Pizza Becomes Even More Important

In 1889, Chef Raffaele Esposito created a pizza resembling the Italian flag: red (tomato), white (mozzarella) and green (basil). He named it after the queen, Margherita of Savoy, wife of King Umberto I. Since then, pizza has become a global favorite and for many, the ultimate food.

In fact, here in the U.S., 17 percent of ALL restaurants are pizzerias, accounting for almost $40 billion dollars in sales each year – not including the pizza we buy in supermarkets. It is big business and the Italian city of Naples wants the world to know that it is the heart and soul of pizza. And to prove it, 100 chefs teamed up on May 15 for 11 hours to make the planet's longest pizza – 2 kilometers. 

Making it is one thing, baking it another. A custom-designed five motorized wood-burning stoves on wheels drives over the pizza and gets baked as the cars drive across. 

Not to be outdone, Judge Chiara Bitozzi in court in the Italian city of Padua, ruled in favor of a divorced father who was taken to court for paying alimony to his ex-wife exclusively in the form of pizza. The judge ruled that pizza-as-alimony was just fine. The man, who has been identified only as a 50 year old pizza maker with the initials NT, was required as part of a divorce settlement to make a monthly payment of €300 ($333.99 USD) in child support to his ex-wife.

In the ruling, the judge stated that the pizza maker did not earn enough money to make full payments in actual cash, and as such, it was totally acceptable for him to pay for the alimony entirely in pizza.