, ID, sees a Thai-curry pizza with bean sprouts, bamboo shoots, water chestnuts, edamame and cilantro. He imagines an Indian-style pizza topped with tandoori chicken or a Mediterranean topped with roasted artichokes and Kalamata olives and drizzled with pesto oil as a finish.

In many respects, ethnic hardly seems foreign. Perhaps then, Hill's most-exotic ideas are rooted in traditional American cuisine: a pot-roast pizza or a bistro-chicken pizza topped with freshly roasted chicken and roasted herb-and-garlic potatoes. "Turn it into entrée-style pizzas," he says. "It becomes a complete, full meal."

Then again, nothing says pizza has to be a savory application. "Put roasted sweet potatoes with walnuts and throw in a little a caramel sauce," Hill suggests. "Doing dessert pizza, maybe a smaller 6-in.-style crust, possibly even a sweetened-cinnamon crust, and spreading it with mascarpone cheese and topping it with roasted apples, baking it off, and drizzling it with brandy-caramel sauce -- or a pizza topped with a sweet-rum cream, with pineapple, coconut. There you go -- you've got piña colada pizza."

Dough decisions Crusts can be as innovative as toppings. But whether thin and crispy, deep dish, seasoned or filled, they all begin as simple dough, traditionally yeast-leavened.

Steve Stormer, technical service representative, Lallemand, Montreal, explains that there are three types of yeast, all derived from the same basic bread yeast but varying in moisture content. Large-scale bakeries use liquid cream yeast. Compressed yeast, frequently called fresh yeast, has most of the moisture removed. Instant dry yeast pours like granulated brown sugar. The required volume often determines the choice of yeast. "Compressed yeast has to be refrigerated and has limited shelf life," he says.

While stability is the primary factor in choosing the appropriate yeast, slight advantages to instant exist. The additional drying of instant yeast damages cell walls and releases glutathione. "Glutathione has a relaxing affect on gluten, which makes the pizza dough more extensible, so when they stretch it out to a 12-in. pie, it will tend to stay a 12-in. pie. The extensibility comes from the development of the gluten. Because the compressed doesn't have the same level of glutathione, if you want the same amount of extensibility with compressed, you have to mix it longer."

Price is about the same, though instant can cost just a little bit more because of the additional process, Stormer explains. "But instant yeast is used at one-third the rate of compressed, so three blocks of compressed is equal to 1 lb. of instant, and that's because, in the process, the moisture is taken out." Unlike the active dry yeast familiar to home bakers, instant yeast does not require rehydration in lukewarm water. Instant dry yeast is simply added to the flour, mixed and then fluids are added.

Not all yeasts are desired for their fermenting capabilities. "We do have some inactive strains of yeast that are very well suited for pizza dough," Stormer says. "They're fermented specifically for the high levels of glutathione." Inactive yeast will not add volume, but because of the high levels of glutathione, it can be added to instant yeast to increase extensibility.

While yeast adds distinct flavor to pizza dough, some manufacturers do not use yeast at all. Dough leavened with baking powder offers consistent rise and freezeability. The dough will act exactly the same after freezing, regardless of conditions. Frozen yeast-based doughs require critical temperature control. "We've found that the addition of ascorbic acid is beneficial to the yeast in the freezing process," says Stormer. Most frozen, self-rising crusts have both yeast and chemical leavening. He also notes that baking powder is used for the rise, but an inactive yeast contributes flavor.

"Sodium bicarbonate and acids combine to give you carbon dioxide for leavening," says Azarel Nieves, baking lab manager, The Wright Group, Crowley, LA. "However, they only provide rise and no flavor, so yeast must be used to provide the fermentation flavor. Encapsulated leavening systems provide the flexibility to control the release point when the CO2 is released in the dough. This release point is controlled by the melt point of the fat that is used for encapsulation."

Nieves suggests that the addition of salt can increase dough strength and flavor. While sugar will flavor yeast-risen foods and provide color, vital wheat gluten increases dough strength. Oil can provide uniform cell structure and machinability.

"Dough conditioners assist in make up to keep the dough pliable and not sticky," Nieves says. They will keep dough from shrinking back when sheeted or pressed, give good rise when leavening is released, minimize bubbles, and yield a uniform texture in the finished product.

Crusty considerations Pizza crust varies from thin to thick, depending on preference. "The thick crust can be a function of dough sheeting or pressing, weaker flour, lower baking temperatures, and encapsulated leavening system," says Nieves. "The stronger the flour (the higher the protein), the crisper the crust." Flours with 13% to 14% protein are used for thin-crust pizzas. Thick-crust pizzas utilize flours as low as 12% protein.

Additionally, it's important to consider dough thickness prior to baking. Dough may be cold- or hot-pressed. In cold-pressing, the dough ball is placed into a pan and then pressed under lower temperatures. Pressure is used to form the crust, usually for a deep-dish, pan-style pizza. The hot press applies temperature and pressure to a dough ball. An advantage of the hot press is that it allows the formation of an edge on the product. Typically, manufacturers use hot pressing for thinner pizza dough.

Par-baking fully bakes the crust but does not develop the color. Boboli retail crusts, manufactured by George Weston Bakeries, Totowa, NJ, are partially baked. They are ready to be topped, and because they are par-cooked, they bake quickly in the oven.

No longer are crusts solely the base for toppings to be added. Some manufacturers are incorporating traditional pizza toppings into the dough itself. Mozzarella, usually in the form of string cheese, is often added to thick edgings. Spices are sometimes blended into the dough. "There has also been some development work done on putting chiles into the dough itself," says Kirk Bewley, president, Culinary Farms, West Sacramento, CA. "That would generally be, but not specifically need to be, a ground chile that would easily assimilate into the dough and then would give the dough that particular flavor." Likewise, he has seen sun-dried tomatoes, either diced or julienned, added to dough.

Whatever might be added to the dough, the most-important consideration is how it will be topped. "The more toppings that are added, the more necessity for dough strength to keep the crust from falling during baking and causing a gummy center in a thick-crust pizza," says Nieves. Thinner, cracker-type crusts are less problematic.

Saucy selections As pizzas trend toward more-exotic toppings, so do the sauces. Asian pizzas might boast a peanut, teriyaki or hoisin sauce. Seafood-topped pizzas might utilize a lemon-cream type. Italian might use a pesto, Alfredo or the ubiquitous tomato.

Adair advises that there are different ways for the manufacturer or pizzeria to incorporate pestos, from ready-made to scratch. Using frozen basil allows them make their own signature pesto while saving the labor involved in cleaning fresh basil. Pastes are another way to add flavor. "They're basically herbs and vegetables and olive oils," Adair says. Frozen, they have a 120-day shelf life when defrosted. "They have the capability of being refrozen and being pulled back out again, and there's no problem with breaking down of the cell structure. The product is just as good as it was the first time you defrosted it. Under those, we've got something really unique things, like sun-dried tomato basil pesto or paste. We do a sweet-red-pepper-sage paste. We do a tomato-Creole paste and a rosemary-garlic paste. All these pastes and pestos are basically flavor enhancers."

Traditional tomato-based pizza sauces are typically coarser in texture than tomato sauces and ketchup, according to Rachel Zemser and Gwen Young, research team, Kagome USA, Belmont, CA. "The texture of the pizza sauce is usually determined by the coarseness of the tomato paste," they explain. "Some pizza sauces also contain particulates of diced tomatoes, onions and other vegetables. An Old-World-style pizza sauce might be very coarse, very viscous, bright red and contain traditional Italian herbs and possibly olive oil. Many pizza chains use a moderate-textured product with seasonings and spices that provide a flavor that is distinctively their own. This is usually some variation of traditional herbs and spices, with a unique or signature spin. Also, sauces can be purchased ready to use or in concentrated form where water and/or other ingredients are added at the back of the restaurant. If the pizza has to be presauced or sold ready-made, that sauce must be thick so as to prevent water migration to the dough or cheese."

Product designers have several ways to increase viscosity. Typical chef methods include increasing solids or reducing the sauce through extended cooking. Technologists tend to add starches or gums. A touch of xanthan can improve freeze/thaw stability in frozen products. Coarsely ground, pregelatinized starches can add texture to tomato sauces and give the illusion of pulpiness. With tomato prices soaring this year, this can be an important cost-cutting measure. Tomato-paste extenders can replace up to 40% tomato solids in cold or heated food products. Besides offering economic benefits, extenders also provide better cling and syneresis control, as well as improved cold storage and freeze/thaw stability.

Allison Rittman, corporate chef for Paradise Tomato Kitchens, Louisville, KY, and corporate chef for Charlie Baggs, Inc., Austin, TX, believes that harnessing the tomato's full impact is helpful in unfavorable markets. "Try to get the most impact out of the tomato that you can," she advises. "If you take a tomato and you smoke it or roast it, as opposed to just simmering it on the stovetop, you really get a much bigger flavor impact for the amount of tomato you use. There are definitely ways to create a bigger impact just by the cooking technique that you use." A fire-roasted sauce would be an example of a popular cooking-enhanced tomato-flavored product.

Many techniques for adjusting the color of the finished sauce exist. Using more tomato paste or diced tomatoes achieves a brighter red. Oil can create an orange-red color or add sheen to the sauce. Caramel color can add a darker hue. Typically, more cooking darkens the sauce while less cooking yields a brighter color.

Rittman says that there are regional differences among tomato pizza sauces. "The level of sweetness can vary from where you are in the country," she says. "Down south, they prefer a slightly sweeter sauce. In the East Coast region, people like a more-herbaceous, a more highly seasoned sauce. I think there's also a difference, not just in flavor, but in consistency. When you're talking about tomato sauces that are really thick and rich and darker in color, to me that's a very Southern, Midwest type. Of course, it depends on the application, but I see some of the lighter sauces, more fresh sauces, being used in California, on the East Coast."

According to Zemser and Young, "the key to any good pizza sauce is the balance of tomato sweet and acid. One has to balance all of the ingredients to achieve the sensory goals. Many spices can become bitter over storage time, especially if the levels are high or the formula not balanced. Mexican oregano is more bitter than Mediterranean (aka, Greek) oregano. The name indicates more than just a geographical region -- they are two very different spices. Use of flavors in combinations with herbs and spices is a good way to achieve long-lasting, balanced flavors and aromas. Sugar (sweetness) is key when marketing to children and some adult groups. Again the key is balance, and tomato flavor must come through in the end. Acidity can be impacted by raw-material sourcing (tomatoes, tomato paste, etc.) or by acidulants (citric acid, vinegar, wine and other organic acids). Again, the balance is key."

Many foodservice tomato sauces can be stored at ambient conditions for a year or longer without quality degradation, the Kagome research team advises. Due to the acidity of tomato sauces, preservatives are not usually necessary. If a customer needs to hold sauce after opening for longer than a few days, such as in a cold well, then sorbates and/or benzoates can effectively prevent bacteria growth. For refrigerated items, preservatives and additives play a greater role, especially at the point of contact between the sauce and the pizza dough.

Cheese please Cheese is so important to a pizza's identity that the basic, unadorned cheese pizza is in the trio of top sellers. In fact, extra cheese is one of the most-requested toppings.

Barbara Gannon, vice president, corporate and marketing communications, Sargento Foods Inc., Plymouth, WI, explains that while almost any variety of natural cheese can be used on pizza, mozzarella is the traditional favorite. "Mozzarella is the standard for three reasons," she says. The stringiness of mozzarella -- a result of the pasta filata cheese-making process in which the curds are stretched -- has become part of the fun and expectation of a great pizza. Secondly, mozzarella is an Italian-style cheese, true to pizza's origins. Lastly, and perhaps most importantly, mozzarella is multifunctional.

The mild, fresh flavor of mozzarella pairs perfectly with a wide variety of pizza toppings, Gannon continues, "whether you use a spicy tomato sauce and flavorful meats, olives, onions, mushrooms, peppers and grilled vegetables, or prefer more-unique pizza toppings, such as ham, pineapple, barbecued chicken or taco-style. Mozzarella has a higher moisture content than many other natural cheeses, which contributes to its flow and melt, as well as the pasta filata process, which imparts the unique texture." Browning, another important attribute of pizza cheese, is a factor of time, temperature and ingredients. "Since mozzarella is a young cheese, it has a bit more natural milk sugar (lactose) than would a more-aged cheese, such as Cheddar, which contributes to browning," Gannon notes. "The higher the temperature and the longer the bake time, the more browning can be expected."

However, adjusting certain cheese characteristics can improve some applications. "When you're dealing with natural mozzarella, you only have a couple tools to adjust to meet the specifications that your consumer has, which are usually melt, stretch, browning and some people want a little bit of oiling-off on it," says John Sadowsky, technical sales director, Blue Valley Foods, Wapakoneta, OH. "The only way you can really control that is through the pH to control the body and the melt, as well as you can adjust the moisture to a degree on a dry basis -- but again, those are under constraints by the CFR." The answer is nonstandard "pizza cheese," defined as mozzarella that contains the addition of any nonstandard ingredient. Adding starch during the pasta filata stage can, for example, bind water and improve freeze/thaw stability.

Imitation and substitute mozzarellas can offer substantial cost savings, roughly half the cost of natural cheese. Sadowsky suggests that the performance of imitation is comparable to natural mozzarella because mozzarella cheese provides more mouthfeel and texture with little flavor impact in pizza.

"The flavor might not be quite as clean as what you're used to, but if you were to blend 25% of imitation in with your natural cheese on the top of a pizza, saving 12% on your cheese buy can be enormous if you're buying 25 million pounds of cheese a year," says Sadowsky. "The difference between 'imitation mozzarella' and 'substitute mozzarella' is that a substitute mozzarella is nutritionally equivalent to the natural mozzarella, so it's fortified with vitamins. In many cases it actually has a higher vitamin content than natural cheese does." Additionally, substitute has a slightly higher protein level, around 21%, as opposed to 17% to 18% protein in imitation. "The body isn't quite as firm as a mozzarella substitute, but you really couldn't tell the difference. The average consumer couldn't tell the difference, but there is a nickel or a dime price difference," he says of the lower-protein product.

Traditionally, in imitation or mozzarella substitutes, vegetable oils replace the milkfat. Oftentimes, this introduces trans fatty acids. Products that use trans-free interesterified soybean oil or safflower oil help manufacturers avoid any labeling issues.

A prime advantage of imitation or cheese substitutes is the ease with which three or four cheeses can be incorporated into a single block and shredded. "It provides better weigh control and more-accurate metering," Sadowsky says.

Indeed, if there's any trend in cheeses for pizza, Gannon says it's "blends, blends and more blends. Instead of one cheese, pizzeria restaurants and consumers at home want the flavor variety cheese blends offer." For example, his company offers a Pizza Double (mozzarella and Cheddar), a 6 Cheese Italian (mozzarella, provolone, Parmesan, Romano, Asiago and fontina), and a Bistro Blend(TM) (mozzarella, asiago and roasted garlic).

Sadowsky agrees that blends are the buzz. At the recent New York Pizza Show, everyone was talking about a multi-cheese pizza cheese. "It's usually a mozzarella, a little bit of Cheddar to add some color to the top, and Romano or Parmesan -- typically Romano, because Romano has a little bit more of the lipolytic flavor than Parm, so a little bit less cheese offers a lot more flavor," he says.

As people are demanding more flavor from their pizzas, their cheese tastes are becoming more adventurous. For example, goat cheese is finding a pizza niche. "People have been asking us for goat cheese," Sadowsky says. His company carries IQF goat cheese wafers. "You simply place them on the top of pizza and they will literally thaw out in a matter of minutes," he says. "You could not tell that these were ever frozen. They have a very good flavor, and the nice thing about that is the portion control, because goat cheese tends to be really crumbly, almost like feta, so it's very difficult to cut." Goat cheese might not yet have its place on a retail level, but it's slowly finding its way into some more-upscale pizzerias.

Meaty choices When it comes to meat, the old basics are the biggest sellers, says Liz Hertz, marketing manager, Burke Corporation, Nevada, IA. Sausage and pepperoni reign supreme. Canadian bacon, ham and chicken follow suit. In Memphis, barbecued pulled pork is king. Turkey and seafood are even finding their place atop pizza crust.

"We've seen a lot of interest in what we call specialty toppings," Hertz says. "We've really started to see a lot more interest in chicken, partially just because you can do so many different things and also that chicken is being seen as a healthier alternative. You can do so many different things with it, ethnic and specialty signature pizzas. We have other specialty toppings, like a beef-strip topping, a taco meat that's used a lot on taco pizza. We have some newer products, like a chorizo-style topping and andouille topping and a gyro or Greek-flavored. What we have seen is a lot of interest in people trying to add something kind of new and unique to the menu. It really augments their pizza menu. It doesn't really replace the traditional toppings, but it augments it."

While consumers might be ready to try something new, they prefer it to look freshly made. "One of the products we have that's unique, we call it a hand-pinched-style topping, and we developed it to emulate the hand-pinched toppings that we put on raw in the pizzeria," says Hertz. "There's always a desire to upgrade and look more like it's handmade in the pizzeria rather than something that's a frozen product that's put on. In general, there's a trend that way in foodservice in what the public is expecting in food. They want it to seem fresher or more natural or prepared right at the point at the restaurant."

People purchase a fully cooked meat topping for several reasons. Foremost is food safety. It's also a lot more convenient, since the meat doesn't have to be cooked. It takes less labor and less training. Lastly, it offers greater consistency.

"You have to offer the old standbys," Hertz says, "but everyone's looking for a new flavor now. It's an across-the-board change in the consumers' preferences. They are much more sophisticated now than they were years ago, and they're looking for new flavor profiles. They eat out a lot more often. They don't want the same old thing all the time. It probably won't go all the way -- you're not going to get rid of sausage and pepperoni -- but every pizzeria's got to offer something a little unique."

Vegetable variety Green peppers, onions and mushrooms might have traditionally anchored the vegetarian pizza, but today the options are far more plentiful. Vegetable choices run the gamut, from artichokes to zucchini and blanched to roasted. With today's vegetables, variety is key -- whether in pairings or presentation.

"The trend when you order a vegetarian-style pizza is broccoli, mushrooms, artichokes, eggplant, roasted peppers," says Hill. "I'd say roasted peppers and artichokes are probably the two most-mainstream ways to upscale your pizza. The whole healthy lifestyle is really geared toward vegetables for pizza. Roasted vegetables work really awesome, whether it's roasted asparagus, mushrooms, red peppers, roasted potatoes or roasted sweet potatoes. Roasting will add a lot of flavor."

Manufacturers can opt to roast their own vegetables or buy them from a supplier. That makes preparation simple: Just take them out of the bag and top the product for a great roasted-vegetable pizza. Many different blends are out there to use with different products. "Broccoli is a great vegetable for pizza if you're doing an Alfredo pizza," suggests Hill. "Broccoli and carrots don't really roast well. We won't roast them, but we'll blend them. We'll take broccoli, carrots and mushrooms and mix those with other roasted vegetables, like artichokes, roasted peppers, roasted zucchini, roasted eggplant, and now you have a blend of vegetables -- both roasted and not roasted."

The line between vegetables and fruits is sometimes narrow. Think of the popularity of pineapple paired with ham. Then imagine the enhanced sweetness of roasted pineapple. That suddenly makes a Hawaiian-style pizza more chic, especially when married to pancetta or Black Forest ham.

Perhaps the fruit most suited to roasting is the tomato. In fact, as synonymous as tomato is with pizza, its moisture content does not lend itself to raw use. Simply adding diced tomatoes can lend an undesirable sogginess to the dough. The tomato has to be processed in some way, if only drained extensively before use. More-flavorful options are roasted or sun-dried tomatoes. "They are full of flavor, real intense tomato flavor," says Kirk Bewley, president, Culinary Farms, West Sacramento, CA. "And, of course, you don't have all that moisture pooling on the top of the pizza, either."

Dried tomatoes also offer processing advantages, since moisture can be controlled. "We accommodate moistures," Bewley says. "We have all different types of applications, from very, very dry to quite wet (8% to 28%), so it's a manufacturer's specification." Some moisture is desirable since an overly dry sun-dried tomato might scorch when exposed to high temperatures or lengthy cooking times. "Cooking has effects on any kind of topping that you put on the pizza," he says. Another advantage of dried tomatoes is the varieties of cuts available, from halves to granules.

While drying intensifies tomato flavor, Culinary Farms has taken this process a step further by infusing sun-dried tomatoes with natural-herb essences to create a product similar to oil-packed and -flavored foodservice tomatoes. The difference is that that these are not jar-packed, so there is less waste (the jar and lid are typically discarded and the oil is drained from the product before use). The result is a moist, flavor-infused, sun-dried tomato.

And for those wishing to upscale the old standard, look no further than roasted, dried bell peppers (6% to 7% moisture), available in red and green, which not only contribute a splash of color, but also a smoky flavor and aroma. Everything old is new again, so they say.

Pizza possibilities A category as fluid as pizza stretches boundaries as smoothly as strings of cheese. Potential combinations are endless, and it's perhaps more difficult to name the ingredients that cannot be used in or on pizza as opposed to identifying pizza-friendly choices. With so much creative opportunity, can anyone predict what's next?

Hertz suggests that the industrial market simply watch the foodservice side. "Frozen pizza has mirrored the foodservice market," she notes. "It always lags a little bit behind the foodservice market, but I think as people begin to expect things from pizzerias, then they also expect to find it in the grocers' frozen section."

Bold flavors are taking hold, such as "anything fresh herb," Rittman says. "People are starting to realize the impact of herbs, and they really kind of fit the whole low-carb, no-fat, healthy-for-you, bold flavor. I think there's definitely going to be more sauces that feature fresh herbs."

Adair sees herbs as an economical way to meet consumers' demands for   increasingly fresher products. "Herbs are the quickest and most-cheap way to add flavor to anything that you're producing," he says.

Bewley has seen interest in more exotic chiles on pizza, such as ancho, chipotle, guajillo, chilaca and pasilla. "The warmest of those would be the chipotle," he says. "The most mild would be either the ancho or the chilaca. If you're looking for heat, you can use just generic chili powder. But when people are using Mexican chiles, traditionally you would be looking for a chile that would give you a flavor profile, and the heat is somewhat incidental."

Regional culinary influence can also play a part. To Rittman, the "Pacific Rim exemplifies the whole fresh flavor." Sweet and savory ingredients are crossing lines. Tropical fruits, like mango and pineapple, can work in savory applications. "Vanilla pairs very well with some of the savory flavors," she says. "Ginger is a very versatile ingredient that people are familiar with. It crosses through India, the Pacific Rim and China."

As interest in ethnic foods continues, Rittman finds a lot of flavor profiles rising to the surface. She sees possibilities for creating exotic flavor profiles with recognizable ingredients. While curry is a word that scares many people, familiar Indian spices can be used to create unique profiles. She suggests adding toasted spices to a sauce.

Ultimately, the biggest ethnic trends might descend from Americans' favorite cuisines: Chinese, Italian and Mexican. Rittman forecasts a regionalization of these three, such as Yucatan as opposed to generically Mexican or Sicilian instead of strictly Italian. "I think people, through their own education and travel, are starting to understand that what we call 'Italian' really encompasses a huge variety of regions in Italy, and they're all very different and have unique cooking techniques and ingredients," she says.

Perhaps that brings new life to pizza Margherita as consumers explore the pizzas of central Italy. They might even try a pizza Napoletana, the Margherita sans cheese -- but then again most Americans are only so adventurous. Pizza without cheese might be a little too exotic for mainstream tastes.

Cindy Hazen, a 20-year veteran of the food industry, is a freelance writer based in Memphis, TN. She can be reached at [email protected] .

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