Italian tomato pie facts for kids
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| Type | Pizza |
|---|---|
| Place of origin | United States |
| Region or state | Northeastern United States |
| Main ingredients | Focaccia-like dough, tomato sauce |
Italian tomato pie is an Italian-American and Italian-Canadian baked good consisting of a thick, porous, focaccia-like dough covered with tomato sauce. It may be sprinkled with romano cheese or oregano. It is not usually served straight from the oven, but allowed to cool and then consumed at room temperature or reheated. Like Sicilian pizza, tomato pie is baked in a large rectangular pan and served in square slices. In Rhode Island it is cut into long strips and often called pizza strips. Tomato pie descends from and resembles the Italian ', although it is not the same dish; for instance, sfincione may have toppings, is usually served hot, and has a crust more like brioche than focaccia.
Other names for tomato pie include gravy pie ("gravy" here refers to "Italian gravy", i.e. tomato sauce) and church pie in Philadelphia, and red bread, strip pizza, party pizza and bakery pizza in Rhode Island. In Montreal, the names in English are tomato pizza or cold pizza.
A 1903 article in the New-York Tribune on the food of Italian-Americans described an early version of tomato pie. Tomato pie has been sold by Iannelli's Bakery in Philadelphia since 1910. In Utica, the family that would later found O'Scugnizzo's Pizzeria in 1914 sold tomato pies from their basement for several years prior, starting in 1910. Tomato pie remains popular in Philadelphia, Utica, Rhode Island, and Montreal.
Gallery
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Typical palermitan sfincione
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Tomato pie for sale in a grocery store near Utica
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Rhode Island pizza strips
See also
In Spanish: Tomato pie para niños
