The first time I met Fernanda Miano, 82, was on a sweltering afternoon in early August. She was sitting in a plastic chair and smoking a cigarette in an alleyway outside a basso (house on the ground floor) which she operates as a humble food stand in the historic Quartieri Spagnoli in Naples. It is called Pizza Fritta da Fernanda and the menu consists of pizza fritta (fried pizza) in two sizes: big (large) for 3 € and piccola (small) for 2 €.
Miano, whom locals and tourists affectionately call “Nonna Fernanda,” learned from his mother how to make pizza fritta on this same street, where the family business has been around for decades.
I ordered a large fritta pizza for her, not knowing she was going to be as big as my head. Miano put out his cigarette, motioned for me to sit down in the chair she was leaving and get to work. She moved quickly, using her fingers to knead a dough consisting of extra-fine Tipo 00 flour, baking powder, water and a pinch of salt. She then added chopped tomato balls, pork scrapes, mozzarella, and ricotta. Another piece of dough was added as a top layer. Finally, the concoction was fried in oil until the filling melted and the outside was crisp and puffed.
Miano wrapped the final result in paper and handed it to me. She watched as I bit into it and she asked, “Buono? ” (“Well?”). I nodded. She gave a proud and informed look, something between a smirk and a smirk.
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When most people think of Neapolitan pizza, also known as Naples pizza, they think of thin crust pizza baked in a wood-fired brick oven. The dish is so popular that Unesco granted it World Heritage status in 2017. Neapolitan pizza is also the inspiration for New York-style pizza, which Italian immigrants introduced to the United States at the turn of the 20th century.
Fritta pizza is the lesser-known cousin of Neapolitan pizza. It emerged as a result of poverty during World War II, when Naples suffered around 200 Allied air raids, according to Simone Cinotto, associate professor of modern history at the Università di Scienze Gastronomiche in Pollenzo, Italy, and author of The Italian American Tableau: Food, Family and Community in New York City.
“Pizza fritta really looks like a food of war,” Cinotto said. “There were no ingredients for making pizza and many ovens were actually destroyed by the bombing … People had to be creative and ingenious to find substitutes for the missing ingredients.”
Unable to access – let alone afford – the traditional pizza, locals began to fry the dough and use lower-quality ingredients – such as anchovies and broccoli – bought spoiled or out of season to make this. which became known as pizza fritta. The less desirable parts of the vegetables, like the artichoke stems, were also used. “Anything you fry gets tasty,” Cinotto said. He added that the technology and the market for fried foods existed and were documented in Italy long before WWII, but pizza fritta was likely a specific outcome of the crisis.
Dubbed “the people’s pizza,” the street vendors – including Miano’s family – sold the item to distressed customers as “an ogge an ottoWhich means they could eat it that day and pay for it eight days later. The phenomenon even made its way into Vittorio de Sica’s 1954 film L’Oro di Napoli (The Gold of Naples), which contains six chapters set in the city. In the chapter “Pizze a Credito” (Pizza on Credit), a young Sophia Loren portrayed a fritta pizza maker cheating on her husband. She rose to international stardom soon after.
But not everyone is convinced that the origins of fritta pizza are as simple as those described in popular culture. “If you look [Italian] cookbooks, even from the 1500s, you will find fried foods, fried dough, ”said Fabio Parasecoli, professor of food studies in the Department of Nutrition and Food Studies at New York University . “I’m not totally convinced of the theory that it suddenly arose after WWII because there was no food and it was easier to fry than to cook. [Yes], this is all true. But I think [pizza fritta] was built on [cooking] traditions that already existed. “
These deep-frying traditions, however, have lost popularity over time. Cinotto notes that Italians began to become more health conscious in the 80s and 90s. He also cites pizza fritta’s affiliation with the lower classes as the reason it lost its appeal during this time.
Pizza fritta is the lesser-known cousin of Neapolitan pizza
According to Cinotto, the urban middle class in the south of the country, where pizza fritta was common, did not enjoy fried foods until the last decade. He says that’s when trendy restaurants in Naples reintroduced it to their menus and the photos of pizza fritta grabbed attention on social media.
One of these popular pizzerias is owned by Isabella de Cham, 27. She opened her eponymous restaurant, run entirely by women, two years ago in the Rione Sanità district of Naples after working at pizzeria Gino Sorbillo and La Masardona, the two hot spots hailed for their pizza fritta.
“I have always liked pizza fritta. When I was little, I always had fritta pizza on Sunday mornings, ”she recalls.
But De Cham says she noticed that when she first entered the food industry, many people considered her favorite dish to be “junk food” and avoided it. She decided she wanted to elevate the image of pizza fritta using ‘old-fashioned’ ingredients – like Nonna Fernanda’s pork nibbles – and created a menu dedicated to elegant variations such as crispy octopus. , pan-seared escarole and Stilton cheese.
“Our slogan is’ Pizza fritta like you’ve never had it before”, ”she says.
While it can be difficult to pin down the exact origins of pizza fritta, Francesca Stanziola, 22, a Naples resident who runs Bed & Breakfast Museo19, believes the food is an emblem of Neapolitan pride. Like many of her friends, she has parents and grandparents who are eager to pass on stories about the traditions and history of the city, including the pizza fritta. She says it’s especially important because her generation may be the last to know about the people and businesses that survived WWII.
Stanziola, in fact, was the one who suggested that I visit Miano’s no-frills booth while I was in Naples.
“Fernanda is a real Neapolitan woman. There aren’t many people left like her, ”she told me. “If you are visiting Naples and want to understand and appreciate its history, you must try pizza fritta like hers.”
Pizza fritta really looks like a food of war
When I returned a few weeks later to see Miano again, she was again sitting in the plastic chair in front of her store, this time without a cigarette. She agreed to tell me more about herself, but only after I ordered three fritta pizzas for her. “I’m very busy and can only talk to you when I’m working,” she says.
Miano wasn’t surprised that I was curious about him. In 2018, British chef Jamie Oliver visited him to learn how to make pizza fritta himself. She was featured on her TV show Jamie Cooks Italian, which caused an increase in the number of tourists visiting her store. But Miano seemed more satisfied with his status as a local legend. She beamed whenever a neighbor stopped to chat or someone waved at a motorbike as they whistled past. I have noticed that this happens very frequently.
“I was already famous here before he [Oliver] has come, ”Miano said, as if reading my mind. And once again she gave me that proud and informed look, something between a smile and a smirk.
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