Like a grilled cheese with a kick, this pie is all about childhood nostalgia.
Adam Horvath
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Most of Philadelphia’s signature meals have transcended its borders. The cheesesteak is acknowledged from Anchorage to Australia. Neighboring states might tease concerning the pronunciation of “wooder” ice, however they actually find out about it. Even town’s true favourite sandwich — roast pork with broccoli rabe and sharp provolone — bought the nationwide consideration it deserves, when Adam Richman in 2012 named it “Greatest Sandwich in America.”
There’s one South Philly secret that hasn’t but hit the massive time. It’s the pizzaz: a sauceless pizza topped with American cheese, sliced tomatoes, and banana peppers.
You learn that proper. American cheese, on a pizza. Within the coronary heart of town’s Italian American neighborhood.
“I find it irresistible,” mentioned native illustrator and meals historian Hawk Krall, who focuses his work on regional specialties. Nonetheless, he acknowledged, “Some folks hate it.”
How did this seeming sacrilege even come to be? Right here’s the inside track.
Celebre’s Pizza in Packer Park, positioned subsequent to Chickie’s & Pete’s within the shadow of the Linc, is believed to have originated the unusual pie someday within the Nineteen Eighties. In keeping with “Dinner at the Club,” the just lately printed e-book of tales and recipes from Palizzi Supper Membership, the pizzaz second of conception occurred one gradual day when brothers Ronnie and Robert Celebre had been operating the household store.
Reminiscing concerning the grilled cheese he and his brother used to eat as youngsters, Ronnie determined to make a pizza that introduced again the tastes of their childhood. He stretched out a spherical of dough, layered it with a wholesome sheet of American cheese, and lined it with onion slivers and sliced entire tomatoes.
Ronnie tinkered together with his recipe a bit, the story goes, ultimately scrapping the onions and substituting rings of banana peppers (like those you see in a gallon plastic jug in each deli in South Philly). That combo he deemed prepared for a workers style check. Whether or not or not the employees really preferred or or simply wished to maintain their jobs, they gave a collective thumbs up, and the pizzazz went on Celebre’s menu, the place it stays to today.
Different neighborhood pizzerias and bakeries discovered about this unconventional mixture and commenced creating their very own variations.
The pizzaz has been out there for many years at Cacia’s Bakery. Alongside its well-known tomato pies, the small store on the nook of fifteenth and Rittner gives sq. cuts of skinny, crunchy crust topped with melted American cheese, tomato slices, and the requisite banana peppers. (Seize a scorched nook slice if they’ve one.)
Different close by outlets which have earned their very own legions of pizzaz followers embrace Uncle Oogie’s, La Rosa, and Francoluigi’s, which provides mozzarella to the American cheese.
You might have points for those who attempt to order the combo outdoors South Philadelphia. That’s what occurred to neighborhood native and restaurant proprietor Anna Marie Maglio, who moved to the far Northeast when she married her husband Joe.
Maglio remembers calling an area pizzeria and ordering “a pizzaz.” She was given a sauceless crust lined with nearly each topping the shop had available.
Just a few years later, when she and Joe opened Cafe Carmela in Winchester Park, she knew she wanted to incorporate it on the menu so she may introduce her new neighbors to the South Philly secret.
When somebody asks what it’s, she has a prepared reply: “It’s like a grilled cheese — with somewhat pizzazz!” Ronnie Celebre could be proud.
