Facts for Kids

Pizza is a flat, round food that started long ago in Italy. People in Naples first made the kind of pizza we know now: thin dough topped with tomato, cheese, and other things, then baked very hot. The word “pizza” appears in old papers from the year 997, and a baker in Naples helped shape the modern pizza in the late 1800s.

Pizza is eaten all over the world today. You can buy it in special pizza shops, at markets, or at restaurants. In Italy some restaurant pizzas come unsliced to eat with a knife and fork, while casual pizzas are cut into slices you hold in your hand.

Making pizza starts with a dough of flour, water, yeast, and salt. The dough becomes the base and its outer edge is the crust, which can be thin or thick. Sauces, cheese, and toppings go on top. Bakers sometimes dust a wooden paddle called a peel with cornmeal so the pizza slides easily into the oven.

Pizzas bake in many ways: hot wood-fired brick ovens, electric ovens, home ovens with a pizza stone, or even on a barbecue grill. Some styles are baked in pans instead of directly on the oven floor. Different ovens and times change how the crust feels and how toppings cook.

Pizza traveled from Italy to many countries and changed in each place. Authentic Neapolitan pizza uses special tomatoes and buffalo mozzarella near Mount Vesuvius, and people protect those local foods because they are special. In the United States, immigrants made new styles like New York thin crust and Chicago deep dish.

In Argentina, Italian people made pizza heartier and it became a big part of city life, especially in Buenos Aires. Different regions add local foods and tastes, so pizza can taste very different depending on where you are—what would your local pizza look like?

Dessert pizzas use the same round shape but have sweet toppings instead of savory ones. Some use regular pizza dough topped with chocolate, fruit, jam, or sweet sauce. Others use a cookie-like or pastry base and add things like cream, sliced fruit, or marshmallows.

Restaurants sometimes offer sweet pizzas after a meal, and people make them at home for treats. Dessert pizzas are a fun way to play with flavors—would you try one with chocolate and strawberries or cinnamon and apples?

You can eat pizza in many places: small pizzerias, restaurants, market stalls, or from food trucks. Stores sell frozen pizzas and pizza kits you bake at home in your oven. Some supermarkets also have fresh take-and-bake pizzas that you finish cooking at home.

Big pizza chains make pizza easy to get quickly, and some restaurants use machines to help put pizzas together. At sit-down restaurants in Italy, pizza may arrive unsliced to eat with a knife and fork, while fast places give slices you eat by hand.

Many kinds of pizza exist because people try different doughs, toppings, and baking ways. The Margherita is a famous Italian pizza with tomato, mozzarella cheese, and basil. The marinara is older and has tomato, oil, herbs, and no cheese.

Other favorites include thick pan pizzas like Chicago style, thin foldable New York slices, and square, cheesy Detroit pizzas where the cheese caramelizes at the edges. There are folded pizzas like calzone, fried ones like panzerotti, and creative versions with four cheeses or seasonal toppings that mix flavors in fun ways.