So – no tomato sauce and no Canadian Bacon (or Ham), and the pineapple is caramelized. But it’s still pineapple despoiling the sacred dough of the pizza.
According to Wikipedia, ragù alla bolognese is not used on spaghetti in Italy, only on flat pasta or in lasagna. “Spaghetti Bolognese” is one of those pseudo-Italian dishes developed outside of Italy, and is thus looked down on and is not considered real, traditional Italian food by people in Italy.
I don’t think it’s actual Bolognese sauce that they take umbrage with, but rather the Italianoid “Spag Bol” type stuff that is made in other countries and called Italian.
But then again, Italians are a bit ridiculous IMO, with their notions of cuisine purity, and it should be taken with a grain of salt. Cuisine is a living thing, not something codified, solidified, and never to be changed. If they’d always felt like they do now, we wouldn’t see tomatoes, potatoes, or chilies used in Italian cooking, nor would we have seen polenta either.
Case in point- them getting prickly about Bolognese sauce being used on tagliatelle, and NEVER on spaghetti. Absurd.
I have had pineapple on pizza in Italy, almost 20 years ago. I had to ask for it, but they had some canned pineapple for some reason and were happy to put it on for me. (I did, at least, ask in Italian.) It was delicious.
My father, an Italian-American, repeatedly threatens to disown me over my love of pineapple pizza, but I don’t care. I also love spaghetti bolognese, but will go cold in my grave before I recognize béchamel as an acceptable addition to lasagne.
And agree about bechamel. Went to a good Italian restaurant in town (good pizza anyway) and had the lasagna. It had bechamel. It was ruined. Just horrible.
Agreed. Tradition has its place in cuisine, but it should be as a guide, not as a cage. One of my greatest moments of kitchen satisfaction was when someone once said to me, “I never knew these flavors existed, and now I need them in my life.” I salute Signore Sorbillo for his stand against food prejudice.
As to pineapple on pizza specifically–it’s not bad in certain combinations, but I prefer red grapes for a tart/sweet/juicy topping component. They’re not as prone to overpowering other flavors as the pineapple, but are just as good at supplying a touch of acid to meld flavors, sweetness to complement a strong cheese, and moisture to balance the caramelization of toppings.
It’s okay once in a while. Ideas of food purity are often ridiculous, but it does make sense to have standards and use tradition as a guide.
(But why do you care what I eat on my pizza, or when I drink my coffee? Is it because this is about you? If going to riot in the streets, you think it would be over something like aerosol cheese?)
As I said in another thread, I’m not much of a pizza guy, but I have liked pineapple on mine since I first encountered it in Germany in the summer of 1981.
And I gotta agree with @Dr_Paprika above–why is it so important to so many people what other people eat?
I’ve always made lasagne with bechamel, delicious, delicious bechamel. Am I learning that this is not authentically Italian? Or that Italian-American lasagne is bechamel free?
I believe it would be because in the traditional Italian multi-course meal, spaghetti would be served as a primi – or intermediate course following the antipasti – and would then be followed by a meat or seafood dish. So it’s counter to tradition to serve spaghetti with any sort of meat. Besides spaghetti bolognese, I believe spaghetti and meatballs is a distinctly new-world invention that came from spaghetti dishes being served as a meal in itself, which isn’t the Italian tradition and would be regarded as “pseudo-Italian”.
I’'ve never seen that on a pizza menu, but it makes a lot of sense. I’m not a big pineapple fan but often get figs on my pizza (alongside a strong cheese). I have a grapevine in my garden and they are tart and sweet. I will give it a go with homemade pizza with bacon and a medium strong cheese, Wensleydale
There’s no objection to serving pasta with a meat sauce such as ragu alla bolognese; but spaghetti is not the pasta to do it with. Tagliatelle al ragu is a perfectly normal primi course, and (unsurprisingly) a staple of Bolognese (Emilie Romagna) cuisine. But it is a sauce of finely chopped ingredients which flavours the pasta, not a serving of meat as you say. I believe the theory is that the wide ribbons of tagliattelle are better for heavy meat sauces than thin strands of spaghetti.
Whether lasagne has bechamel or ricotta depends on what part of Italy you are in. In general , northern has bechamel, southern has ricotta. For the most part, in the US you will find the ricotta version because of the immigration pattern. I first heard of the bechamel version on the Dope maybe 20 years ago and have never seen it - but I live in NYC and my family is from Sicily.
Ah, interesting! It’s funny how these things ripple - most Italian emigration to the UK is from the north of Italy so for me bechamel is how lasagne is meant to be.