Pizza Bites: America’s Favorite Pizza Topping Isn’t Italian

In the second Pizza Bite from Eating History, Adrienne and Stephen tackle America’s undisputed favorite pizza topping: pepperoni. From the surprising reality of ordering "peperoni" in Italy to its mysterious origins in early 20th-century New York, they explore how an Italian-American community creation transformed into a national culinary staple. In this episode: Why ordering a "pepperoni" pizza in Naples will get you a pie covered in bell peppers The 1919 debut of the word and its evolution from Southern Italian cured meat traditions The culinary science behind why pepperoni’s high fat content and paprika make it the perfect pizza topping The earliest documentation of a pepperoni pizza at The Spot in New Haven, Connecticut How post-WWII expansion turned this Italian-American invention into the default topping for one out of every three pizzas in America