Holiday Pizza Buying Guide
Gifts for the pizza enthusiast in your life (or yourself)
Hi there!
I think I need a better salutation. Something pizza related. Maybe like “Cheesey Greetings!” or “Slice Up!” I don’t know if either of those work, but I’m open to suggestions.
The holiday are upon us! Today is the dreaded black friday. A day named for its sickening and dreadful deals, terrible tantrums thrown by cranky customers and frightening freebies. To help ease anxiety I wanted to put together a shopping guide to help you navigate some amazing pizza items that are out in the wild. I do not get any money from these links and no one is paying to be here. Just a list of items I respect in the pizza world.
We’ll cover gift categories like:
Pizza books
Pizza music
Pizza Equipment
Pizza as its own gift
Pizza Books & Novels for the Pizza Scholar
Books are a really funny gift to receive. Reading a book is a commitment. If you don’t have a good reading habit in place changing your habit around a gift is difficult. I do my best to read books gifted to me, but sometime they slowly rot away on the book shelf.
Even when writing my own pizza book, Pizza Walk Pittsburgh: A Guidebook, I thought to myself, “What can I do to get people who don’t read book to have fun reading this book?” I added some interactive elements like a pizza mad lib, made the chapters concise and provided fun self-guided tour.
All this to say, there’s a deluge of pizza books out in the wild, but these two provide an inspirational experience.
Modernist Pizza - A Tome of Epic Pizza Proportions
Alright let’s be real about this “book.” It’s $425. That seems like a lot. Well, it actually is a lot to pay for a book. But the odd thing about Modernist Pizza is that I’m not sure I’d classify this as a book. It’s a historical document. It’s the type of work you put on a spaceship that floats through the galaxy for thousands of years before being discovered by another type of life.
The Modernist Pizza chronicles every single aspect of pizza making. Literally every aspect. Making cheese, making dough, how to properly prepare and cook a pizza. There are complex diagrams that belong in science books depicting how heat in the oven cooks the pizza. They sent me over a sample of the book and I don’t think they’d mind me sharing this here.
Check out their chart below depicting fermentation time and yeast content. Now that’s pizza science.
You can buy Modernist pizza online but here’s two local Pittsburgh spots:
Pizza Czar - Recipes and Know-How from a World-Traveling Pizza Chef
Anthony Falco is a familiar name to those in the pizza business. He got his start by building out Roberta’s Pizza in Brooklyn. Roberta’s would usher in a new era of pizza where the pizza shops are a cool place to hang out, drink unique cocktails and, most importantly, eat innovative and modern pizza.
Falco has since left Roberta’s to spread the good word of pizza around the globe. As a pizza consultant he travels to pizzerias to help them figure out every aspect of pizza production: sourcing ingredients, working the ovens, logistics and process.
He recently wrote a book detailing just about everything he knows about pizza. If you want to make the best pizza possible, you’ll probably want this book to guide you on your journey.
You can buy Pizza Czar online but here’s two local Pittsburgh spots:
Pizza Equipment for the At Home Pizzaiolo
There’s no shortage of equipment a pizzaiolo needs to make pizza at home. Each month I find myself yearning for something else - an apron, another pizza tray, another utensil to manipulate the pizza in some way.
I’ll recommend a few things here.
For pans, you gotta go Lloyd. Lloyd pans have served me well on my pizza journey. I highly recommend their Detroit Pizza pan.
For cutting the pizza, I use a Boska pizza cutter. It slices pizza flawlessly and looks good doing it. Easy to clean, nice to hold. Perfect companion.
If you want a pizza oven for your home I can’t recommend the Ooni enough. I got one of these in May and fire it up a few times a month. There’s a small learning curve, but once you figure it out it’s very easy to use. Check out the Ooni here.
Easy Listening for Post-Pizza Consumption
Vinyl is a great gift to give. It’s fun to give someone a record, get the needle scraping and getting your groove on. There are a few pizza related albums out in the wild you might find make stellar gifts for anyone with a turntable, but I’ll recommend two right this very moment.
Lou Monte Sings
Lou Monte Sings: Songs For Pizza Lovers is a staple in my home. Whenever there’s pizza making or pizza consumption happening this vinyl finds its way to the turn table. The record has a variety of hits to serenade your pizza crew. Your best bet is to find it on eBay.
Personal and the Pizzas
On the other end of the spectrum we have Personal and the Pizzas. Here’s how they describe themselves: These 3 greasy goons from Jersey write Rock n Roll songs about girls, hangin around, startin' trouble, partyin, beatin up nerds, delinquency, cars, rocking n rollin, eatin pizza, drinkin, fightin, smokin, cryin, kidnappin, and everything else 3 greaseballs from the streets might sing about. Now that’s good stuff! Songs embedded below, but you can find their vinyl on their Bandcamp here.
Pizza Itself is a Perfect Gift
What am I doing recommending all these pizza items to you. Pizza itself is the ultimate gift for the pizza lover. Why get someone a treasure map when you can just hand them the treasure. If that’s your philosophy then you’ll love these recommendations.
The Sleeping Pizza - Talia Di Napolo Frozen Pizzas
Frozen pizza technology has evolved drastically in the past few years. Gone are the days of pizza glistening with freezer burn or pizza that taste like cardboard. Now, pizzerias can flash freeze pizzas in time so what you’re thawing taste like it came right out of an oven in Italy.
And that’s exactly what Talia Di Napoli pizza delivers. We had a box of these pizzas delivered and I was amazed with each pizza we cooked. The pizzas have the familiar scars from cooking in the oven, the cheese is melted and there’s frozen pools of oil. They look like planets frozen in the darkness of space. But when you pop them in the oven for a few minutes they spring to life, delicious as any fresh pizza.
Get a pack of pizza for yourself or your friends.
Deliver Pittsburgh Pizza
Mineo’s and Aiello’s are pillars of the Pittsburgh pizza world. Anyone who has uttered the words “pizza” in Pittsburgh has heard of these two juggernauts of pizza. So why not send your friend or family member who left the city a slice of home?
Both Mineo’s and Aiello’s will freeze their half-baked pizza, put it in a box, and ship it to whatever location you want. I sent some of these to my sister in Atlanta years ago and I’m told they hold up pretty well!
Pizza Currency
Let’s not forget that most pizzerias offer gift cards. Sometimes $10 or $20 to the neighborhood pizza shop is the best gift you can get.
Alright, that was fun! I hope this helped you get a great gift for that special someone in your life. Please feel free to share this around the net, I’d really appreciate it.
Pizza ya later!