Pizzapedia

Description

A book for the pizza obsessed, with 80 charming illustrations and information about the history, ingredients, and lore of everyone’s favorite food.

Pizza is a food that lends itself to legend and obsession, spanning geography, generations, and gender. In lavish illustrations and hand-lettered text, Pizzapedia celebrates all there is to fixate about: the stories behind its origin (we have the ancient Greeks to thank before the Italians); the delectable ingredients, from San Marzano tomatoes to buffalo mozzarella; the failed and the famous inventions (like “the pizza saver,” the piece of plastic that prevents a pizza delivery box top from drooping into the pie); the merits of Sicilian vs. New York vs. Chicago vs. new (Detroit?!) styles; and much more. Like the universally beloved food, this art-driven book of miscellany is inviting, colorful, and a delicious gift to give and get.”Lighthearted yet well researched, this illustrated pizza Baedeker hits the right buttons.”
— New York TimesDAN BRANSFIELD is a food-loving illustrator and pun enthusiast. Much of his illustration work is made for the food and dining industry, including True Story Foods, Applegate Farms, Beringer Winery ads in The New Yorker, NOPA restaurant, and regular contributions to the Rumpus and Edible San Francisco magazine.The Beginning

Some of my earliest memories regarding pizza involved spending Saturday nights at home, in Oak Park, Illinois, with my brothers and sisters. We would watch The Love Boat and Fantasy Island and order pizza from neighborhood places like Capizi’s, Salerno’s, and Grand Slam.

Our pizza nights were not without incident. On occasion, when I’d bite into a slice, the cheese would slide off.

“My pizza broke!” I’d exclaim.

My siblings would put the cheese back on, but I was inconsolable — I could not be convinced to eat that mishapen slice.

These pizza nights happened with an assured regularity. But time marches on. The house in Oak Park would change hands over time. Capizi’s would shutter and The Love Boat would sail only in reruns.

But the one thing that remains reliably constant and immune to the ravages of time is pizza — which I love to this very day.

I just don’t cry as much now when the cheese falls off.CN

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