THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, June 22, 1995 TAG: 9506210067
SECTION: FLAVOR PAGE: F1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY MARY FLACHSENHAAR, SPECIAL TO FLAVOR
LENGTH: Medium: 83 lines
WE KNOW the phone numbers better than we know our own.
Dial those seven sweet digits, and a pizza will arrive at your door - sometimes in 30 minutes or less.
Some Hampton Roads households dial the magic numbers several times a week. Proof lies in the pileup of cardboard boxes on certain curbs every garbage day.
Americans love pizza.
Sample the following slices of statistics from the National Association of Pizza Operators:
Americans eat about 100 acres of pizza each day.
There are more than 58,000 pizzerias in the United States.
Pizza is a $30 billion-a-year industry.
Pizza is not just a 20th century American phenomenon. Top those stats with these historical tidbits, also provided by the pizza association:
Basic pizza probably originated in prehistoric times, with bread cooked on hot stones.
Shops in the volcano-devastated city of Pompeii bear the characteristics of a pizzeria.
Marie Antoinette's sister had ovens built in the forest so she could eat pizza, though the entree of choice for the royal hunting party she accompanied was fresh-killed duck.
Whether her highness preferred thin or thick crust is a subject still open to scholarly debate.
Modern-day, homemade pizza should be making history of its own. After all, it conforms to contemporary nutritional guidelines and is quick to make.
Author James McNair calls pizza ``a near-perfect food'' in the introduction of his cookbook ``Pizza'' (Chronicle, 1987).
McNair says pizza, minus sausage and other high-calorie toppings, ``supplies basic nutrients in almost the exact amounts recommended in the Dietary Goals for the United States . . . 15 percent protein, 27 percent fat and 58 percent carbohydrate.''
Pile fresh veggies on top of that pizza, use low-fat cheese and a minimal amount of oil, and it gets even closer to nutritional nirvana.
Making pizza at home is quicker and easier than many home cooks think it will be.
Janie Jacobson, cooking school director at the Kitchen Barn at Hilltop shopping center in Virginia Beach, uses rapid-rise yeast and commercially prepared sauce to make one of the speediest homemade pizzas in the East.
``I like rapid-rise yeast because it makes a lighter crust,'' said Jacobson, who recently taught a class in making healthful pizza. ``And some of the good-quality commercial tomato sauces are thicker than homemade and less apt to make the crust soggy.''
The whole-wheat crust made by Angela Phillips, a fitness director at Results fitness club in Chesapeake, is appealingly convenient.
``You can knead it in a food processor instead of by hand to save time,'' said Phillips, who has taught local classes in healthful cooking. ``And it rises in the refrigerator overnight so you can get a head start on tomorrow's meal.''
Jacobson and Phillips slide their from-scratch crusts onto a baking stone that has been preheated in a 500-degree oven. Pizza baked on a stone, they say, has a crisp crust - although not as crisp as one that comes out of a pizzeria's oven.
``You can't reproduce pizza from a 700-degree restaurant oven in a home oven,'' Phillips said. ``Home pizza will be different but in many ways it will be better. You can have it your way.''
If you don't want to invest in a baking stone and a paddle to transport the pizza to the hot stone, you can still make pizza at home.
There are many alternatives to a crust that requires kneading, resting and equipment from a kitchen shop.
One of the most popular is the prebaked Italian bread shell available in most supermarkets.
The shells are manna from heaven for cooks who are short on time. MEMO: Pizza recipes appear on page F5.
ILLUSTRATION: Color photo by Martin Smith-Rodden, Staff
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