Find out where pizza comes from this National Pizza Day with Sun Bingo
LEARN about the history of pizza before checking out Sun Bingo’s tasty pizza slot.
National Pizza Day is celebrated in the UK every 9th February.
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This delicious food is a staple takeaway choice or go-to restaurant option.
Parents everywhere have disappointed their children at some point by telling them “no we won’t order pizza, there’s some in the freezer”.
Why does pizza come from? Who first invented this tasty dish, and do they know what a favour they did for humanity?
Discover the history of pizza. Be warned, there are plenty of cheesy puns ahead.
History of pizza
The story of pizza is pretty much as long as the story of humanity.
Ever since we first learnt to cook bread, humans have attempted to top this bread with extra food, creating a rudimentary pizza.
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First, there were flatbreads served with a variety of toppings. These can be traced back to Ancient Egypt, Ancient Greece and the Romans.
There even seems to be an example of an early pizza-like food in Virgil’s epic poem the Aeneid.
When it comes to the name “pizza”, the first recorded use of the words seems to be from Gaeta, southern Italy, in 997 AD.
While early forms may have been delicious, there was mushroom for improvement.
Modern pizzas started to appear in Naples, Italy, in the 18th and early 19th centuries.
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Street vendors would sell flatbreads topped with tomatoes, cheese, garlic, anchovies and oil.
It was cheap, quick to eat and didn’t require a plate so it could be eaten while hungry, busy workers got on with their days.
It made grabbing something to eat a pizza cake…
The story goes that in 1889, King Umberto I and his queen where visiting Naples.
Bored of French cuisine, which was popular at court, they asked for something new.
Pizzas were brought to them, including one in the Italian flag’s colours: white cheese, red tomatoes and green basil.
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Queen Margherita declared it her favourite and it was named in her honour.
Pizza around the world
It wasn’t until the 20th century that the concept of pizza left Italy and the rest of the world got a slice of the action.
This was due to increased migration, with Neapolitans taking their delicious knowledge across the world, particularly to America.
The first pizzeria in the US was Lombardi’s in Manhattan (1905), and it’s been serving slices ever since.
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In 1934, the Olivelli restaurant opened in Bloomsbury, which had a recipe for a Margherita pizza, making this potentially one of the first UK restaurants to offer the Italian cuisine.
Evolution of pizza
From the 1950s onwards, pizza’s production changed according to the economic and technological advances in society.
Fridges and freezers made it possible to develop the concept of frozen pizzas for domestic cooking.
Plus, the increased presence of cars and motorbikes meant that the notion of pizza delivery could be cooked up.
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This saw some changes to the dish as well. Gone were the slices of fresh tomato. Instead, a smooth tomato paste was introduced, to prevent the dough from drying when oven cooked.
Also, producers had to use cheeses which could be frozen and unfrozen without compromising their quality or taste.
As the world started to taste pizza, different topping choices started to appear.
That includes the 1962 creation of the Hawaiian pizza (ham and pineapple) by restaurateur Sam Panopoulis in Canada!
The next major turning point for pizza was online ordering. One of the first ever online purchases (certainly the first online food order) was for Pizza Hut in 1994.
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What classifies as a Neapolitan pizza?
Of course, not just any old pizza is a Neapolitan pizza. In fact, the turn is protected.
Only pizzas that conform to the specification registered with the Traditional Guaranteed Specialty (STG/TGS) mark can call themselves a “Pizza Napolentana”.
To be a Pizza Napolentana, there are several restrictions around what ingredients may be used, the texture of the dough and its size.
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The shape must be “wavy”.
There are even specific instructions for how long it must be cooked and at what temperature (wood-fired ovens at 485 degrees, cooked for 60-90 seconds).
Play with pizza
Sun Bingo also wants a pizza the action this National Pizza Day! We’ve got the perfect slot game for all pizza fans…
Pizza! Pizza? Pizza!
So good, they named it thrice.
In this slot game, players have the chance to win lots of dough!
Select your bet amount between 20p and £20 then click spin. The game is played on top of a delicious looking slice of pizza, oozing with melted cheese.
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If the pizza toppings spin into a winning pattern, you get a cash prize!
There are extra ways to win as well, including landing 3, 4 or 5 Scatters, which awards 10, 15 or 20 free spins, respectively.
Players can select the ante bet option before clicking “spin”.
This slightly increases your bet amount, but when it is active is also increases the chances of a Scatter landing on the pizza.
Players can win up to 4,800 x their stake.
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