Pizza first made its appearance in the United States with the arrival of Italian immigrants in the late 19th century. This was certainly the case in cities with large Italian populations, such as San Francisco, Chicago, New York City, and Philadelphia where pizza was first sold on the streets of Italian neighborhoods. In late 19th century Chicago for example, pizza was introduced by a peddler who walked up and down Taylor Street with a metal washtub of pizzas on his head, crying his wares at two cents a chew. This was the traditional way pizza used to be sold in Naples, in copper cylindrical drums with false bottoms that were packed with charcoal from the oven to keep the pizzas hot. It wasn’t long until small cafes and groceries began offering pizzas to their Italian-American communities.
The first “official” pizzeria in America is disputable, but it is generally believed to have been founded by Gennaro Lombardi in Little Italy, Manhattan. Gennaro Lombardi opened a grocery store in 1897 which later was established as the first pizzeria in America in 1905 with New York’s issuance of the mercantile license. An employee of his, Antonio Totonno Pero, began making pizza for the store to sell that same year. The price for an entire pizza was five cents, but since many people couldn’t afford the cost of a whole pie, they could instead say how much they could pay and they were given a slice corresponding to the amount offered. In 1924, Totonno left Lombardi’s to open his own pizzeria on Coney Island called Totonno’s. While the original Lombardi’s closed its doors in 1984, it was reopened in 1994 just down the street and is run by Lombardi’s grandson.[6]
Pizza was brought to the Trenton area of New Jersey very early as well with Joe’s Tomato Pies opening in 1910 followed soon by Papa’s Tomato Pies in 1912. In 1936, Delorenzo’s Tomato Pies was opened. While Joe’s Tomato Pies has recently closed, both Papa’s and Delorenzo’s have been run by the same families since their openings and remain among the most popular pizza’s in the area. Frank Pepe Pizzeria Napoletana in New Haven, Connecticut, was another early pizzeria which opened in 1925 which is famous for its New Haven style Clam Pie. Frank Pepe’s nephew Sal Consiglio opened a competing store, Sally’s, across the street in 1938. Both establishments are still run by descendents of the original family. When Sal died, over 2000 people attended his wake, and the New York Times ran a half-page memoriam. The D’Amore family introduced pizza to Los Angeles in 1939.
Prior to the 1940s pizza consumption was limited mostly to Italian Immigrants and their descendants. The international breakthrough came after World War II. Allied troops occupying Italy, weary of their rations, were constantly on the lookout for good food. They discovered the pizzeria, and local bakers were hard pressed to satisfy the demand from the soldiers. The American troops involved in the Italian campaign took their appreciation for the dish back home, touted by “veterans ranging from the lowliest private to Dwight D. Eisenhower”.
According to an article in American Heritage, the modern pizza industry was born in the Midwestern United States. Ric Riccardo pioneered what became known as the deep dish pizza when, in 1943, he and Ike Sewell opened Pizzeria Uno in Chicago, and a generation later, Tom Monaghan launched what soon became known as Domino’s Pizza and introduced home delivery.
In 1948, the first commercial pizza-pie mix — ‘Roman Pizza Mix‘ — was produced in Worcester, Mass., by Frank A. Fiorillo.
With its rising popularity, chain restaurants moved in. Leading early pizza chains were Shakey’s Pizza, founded in 1954 in Sacramento, California, and Pizza Hut, founded in 1958 in Wichita, Kansas. Later entrant restaurant chains to the dine-in pizza market were Bertucci’s, Happy Joe’s, California Pizza Kitchen, Godfather’s Pizza, and Round Table Pizza.
Today, the American pizza business is dominated by companies that specialize in pizza delivery. Besides Domino’s, this includes Little Caesar’s, Papa John’s Pizza, Giordano’s Pizza, Pizza Ranch, Mazzio’s and Godfather’s Pizza. Pizza Hut has also shifted its emphasis away from pizza parlors and toward home delivery. Another recent development is the take and bake pizzeria, such as Papa Murphy’s, at which raw pizzas are made from fresh ingredients and taken home to be baked in the customers’ own ovens.
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One important characteristic of American cooking is the fusion of multiple ethnic or regional approaches into completely new cooking styles. The cuisine of the South, for example, has been heavily influenced by immigrants from Africa, France, and Mexico, among others. Asian cooking has played a particularly large role in American fusion cuisine.
Similarly, while some dishes considered typically American may have their origins in other countries, American cooks and chefs have substantially altered them over the years, to the degree that the dish as now enjoyed the world over may even be considered archetypically American. Hot dogs and hamburgers are both based on traditional German dishes, brought over to America by German immigrants to the United States, but in their modern, popular form they are so altered that they can be reasonably considered American dishes.
Given the United States’ large size it is not surprising that its cuisine is typified by distinct regional variations. The cuisine of the East Coast and Pacific Northwest, for example, makes use of fish and seafood to much greater degree than that of the Midwest, where corn and beef were long more readily available. To some degree, easy transportation of perishable foodstuffs has diminished these regional differences in recent years, but many Americans still associate certain foods with specific places, such as steak with Omaha; lobster with Maine; salmon with the Pacific Northwest; and crab and crabcake with Maryland.
American cooking has been widely exported beyond its borders. Tex-Mex, Creole, and barbecue restaurants can be found in cities all around the world, while fast-food burger bars and pizzerias are even more popular