this post was submitted on 20 Jan 2024
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Today I Learned

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[–] [email protected] 140 points 8 months ago (11 children)

It's kinda crazy that it took the combined culinary efforts of at least 4 nations to create something genius that would piss off all of those nations.

Also, pineapple on pizza is fucking delicious, and I will fight over that personal opinion being as valid as it sucking :)

[–] [email protected] 55 points 8 months ago (7 children)

Pepperoni, bacon, pineapple, and jalapeño. The ultimate combination of sweet, spicy, salty, and savory.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 8 months ago (1 children)

You have been awarded the key to the city of Halifax.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Drizzle a little mango sauce on top, and I'm sold.

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[–] [email protected] 15 points 8 months ago

Whats even crazier is the ethnobotanical path to GET those ingredients together.

Tomatoes had to be brought from south america. Bred to grow at lower altitudes. Peasants had to be persuaded to eat them (they were formally animal feed because they were from the nightshade family and peasants didn't trust the fruit not to be poisonous since the leaves are) and then enough time (100 years) had to pass for them to develop cuisine around them.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 8 months ago (4 children)

In Greece, eating feta cheese with watermelon(or melon) is somewhat common. You combine the sweetness of the watermelon with the saltiness of feta. And both things are cold.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 8 months ago (2 children)

In Italy, prosciutto with melon is pretty common. Sweet and savory as a combination is pretty common. See also: sharp cheddar on apple pie.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 8 months ago

Yup, people who object to Hawaiian Pizza for any reason other than "it's not for me" don't really understand food.

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[–] [email protected] 5 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Pizza is a very fatty, often greasy food, and acidic taste balances out greasiness in the mouth

[–] [email protected] 5 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Good thing tomatoes are acidic then

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago

It really depends on the quality of the pineapple to me. Sometimes it is dry and it sucks. Sometimes it is kinda melted, which gives a sweet to the pizza without making the texture weird.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Pineapple, Canadian bacon, pepperoni, red onion, and balsamic drizzle. My recent stroke of genius from the local unlimited topping pizza place.

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[–] [email protected] 42 points 8 months ago (1 children)

And some countries put canned corn on pizza and call it “American style” because Americans love corn.

[–] [email protected] 19 points 8 months ago (3 children)

I was once in a Filipino grocery in L.A. and they had corn and cheese ice cream. I don't mean they had corn ice cream and they had cheese ice cream, I mean they had an ice cream flavor called "corn and cheese."

[–] [email protected] 6 points 8 months ago (5 children)

Filipino here, grew up with the stuff and never realized how weird it could be perceived as until now. It's more like a cheesy vanilla flavor with bits of corn.

We also have a creamy vanilla sort of popsicle with red mung beans in it that I suspect we got from the Chinese.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 8 months ago (1 children)

"cheesy vanilla flavor with bits of corn"

That is seriously not helping lol. I will concede though that it could be one of those things better tasting than you would imagine. Like the first time I tried the off the cob version of elote (Mexican Street corn.) A cup of hot corn with mayo, cheese, and chili powder? I thought it sounded bizarre at the time but holy shit - I ate the hell out of it and wanted more lol.

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Me loading my .45 1911

"Shame"

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[–] [email protected] 26 points 8 months ago (5 children)

In Japan, there's Vermont curry, which has a maple-syrup-y taste.

Vermont doesn't have a state curry.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Yup. You can get it in the USA at Asian grocery stores, and even in some American stores located in areas with large Asian populations. And it’s fucking delicious.

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[–] [email protected] 21 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

AAAAND it is inspired by north American Chinese food.

Inspired in part by his experience preparing Chinese dishes which commonly mix sweet and savory flavours,

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawaiian_pizza

[–] [email protected] 17 points 8 months ago

It gets even messier.

Modern tomato sauce used in pizza is a variation of the sauce in southern Italy. People were cultivating tomatoes there after they were introduced by Spain, that controlled both that region and the North American lands formerly controlled by the Aztec city-States (nowadays by Mexico).

Where are tomatoes from? South America. Yup. The lands are today Peru's and/or Ecuador's. Likely domesticated way before Cuzco/Inca expanded over the region. In the meantime, the pineapples being put over the pizza are from another region, the Paraná basin (currently controlled by Brazil and Paraguay).

Then you got the dough. Wheat was domesticated somewhere in the Fertile Crescent; I think that the lands currently controlled by Iraq should be a safe bet. In special, Eastern Rome (aka Byzantium) used to control Naples too, spreading πίτα/pita (a type of flat bread) again into the region. (I say "again" because the Aeneid already talks about pizza, in Republican times.)

Cows (for the cheese) were domesticated a bit further to the west, probably what's today controlled by Syria... well, at least one of the times, because you can almost hear haunting zebu moos from what's controlled now by Pakistan. (I believe that most domestic breeds should be a cross between both, with varied amounts of zebu x taurus. And perhaps a third stock from the Maghreb.)

[–] [email protected] 17 points 8 months ago (2 children)

And then the Hawaiians replaced the ham with spam.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 8 months ago (4 children)

Honesty that'd probably be better. Ham is so bland on pizza; it can't compete with the sauce. I always do pineapple and pepperoni. The spice from the pepperoni cuts through the sweetness really nicely.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 8 months ago

That's why you need some nice smoked ham or honey roast or similar....agree though, most places just use most bland crap they can find cheap

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[–] [email protected] 13 points 8 months ago (5 children)

I go to Italy often just to eat real Italian food. I understand that for Italians, the hawainana pizza is an aberration, like many other things if not cooked as they traditionally do. And I respect it, because it's a key part of their culture. Still, I have a right to eat and like whatever I want, so I also expect respect on that sense. Some people will do this and some others won't. I think it's a personal choice to decide respecting others opinions.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Traditional schmaditional. They never had tomatoes, peppers, potatoes, corn or a bunch of other things until Meso-America was ransacked.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

Discovering that tomatoes were new world fruit really torpedoed any chance of me respecting Italian traditions

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[–] [email protected] 13 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

Finally

That being said, I do enjoy it.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 8 months ago

This is why I can never hate on hawaiian pizza. It is a true-born Canadian pizza, birthed from these frozen wastes.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Whats a Canadian from Greece? Was the guy Greek living in Canada? Doesn’t that just make him Greek? Or was it a person born in Canada with Greek ancestry? That would not make him from Greece.

[–] [email protected] 34 points 8 months ago (1 children)

He was born in Greece and became a Canadian citizen. That made him a Canadian from Greece.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Now, were I a smarter man, I would have realized that. Thanks for the correction.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 8 months ago

I dunno everything is Greek to me...

[–] [email protected] 11 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Just think, if you open your mind and let other cultures be your inspiration, you too could invent something as reviled and divisive as Hawaiian pizza.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago

Multiculturalism was a mistake.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (2 children)

The Germans seem to think they invented it. Order it in Sweden, and it'll come with bananas.

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[–] [email protected] 8 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (5 children)

A fruit native to Brazil. We call it "pizza hawaii" in the Netherlands and it's tasty. Ananas, ham and cheese, perfection I say, pizza puritan snobs be damned.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I personally cannot stand pineapple on my pizza (despite wanting to like it). And really do not care what other people put on their food.

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago

I'm not too sure if pineapples are native from the lands currently controlled by Brazil, Paraguay, or both. The Amerindians farmed them quite a bit, so they spread even to to a chunk of North America; and the native range of a relative hints me that the genus originated further west.

That's just a guess though - the point is that nobody knows for sure.

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