How pizza became American 

theres literally a thing called the "pizza effect"

What about Lain?

@@moronivasquez3167 Favorite anime 🤣👌

Winner mentality.

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Who knew you guys were fans of JJ? Hey Grumps!

He's probably got a nice sprinkling of pizza grease lining his studio now

It looks like it's cold

Danny I hope you’re reading this, if you are how has your wig been suiting you? I know your friends at The Oathkeepers make fun of you for it but I think it looks beautiful.

You.... you come on this channel... complimenting a person's ability to handle a pizza... When you won't even finish a Final Fantasy game that is within canon... (Something Godfather, Something Goodfellas)... Oh hi Mark!

Thanks! I think it comes from the fact that I am just genuinely interested in culture as something that's "made." I think we are always in the process of building culture, so it seems pointless to judge is inherently a process of constant evolution.

Why do more people eat burgers tho

@@Littlegoblinfatface Get them faster, more easily served in single portions, maybe.

@@JJMcCullough Congrats on being a culture builder Mr. JJ

​@@Littlegoblinfatface cus they taste amazing

That's fair 😂.

Which one is more realistic

@@bathamsteryt From my experience, Old Wild West takes the cake at doing American food very very well, while Olive Garden gets an okay at recreating classic Italian-American food.

@lemonzef interesting I have only ever been to two countries My home country 🇺🇸 Other Country when I was really young 🇧🇸

@@lemonzef although I do have cousins who have been to Italy

Or mention Pizza Delight's kids menu with candy on pizza (although that's only an Eastern Canada chain). Or what I've always wondered, why Boston Pizza is called that when it's Canadian. I don't think there is a Boston-style pizza to name it after.

Denying Canadian inventions/ideas is sort of his deal.

If I’m not mistaken, I think he mentioned it in another video.

Because he links Canada as ‘American’ and doesn’t distinguish between the two usually. There’s more difference between the North American east and west coast culturally than there is between an American and Canadian border town.

@@jeremymullens7167 Anyone who says this has not actually visited either country a whole lot. Culturally? Sure. As a people - we are different. Try walking downtown Chicago at 10pm vs. Toronto. There's a difference. Trying to pretend there are no differences is just contrarianism pegged as insightful thought.

Amazing

Is this on youtube? Please say what video this is.

I would also like to see it

Ok but why was he yelling

​@@joshuasgameplays9850 pizza is just that exciting

RIP Adams

​@@cosmiccutie6687 hear, hear!

Very true, I would say it's also the cheapest "big meal" you can buy for parties and things, which helped popularize it as something we associate with fun times.

In the UK the pizza from US chains like Domino's, Pizza hut and Papa John's tends to be the most expensive. But they tend to be bigger with more toppings, so it is easier to share. More upmarket pizza restaurants tend to be cheaper but smaller, generally designed to be eaten by one or two people. The cheapest are independent takeaway pizzas which are generally little better than what you'd get from the frozen food section in the supermarket.

@@JJMcCullough In the tech industry it also became stereotyped as the coder bro food, for people without the time or inclination for something more fancy. Amazon popularised the whole concept of that a team that took more than two pizzas to feed was too large and unwieldy to manage. I think this is one of the reasons why it still remains kind of cool despite the hipster onslaught, it has transitioned well into the "authentic hipster" and "brogrammer" era we live in, whereas a lot of 80s/90s paraphernalia hasn't. But adaptability has always been its hallmark. That said, like with the rise of gourmet burgers making McDonalds/Burger King seem kind of vulgar, chain pizza has now become very declassé as a result of these trends.

Pizza, the true food to unite the proletariat

@JJMcCullough not just big enough for a party, but super easy to share. Everyone can grab a slice and eat it without any utensils

Hmmmm… Corned Beef Pizza anyone?

That's very sad about no desire for italian food.

​@@jessesleight9631it has changed significantly, don't worry ❤

Yeah i'mnot realy surprised either, a lot of the Ameericanization of Italin food was made by Italian immigrants at the end of the 19th and beggining of the 20th century for some reasons like how some ingredients that are were used in Italy on that time were rarely available, and also they needed to just make the food more interestung for Americans and Pizza is like teh best example of that.

I am Brazilian as well and I disagree completely. We had our own wave of Italian migration to São Paulo, and we got pizza from Italy, not from the United States. We have our own style of pizza, which the Italian-Brazilian community is very proud of. It was a completely separate historical process and no one that I know sees the United States as an influence in this regard at all. American chains like pizza hut and domino's now exist in Brazil, but they are clearly different from the usual kind of pizza you find.

@@heitorborges8008 You’re probably right! I lived in Minas Gerais which probably doesn’t have as much of that as heritage as São Paulo. I also only lived in Brazil when I was younger so my memory might just not be the best. I appreciate the correction, I shouldn’t have spoken so plainly when a country as big as Brazil is much more than my own personal experience.

From my experience, the most people who are surprised are Europeans, especially Italians themselves, who want to retcon American influence out of Italian food, decrying Americanization as a bastardization of "traditions" that go back less than 70 years (and were codified in response to the Americana pallet) in some cases.

@@bort6459 I imagine most Italians don't actually see pizza as 'Italian'. That's because it is a southern Italian dish. I once offered some pizza to my Italian lodger and he refused saying 'it's not my culture'. He was from the North, and his staple diet was spaghetti, cooked with a drop of olive oil and grated Parmesan on top. So he wouldn't eat pizza, and I don't remember him ever eating any other type of pasta!

Especially with the way he was smacking it as he listed the toppings hahaha

I'm guessing it was a prop. If not, I want to know what cheese they used because those toppings stuck like they were glued.

@@wombatpandaa9774 pretty sure that was an actual cold piece of take out pizza. I'd say at least a half day old maybe previous night's. At one point in the video I can see the pizza box on the table. Pizza hut or dominos pizza can look like that especially if it's extra cheese.

It looked like a cardboard prop. It appeared to me that it was pizza toppings on both sides; not toppings on one side and crust on the other.

foccacia? I love that stuff, especially spicy with olives!

When I was in Italy for a month I'd have focaccia for breakfast and pizza for dinner every single day!

@@gdemorest7942 That sounds a bit much. When I was in the UK I'd eat pizza for lunch every day for a week, and though it was delicious, it was a bit much even for me

@@gdemorest7942 I have liked focaccia, but everything I've found lately has had an odd taste and aftertaste. Are these grocery-store bakeries and standalone bakeries putting in rosemary or using slightly rancid olive oil? I wish I knew.

@@kathyw7369 Sad to hear. Fresh is important and rosemary is quite a strong herb so should be used sparingly. I don't remember encountering rosemary being used on the Focaccia that I ate in Liguria so could be a different regional variation. Look for the olive of onion ones where you can see them being baked fresh. Good luck!.

Grandi is a fraudster that propalate mostly fake news to gain attention with the inevitable polemics.

Here in Vancouver (and I'm sure most other places), Costco now carries Detroit style frozen pizza, and it's absolutely become my go-to.

Good observation. Nowadays it's fairly common to see restaurants offer Detroit-style pizza, New York-style pizza, and Chicago-style pizza. I don't remember this being the case in the 90s and 2000s.

I love me some jets pizza.

I recently found out here in Columbus we have our own pizza style, which has a thin crust and is cut into squares. It wasn't till I saw an article by a local newspaper about it that I found out it was just a Columbus thing

😂 that's st Louis style pizza homie y'all got Columbus imo's the square beyond compare

Yep my grandfather was the same way at that time. My grandmother would get us pizza for our weekend visits but she'd have to make him some traditional TN comfort food because he wouldn't have anything to do with it. I do think though if my gran would have made it and called it a casserole he'd be all over it! ;)

Yes. Growing up in the 70s ordering pizza from Pizza Hut with half one set of toppings and half another.

When people complain about pineapple, I tell them to look up Swedish banana pizza or the many fruit pizza of Japan, Korea, and China.

I think the pineapple thing was just a silly meme/joke and it took off for whatever reason.

@@jimbodice2672 , I hate pepperonis and sausage as much as I hate pineapple on pizzas, and I’d much rather eat a pizza with sardines, anchovies, and mackerel on it than a pepperoni and sausage pizza or a Hawaiian pizza.

It's silly, Americans thinking pineapple's a controversial topping when it was Americans who had the idea in the first place. And Americans put pepperoni on pizza too...

JJ is the type of fella to make an entire video about this type of joke

what? That came out of nowhere.

Is he? I don't think so.

@@SaoirseVisceral sambucha sounds like a ligma setup ima be honest

Okay

the channel Weird History Food has a good video on US styles of pizza

what is a grandma pizza?

@@slimfix2311 a thick crust square pizza with a lot of sauce, and a thin dusting of cheese and sometimes herbs

Not beautiful anymore when you know there's a human out there holding the title of 'porn historian'. Don't know what they contribute to this world or how they did their research but they exists

He keeps shaking it around like a doll

yeah, São Paulo also has a strong pizza tradition

But how come argentinians mostly speak spanish now? or do they speak italian as well

@@pinkgreenmelon2209 Argentinians speak a variety of Spanish that sounds a lot like Italian and has a bunch of Italian originated slang. The reason why they still speak Spanish is because in the late 19th century there was an effort by President Roca's government to form an Argentinian national identity, and only Spanish was allowed to be taught at school. Same reason why most Irish people aren't fluent in Gaelic. The difference here being that the Irish made an effort to bring Irish Gaelic back because it was 100% an Irish thing, while the Argentinians feel like a new identity of their own was born from this Spanish/Italian crossover language, and mostly believe that it is more practical to speak Spanish given that most of the region does as well. Nevertheless, it is true that at one point in the early 20th century there were more Italian speakers than Spanish speakers in Argentina. But given the similarities between Italian and Spanish that made it easy to learn for immigrants, and the aforementioned school policy, everyone ended up either learning Spanish or having children that spoke Spanish.

@@morejoacomapo7080 Ohhh I see it now, thank you for answering!!

@@pinkgreenmelon2209 most of the people who came there from Italy came from the south, and at the time few people there even knew Italian - they spoke many different regional languages, and Standard Italian was as foreign to them as Spanish was

I'm curious, are there any "Zimbabweizations" of pizza? Like pizza mixed with some traditional or well-liked Zimbabwean food. And are there many locally owned pizza shops?

Also came from a place where Pizza is expensive

@@wombatpandaa9774 It's been so long I had to find the menu again - thanks for the nostalgia! I noticed they have sweetcorn amongst other toppings for the vegetarian and they have boerewors mince amongst other toppings for the "meat lovers" pizza. Boerewors (pronounced: actually never mind, its too hard over text) is definitely a very southern african thing. Boerewors are a beefy sausage invented by the Boers. The Boers are Dutch settlers who formed South Africa, Zimbabwe's bigger and more interesting (but otherwise very similar) neighbour country - think Canada and the US. The word "Boer" means "farmer" and "wors" means sausage. Boerewors and other Afrikaaner culture are part of Zimbabwe's because during the Apartheid regime of South Africa, and the Rhodesian government of current day Zimbabwe, the sanctions imposed by the rest of the world means that trade between the two countries attempted to fill a lot of the gaps from trade deficits. The South African government also sent many South African military personnel to fight in Rhodesia's bush war, much of the slang used in Zimbabwe today is from this exchange 40 years ago. Boerewors is traditionally served as a boerewors roll- in a hotdog bun with relish and caramelized onions if one is fancy enough- very delicious, strongly recommended. Sweetcorn is interesting to me because it is a very Americanized product. Zimbabwe's economy is split between mining and agriculture. The primary crop of the latter is maize (more British name for corn) and so, to me, the fact that sweetcorn is used goes to show the permeation of American influence - distorted as it ends up. There were two locally owned places I remember, as far as I know, they both shut down.

@@lukerees281I have a question did Zimbabwe have a apartheid like South Africa also ?

@@The_king567 Whilst they did not have as formal of an apartheid system in Rhodesia, the minority ruled white government did enact policies that made them more in line with South Africa. The peak of Rhodesian government was from 1965 to 1980. The contrast and difference in severity is not something I know to comment on but due to the proportion of whites being less in Rhodesia than in South Africa, amongst other factors, leads to South Africa being remembered more. The Rhodesian government did enact acts and laws that restricted blacks and coloureds to other, less desirable plots of land as well as more restricted voting, education and financial access. I still have much to learn about my country, I'm only 21 and the historical coverage can be difficult to sift through biases. The topic is difficult to simplify to a yes/no answer. Hope it helped though.

More accurately, pizza is a Neapolitan food that was Americanized then adopted and adapted in every country in the world, including the rest of Italy.

In some parts of Europe a lot of Turkish immigrants set up takeaway pizza restaurants. It wasn't too alien to them to basically make a flatbread and put toppings on it before cooking, so they took to it well.

You sure they weren't serving Lahmacun instead of pizza? It's flatbread with mincemeat that has been around in the Middle East and Turkey for a long, long time arguably even before pizza.

@@Hammi4Real Yeah, it was written as pizza in the menu. There were many variants.

@@Marian87 Ah I see.

I think both America and Canada have sort of ceased being a melting pot and that's disappointing. As I said in a previous video, there's often this idea now that "melting pot" means everyone assimilates into a single grey sludge, when in reality it's supposed to mean that everyone adds something distinct to an impressive whole.

As much as the "mosaic" has been such a strong part of Canada's national mythology, in practice I'm not sure that it's worked out all that differently with regards to integrating immigrant populations compared to America's supposed "melting pot".

@@JJMcCulloughvery well put. ‘Modern’ is rather lifeless

But still this video is mostly misinformed, using only a single indirect source for his thesis. With a quick google search, you can find a 1866 book "Usi e costumi di Napoli e contorni descritti e dipinti" by Francesco De Bourcard, where it is described the "modern" pizza recipe (with tomatoes+mozzarella+basil) in the "il pizzaiolo" chapter. If it was known in italian literature by the mid 19th century, who knows how much before it could have been developed

pizza is not an American dish, try again

I would hardly say that this is modern pizza, as it implies that the tomato is optional that could be changed for something like mussels as opposed to an integral component.

@@operleutnant7235not to mention that it’s almost certainly the American version that gave pizza most of its modern appeal.

That story have been proven to be a myth

@@Jay-pq7nfWhat story?

@@marcotalli561 I think your refering to a story from the 1880s about pizza but the story is been debunked

In Italy, on the other hand, Italian American food has never influenced Italian cuisine, in fact it can only be found in American tourist traps that no Italian frequents

I’m guessing the actual difference is American fast food pizza versus a more American pizzeria style.

@@JustMe-dc6ks probably. Admittedly, the UK is guilty of labelling blatantly Americanised shops as "Italian" when it comes to branding.

@@bingbongvo7287 The UK and US are very similar in the way they commercialize foreign foods

@@michaeltnk1135 Don't worry, it happens more than you think in other countries as well. JJ even did a video on food other countries label "American" but aren't anything like American food in any way whatsoever. Pretty sure it's just a normal thing to promote stuff as more exotic.

"Italian style" pizza in the UK tends to mean a thin crust Neapolitan style pizza, whereas a more Americanised pizza will have a thicker, breadier base. Unless it's "New York" style, then it's like Neapolitan but twice the size!

Bro you from Hamden stop lying 💀

*Bruh you ain't from New Haven there's literally a Dominos on the corner of Ella T Grasso Boulevard and Whalley Ave. Stop lying bro* 💀

@@CaptainAlliance not from Hamden. Said small town. Happened in Branford.

So it’s kinda funny bc I 100% know intuitively that Connecticut pizza is probably the real deal but as a New Jersey resident I still definitely look down on it as fake

@@ianmoore3470 lol. It’s all good New Jersey has great pies. I actually like the little competition. It forces people to keep stepping up their game but I’ll be honest and I’m sure it’s the same in New Jersey. It’s very regional in Connecticut where really good pizza is. And you have to know which spots to go which is easy to look up. One can’t just go to a random pizza place in ct and expect it to be the best. In general if it’s a in the New Haven area and is called apizza you have a great shot of it being great. Barstool did a thing on it and I even seen some Netflix food specials on those places. Glad the reputation is getting out there. PS I know this might sound weird to somebody from New Jersey but did you know Connecticut percentagewise has more Italian Americans per capita than any other state? It’s an neat stat almost everyone I know is at least part Italian.

I moved to Ankara from Canada for a few years and I was actually very surprised at how different traditional Medditerannean foods were from what we ate in Canada under the same name. I found pizza in Turkey actually very different and yeah to be associated as an American thing with pictures of New York all over the restaurant. Here, it would be lots of pictures of Southern Italy, and to think of it as an American food is low-class. I found I actually preferred pide and especially Lahmacun over pizza in Turkey. The biggest culture shock food for me though was donair. In Canada, we eat it wrapped in a flatbread with onions, tomatoes, lettuce, and a sweet garlic sauce. It was a big shock to me that wasn't what a donair is at all!

Italian American food has never influenced the Italian cuisine

@@alessiovalentini4401 yeah sure 😏.

@@alessiovalentini4401 Pasta alla carbonara, a dish unrecorded in Italy before World War II, may be due to an American influence in relationship to the allied liberation of Rome in 1944. Many Italians then were happy to use powdered eggs and bacon supplied by the United States and their armed forces for pasta dishes.

@@andriandrason1318 the carbonara is a dish born in Italy, there are many stories about its origin and one is that it was invented by Roman chefs for American soldiers in Rome. No American Italian food has ever influenced Italian cooking

it was very stale. I bought it the night before.

@@JJMcCullough Please tell us you at least refrigerated it! I remember your last apartment's cupboards filled with books.

Still italian!!!

Everything is invented in USA, like TV, internet, cars, ice, ...

Americans filled it with ground beef and cheese. It wasn't nearly as huge and gooey and thick in its original form, much like the other two dishes.

​@@JJMcCullough Lasagna in Italy is not necessarily filled with ground beef, in many region is used ground pork (in some regions no meat at all, just cheese and vegetables). There are written recipes with pork meat since at least 1837, and with beef meat much later in 1913. Cheese was present even before any meat, even in 1634 "Lucerna de corteggiani". In general the use of cheese with pasta is older than tomato sauce. Maybe in America lasagna got thicker, but in Italy doesn't appear to be a standard thickness, and it varies a lot between different recipes.

@@Liggliluffcopied in a sheet version, you never invented anything

@@KeyserSoze-vi6xe "you"? I'm not from USA, I made a joke

Given in countries like Turkey the food scene skews heavily toward fast, street food style options that are quick to churn out and have better margins, it’s logical that this mindset would carry over in the immigrant communities elsewhere. In all seriousness though, Kebab Pizza NEEDS to become a thing everywhere. But would it really kill them to pre-slice them before handing off to the customer?

I initially read that as “I worked in a pizza once”, and I had questions…

@@cratorcic9362 Hey man, there's all kinds of architecture out there

The thought of that Pizza going cold during the making of this video hurt 😅, I guess sacrifices had to made LOL

In Argentina, a country that had a huge Italian immigration, pizzas are sometimes accompanied with a dish called "faina", which I would describe as a flat pie made out of chickpea flour, the taste is kind of bland and salty by itself, but many people here like to place a slice of it on top on another pizza slice

kebab pizza in Sweden

​@@pablocasas5906 faina is the descendant of the Genoese farinata, which is pretty much the same dish but served without the pizza

@@Alex-fv2qs thanks for the info. Do they serve it in the U.S.?

@Pablo Casas It's called "Farinata," and it's chickpea flour baked in a baking pan. It is a Genova street food dish. I love it!

what you call "faina" in italy it's Farinata, very common dish

Today in "stories that never happened"

​@@schtreg9140Yes, because nothing ever happens

@@myspleenisbursting4825 Italians would lynch you for pretending your pizza is better than theirs. I live in a country next to Italy, so I would know. The story just screams completely made up to me and is something an American would say to flatter themselves. It doesn't even have to do with who has the better pizza. It's just that Italians would never market pizza as something from abroad. That's ridiculous.

​@@schtreg9140dude Italy's entire food culture is a lie you are a product of propaganda. I absolutely believe that story since Italy was poor as fuck compared to America. There's an old story of American soldiers visiting Italy shortly after WW2 and one of the things they found odd was that there wasn't pizzerias everywhere like they were used to in America.

I did get offended a bit lmao. Considering that JJ talks on how the sauce was added in America when here in South Italy tomato sauce has been used for centuries on bread-type foods. Sono di Sicilia ma se fosse di Napoli sarei incazzato hahaha.

@@DistortedEmerald io sono del nord lol quindi non è che mi frega più di tanto

I don't see Pizza as American at all as well.

You should read that book I recommended by the Italian guy

Pizza (as generally intended) is a food from Naples. Current most popular recipe (in Italy) is documented since 1889. As people from Naples migrated to other countries, new variation evolved and the American variation is the one that become more popular and iconic around the world, that's surely true. But in Italy we mostly stick to pizza Napoletana, which spread to other Italian cities with people from Naples migrating for work to other cities.

Indeed this video is mostly misinformed, using only a single indirect source for his thesis. With a quick google search, you can find a 1866 book "Usi e costumi di Napoli e contorni descritti e dipinti" by Francesco De Bourcard, where it is described the "modern" pizza recipe (with tomatoes+mozzarella+basil) in the "il pizzaiolo" chapter. If it was known in italian literature by the mid 19th century, who knows how much before it could have been developed

@@marcotalli561 very true. I have met people from New York who erroneously insist that pizza was invented there. It is ridiculous.

pretty sure he mentioned pizza parties a lot actually lol

Italian Government never had this theory. The theory of the "racial inferiority" of southern Italian was popular in Northern Europe and the US, one of its main proponent was Madison Grant. Italian Government was openly ostile to this theory. There were of course racists in northern Italy (and still there are some) that believed it, but it was never a theory positively view by authorities as was instead the case of the US. Also northern Italian emigrated, but mostly to Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay, while in the US were mostly southern Italians.

Also where in Italy he lived. Like J.J. says, it was historically a Naples thing. You wouldn't find it in Rome, or Milan, or Venice or wherever. It spread to Italy as a whole in part because American tourists went to those other cities and asked "where's the pizza"?

@@jhbadger Reminds me of how the city of Venice supposedly went as far as to pass regulations to prohibit the gondoliers from singing non-Venetian songs because tourists kept requesting Neapolitan ones like O Sole Mio or Funiculì, Funiculà.

Yeah, pizzerias started to open throughout the rest of non-Neapolitan Italy only after WW2

​@@jhbadgerThis is absolutely a lie hahaha. Americans have never influenced pizza in Italy. Southern Italian immigrants who emigrated to the USA did so exactly like in the rest of Italy, so pizza spread throughout Italy without any influence from America

@@jhbadger in Rome the first pizzeria, Ricci, opened in 1888, in Milan the older still in operation, A Santa Lucia, in 1929, in Venice Conca d'Oro in 1947. Pizza was made popular in other cities initially by migrants from Naples, as it happened abroad, including US, and later on by internal tourism.

Grandi really likes to use sentences that are easy to misunderstand, or deliberate exaggerations and provocations, just to trigger polemics. Of course his sentence in this was a joyful exaggeration, as you correctly explained.

ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-fK5CLplRIno.html "Friday was pizza day, the best day of the week"

In reality, pizza is only Italian, then every country has its own versions and the USA is one of them. Pizza in Italy has never been influenced by Americans contrary to what he says in the video. It is true that it was a common thing only in Naples and in the rest of southern Italy but the southern Italian immigrants have emigrated to the USA exactly as in the rest of Italy and have opened and spread pizzerias that have evolved and today every city has its own style with dozens and dozens of varieties. American pizzas are poorly made copies of the various styles of pizza from different regions of southern Italy that Italian immigrants and American soldiers brought to the USA. American Italian food and its values ​​have never influenced Italian food and in Italy, only in the tourist traps. It is no coincidence that when Americans have tried to truly bring their style to Italy they have always failed

I hope someone translates his book

Grandi e` un bufalaro, quasi tutte le cose che dice sono invenzioni o esagerazioni per massimizzare le polemiche e quindi la visibilita`.

now you have.

This is a myth. There’s actually no current evidence to confirm this