For all his claims about Italian tradition, the restaurant’s menu had tiger prawn (large shrimp) pizzas also and I don’t think prawn on pizza is an ancient Italian standard either.
Methinks there’s some snobbery going on here: non traditional is OK as long as the ingredient is $30 a pound
I visited Italy last summer, and had a lot of pizza. They put all kinds of stuff on pizzas there. I’m sure it is traditional to put prawn on pizza.
To quote Bugs Bunny, “what a maroon.”
I happen to like pineapple on pizza. Pair it with ham and bacon and I’m in heaven.
No doubt they do now because unlike a certain chef I could mention modern Italians aren’t trying to be “More Italian Than Thou”.
But from a quick google it seems that “traditional” Italian seafood pizza was about mussels and clams etc not prawns.
I don’t like pineapple on pizza by the way.
And anchovies. And probably other fish.
I do like pineapple on pizza. I don’t usually like sweets on my entree. I don’t like sweet & sour Chinese, or orange marmalade on duck, or honey on ham. But there’s something about pineapple on pizza that really works for me. (And i suppose i like cranberry sauce with almost anything. And it’s sweet.)
But i bet prawns are more traditional than pineapple, because i think you can harvest prawns in Italy, but it’s too cold to grow pineapples there. And i think that “traditionally”, Italians used pizza as a blank slate and put almost anything on it.
I mocked pineapple on pizza for several years.
Then I tried it.
mmm
That is true, and, depending on the locale, “pizza ai frutti di mare” might be a thing. I have also personally met Italians who were genuinely strict about what ingredients might legitimately go into their local cuisine, so it does not beggar belief that some chef did not want to put pineapples, or chicken, or whatever on a pizza.
I mean, you’ve gotta stand for something.
Agree. Which means the fellow is being a snob.
The elderly and heavily pregnant on public transport I regard as sufficient.
Tiger prawns are very big shrimp. The size of a large man’s entire thumb down to the root. ISTM putting that on pizza would require slicing each of them into 6-8 shorter hunks. At which point you sort of lose the point of their impressive size. And could just as well put more ordinary naturally bite-sized shrimp on there.
Leaving them intact would be almost like putting whole link bratwurst on pizza. Funky to look at but not readily edible out of hand.
If it is not on the menu, you can ask, but it does not mean you will get anything you conceivably name. Or was pineapple on the menu in the case in question?
You need to read the article.
It said he was the head chef, so I have to assume pineapple was not on the menu. (Therefore I am not sure wherefore some big customer put in an order for a load of ham-and-pineapple pizza; I guess that was off the menu, which is simply what I wrote in my previous post.) It sounds like the boss [claims he] told him to offer it, or else.
The guy appealed his firing to the government agency that adjudicates such things. The hearing officer found against him on what amounts to technical grounds: failure to file his claim / appeal timely. So we do not know whether as a matter of law his claim was valid or not.
The fact the restaurant subsequently closed suggests that whether he was fired lawfully or not is kinda moot; his job at that place was doomed anyway.
An interesting note is that the article provides some detail on this Australian immigrant worker visa program. Which seems to require 3 years continuous employment with a single employer to be granted permanent resident status.
Yeah, that’ll weed out shitty workers and shirkers. It also appeals to bosses who want a slave for 3 years.
The boss / owner in this particular case is not obviously evil; he might be a great guy. But the risk is sure there. And meanwhile the cook / chef comes across as quite full of himself and of overweening Italianness. And like many a worker, forgets that being partway up the food chain is not the same as being at the top of the food chain. If you’re in the middle, both giving and taking orders is part of the gig.
A whole bunch of restaurants, perhaps even the majority, do not survive 3 years. It says the chef is now employed at a different Italian restaurant, but I am not sure how that works out for him in terms of that lame visa.
It was a $15000 function. For a $15000 function you can put some pineapple on a pizza for your boss IMHO.
Yeah, if you are catering a big event and the buyer really really wants something that’s easy for you to do, you do it. Especially if the owner tells you to.
The man is a hero.
Despite what the article implies this isn’t correct. You can change employers.