Pizza Piazza

My A-Z Challenge series is about Italy, it's lifestyle, the country and other miscellaneous things in regard to it.

Pizaa Pizza. When I was little and living in Italy this is a phrase I used often, apparently. It basically meant I wanted to go to the piazza for a slice of pizza, something that it seems the majority of Italians do every warm evening. Going for una passeggiata to the Piazza is a national constitution, you could say they are going for a constitutional (sorry bad joke). A piazza is just a square usually somewhere in the middle of a town, for larger towns there are more than one piazza, even smaller towns can have more than one but there is usually a lager main one that is visited more. They can be sleepy and quiet except for the voices of people meeting up or they can be loud with bands playing on erected stands. Sometimes there is a little market, and often shops still open till late evening where people browse or buy food, clothes, pans anything and everything, it's cooler so easier to shop at this time of day very often. In Anzio the pizza is right next to the harbour so you can walk along the promenade alongside the beach to the harbour to see the fishermen's boats and then into the pizza.

 Bars and cafes are popular with people sitting drinking a glass of wine or birra (beer) though water is far more prevalent. Sit and have a granita and caffe or stand at a bar and have a hit of espresso. Personally I love a coffee granita, or sometimes a lemon one, it's just finely crushed ice with flavours added. People standing in gelaterias wating for there turn to buy a gelato is a customary sight.

But the main thing to be eaten in a piazza is a pizza. There are stalls and pizzerias to buy them in, I don't mean a pizzeria type restaurant where you sit down and order a whole one but the type where you buy a slice. You can sometimes sit down just inside or outside on a few tables set out for the purpose or find a bench elsewhere or more often walk around eating it. To eat them they are handed to you as a slice, folded over like a piece of paper and wrapped with paper around half of it where you can hold it. The grease does seep though a bit so you need tissues to wipe up after, baby wipes are handy for this too I've found. Lots of pizza toppings to choose from, margherita (tomato) funghi (mushroom), rocket, slices of courgette and my favourite one of sliced roast potatoes with rosemary, mmm mmm, drooling at the thought of one now. Also you can buy pizza bianca which is pizza dough with salt basically, or filled ones with beata (chard). There is no, repeat no, pineapple anywhere to be found near a pizza in Italy. Oh, and don't forget the suppli. I used to love going for my pizza piazza as a child hence my phrase, and still love it now.

Do you have a favourite topping for pizza? Where would like to stroll for the evening?