NAPLES PIZZA GETS EU LAUREL
NAPLES PIZZA GETS EU LAUREL
(ANSA) - Brussels, February 4 - Real Naples-style pizza on Wednesday received a European Union quality seal protecting it from imitations.
The European Commission approved a long-sought TSG (Traditional Speciality Guaranteed) label for Naples' gift to the culinary world.
"I've always loved Pizza Napoletana, which today earns its rightful place among our TSGs," European Agriculture Commissioner Mariann Fischer Boel told ANSA.
"Thanks to this logo, (Neapolitan pizza) is now part of Europe's food heritage".
Naples threw a huge street party like the one it staged in December when news of the EU laurel first broke.
Some 250 free pizzas were handed out in less than an hour by the first pizzeria to boast the TSG certificate as pizzaiolo (pizza-maker) association leader Sergio Miccu' hailed the award.
From today, Miccu' explained, all pizzerias eager to be recognised as supplying the real McCoy will apply to a special commission that will vet their standards.
But he repeated a warning that the numbers of properly trained pizzaioli were waning.
"The trademark is a great honour that we've been seeking for years but I don't see how there are no recognised courses for pizza-makers," Miccu' said.
"To make a proper pizza you need the right ingredients and the right cooking but you also need the manual ability that only a trained pizzaiolo can guarantee".
Neapolitan pizza-makers have been fighting for 25 years to have their unique product put on the EU's list of protected foods.
The only sour note Thursday was the unexpected absence of Agriculture Minister Luca Zaia.
Neapolitan pizza activists said they were sorry Zaia missed the party and criticised him for his recent participation at the high-profile launch of an 'all-Italian' McDonalds burger.
They said it was "a shame" because the TSG pizzeria had prepared a "Padanian pizza," complete with hamburgers and French fries, just for him.
'Padania', from the Italian for Po Valley, is the fictional region used by Zaia's Northern League party to describe northern Italy.
Back in December, however, Zaia was on hand to celebrate what he called ''this major landmark''.
He noted that the recognition coincided with the 120th anniversary of Naples' classic Margherita pizza.
''Europe has finally rewarded the tenacity of the Naples producers,'' Zaia said.
''It is a symbol of Neapolitan tradition that has for too long been the subject of dreadful imitations''.
But on Thursday Italian farming association Coldiretti repeated a warning that, despite the logo, half of Italy's 25,000 pizzerias "will continue to use cheese from Eastern Europe instead of traditional mozzarella, Chinese tomatoes, Tunisian or Spanish olive oil and Canadian or Ukrainian flour''. THE RIGHT STUFF.
The campaign to give Neapolitan pizza a seal worthy of its renown picked up speed in 2000 when then farm minister Alfonso Pecoraro Scanio set up a committee to lay down what should go into the dish and how it should be made.
True pizza, they concluded, must be made only of hard wheat flour, fresh yeast, water and sea salt, with a topping of olive oil, San Marzano tomatoes (in slices no thicker than 8mm) and mozzarella di bufala, the fresh cheese made of buffalo milk.
The dough must be stretched by hand (no rolling pins) and cooked at a high temperature - almost 500 degrees - to achieve a crust that is regular, puffed and free of blisters, the experts said.
The pizza must be frequently turned by the pizzaiolo, whose trained eye knows when the oven bricks' colour corresponds to the right heat for putting the pizza in and pulling it out with just the right touch of scorch marks.
The mark of a Neapolitan pizza is that it is thicker, doughier and munchier than its counterparts elsewhere, the mozzarella is stretchier and tastier, and the olive oil and tomatoes are of higher quality, gourmands agree.
But the final touch, of course, is the strong-scented local basil that perfectly complements the generous pools of mozzarella, artfully scooped tomato sauce and lashings of olive oil.
The tough specifications obviously rule out a vast array of foods that pass for pizza around the world, but Naples wants to convince the world that simple and traditional is best.
Pizza is one of the few foods composed almost exclusively of the region's three PDO (Protected Denomination of Origin) products as already recognized by the European Union: San Marzano tomatoes, extra-virgin olive oil from Campania, and mozzarella di bufala.
With some 180 products, Italy tops the EU charts for the three quality seals - PDO, TSG and PGI (Protected Geographical Indication) - and has recently extended its lead on France and Spain.
