Did you know that you need to get certified to make true Neapolitan-style pizza? There is a Naples-based organization that does just that! This infographic visualizes the pizzerias all over the world who are certified.

The world loves “Italian food.” I love “Italian food,” or at least I love the version of Italian food brought over and created by Italian American immigrants that I can find in most of New York. A few months ago, my husband and I watched a documentary called "E il Cibo Va" or “Food On The Go” on Netflix. The documentary examines what Italian food is, and is not in Italy, and how the Italian immigrants of days yore used food as a creative outlet and to integrate into societies that did not always accept them. Somewhere in this documentary we are introduced The True Neapolitan Pizza Association (Associazione Verace Pizza napoletana, AVPN). The Association was founded to protect the integrity of the 400-year-old Neapolitan-style pizza. AVPN also trains and certiﬁes “Pizzaiolo” or “Pizza Makers” around the world. The Association’s president, Antonio Pace said something during his interview which stayed with me:

“To begin, we recognize two grand pizza traditions: Pizza Napoletana, and the imitation of Pizza Napoletana”

He goes on to say:

“I say that Pizza Napoletana may seem simple, but maybe I sound presumptuous, it’s a perfect product. It can’t be improved or modified and once modified, it just gets worse.”

First off, most of the world knows “pizza” as just “pizza,” but with the internet, I think more and more people are starting to learn the nuances of our favorite foods. How many originals can we say get worse with modification? I could certainly see the case for the pizza. I’ve always been a bit of a “pizza purist” myself, and never found pineapple or ham or jalapeños to be acceptable toppings on pizza. But who am I to say what is acceptable? I’m not even being a purist about the 400-year-old style of Italian pizza with recipes that have been passed down from generation of pizzaiolo to pizzaiolo that Mr. Pace was describing above. The pizza of my youth is the thin New York style of pizza. I’ve moved around the United States a few times to realize that my version of “pizza purism” is not widespread. In New York there is a pizzeria on almost every corner. To walk into a pizzeria and order a slice of “regular” (cheese pizza) will always be something I cherish. To hear that familiar crunch of crust as you fold the pizza triangle in half, longways, lifting it an inch or two off its paper plate and take a bite, a drop or two of oil drips onto the plate, as you stand elbow to elbow with other pizza eaters will always be a happy memory. This is not the way it’s done in Italy, or even in America’s own Chicago, but it’s the pizza I ate every Friday with my family. I think this personal family tradition is somehow connected to fasting from meat on Fridays as a Catholics. Which I think is a nod to why I think people love pizza the way they do. It goes beyond the delicious, simple, and winning combo of sauce and melted cheese on top of flat bread. Modified from the original or not, pizza is wrapped up in cultural and regional pride and is also connected to personal family memories and traditions to people around the world. In fact, Mr. Pace summarizes this perfectly in his interview:

“Pizza Napoletana doesn’t have inventors, nor fathers, neither patrons, It’s the fruit of the Neapolitan people together.”

Pizza Napoletana began as “street food” and continues to be food for “everyone”. Naples was suffering from a series of bad cholera outbreaks and was considered an eye-sore for newly reunified Italy in the late 1800s. Pizza was considered dirty, and a meal for those living in poverty in the slums of one the largest cities in Europe. It wasn’t until the new Italian queen, Margherita of Savory visited Naples in 1889 did Pizza begin to be seen as anything else. The Queen was known for her hygiene and health practices. All her healthy behaviors have been written and fawned over by the press and her inner circle of writers and poets. She had become a model of health for women all over Italy. It was reported that what is now known as Pizza Marinara, and Pizza Margherita was presented to her on her visit. She picked her namesake pizza because the combination of the red sauce, mozzarella and basil was reminiscent to the flag of Italy. No one knows for sure if she ate the pizza. Despite this apparent royal endorsement, pizza didn’t really take hold of the world until the 1970’s. Through globalization and technology, Pizza as we know it today, became beloved across continents.

The story of pizza is a great case study in food tradition, but also innovation. Would Pizza be as beloved if we were all to stick to the original recipe? Is part of the love of pizza based in ingenuity and personal flourishes people around world have added? I think so. There is also something to be said about maintaining and celebrating tradition as well. I do believe that good food, with quality ingredients is something we should not only strive to know more about, but to protect. As the world continues to grow, and the food production industry continues to drive us further away from healthy, sustainable practices, I really do appreciate the work AVPN is doing to protect food tradition and quality. A world where we protect our culinary past, and also remain open to innovation and creativity provides the most opportunities to create food that delights and nourishes a growing world population.

About the Infographic

I really enjoy learning about the historical and cultural significance of good food, and the discovery of APVN, led me down a path of learning and exploration. Like all food and culinary pursuits, people have created their own modifications to the original pizza and created whole styles of pizza that do not even resemble what Mr. Pace is referring to, and yet, there are currently 615 certiﬁed AVPN members in 53 countries world-wide. When you think of every place you’ve come across that slings their version of Pizza, 615 pizzerias is a small number.

I pulled this member data and documentation about how to make the dish from AVPN’s website and brought it over to excel for cleaning and organizing and used a combo of QGIS and Adobe Illustrator to create the maps you see here. Illustrations are hand drawn using the iPad app, Procreate. I created this infographic as a challenge submission to Storytelling with Data’s March 2021 Challenge: Map it!

After I submitted the challenge, I decided to send an email over to AVPN with my graphic. I sent it over as gesture of gratitude, not really expecting a reply. To my delight, I received a reply saying that Mr. Pace himself had requested to get my infographic printed so that is can be hung up at their school in Naples! After a few important tweaks to how I presented the recipe, A few weeks later I received this video:

This is what you see when you walk into APVN’s school in Naples

Mr. Pace and my infographic at the Naples School — Mr. Pace and the infographic I created!

I’m so happy and proud that I could contribute to AVPN’s work in this small way.

Sadly, when my husband I visited Naples in 2019 we did not know about any of this. Lucky for us, we do live close to one of the three APVN members here in Texas and have enjoyed some certified Pizza Napoletana recently. We look forward to visiting Naples again to see this work in person and perhaps learn more about Pizza Napoletana while we are there.