PROVING once and for all that the government is fully behind the Pizza-Industrial Complex (and that squandering money is a bureaucratic imperative), the U.S. Department of Agriculture has just released a study on pizza consumption. About one in eight Americans consume pizza on any given day. Whites consume more of it than blacks and Hispanics, which goes a long way toward explaining why 60 percent of white men appear to be nine months pregnant. In short, the nation is hooked on a loathsome industrial concoction of white bread, tomato paste and greasy rubber. The sacred tradition of dinnertime drudgery is virtually unknown in countless homes and has been supplanted by the grease-stained cardboard box.

I believe these figures are far too low. Most people are not honest when it comes to pizza intake. Notice how the “study” did not correlate pizza to any health (or ill health) indicators. Do you think the government wants people to know?

— Comments —

Jewel A. writes:

I’m going to go out on a limb here and speculate as to why whites eat pizza more than blacks and Hispanics. Delivery drivers won’t go into high crime areas. Almost every pizza delivery man robbery or murder is done in a crime-infested neighborhood, and the suspects usually prove to be black or Hispanic.

Laura writes:

That’s a very plausible theory.

 Bert Perry writes:

Re: “Fix-a-Flat” Study

I know my family eats pizza about weekly, so it sounds plausible.  In our defense, we use about 1/3 whole wheat flour in the dough, and age the dough for a couple of days in the fridge before throwing and baking it.  We don’t have much use for Domino’s, to put it mildly.  You and your family are invited—you will see no greasy boxes, and the crust will have a taste that you don’t find in a box or at most pizzerias.

Two parallel thoughts; in an old “Andy Griffith,” Andy eats spaghetti three times, and in the show, the “remarkable” ingredient that makes the sauce “so special” is oregano, the herb that makes all of Italian cuisine sparkle.  So when you say “loathsome industrial concoction,” you’re pretty close to the truth.  Herbs and spices appear to be optional in modern industrial cuisine, replaced by fat, sugar, and salt held together with white flour.  And isn’t it appalling that the USDA is actually doing a study about this?  It’s not like pizza chains and companies that make frozen pizza don’t release sales figures that would enable the USDA to come up with an estimate in about ten minutes of “googling,” after all.

It’s almost as appalling as the studies that come to conclusions like “sex is fun.”  They spent our money to figure this out?

Laura writes:

This study has “Pizza Conspiracy” written all over it. Believe me, at least five percent of tax dollars feed the Pizza-Industrial Complex.

Thank you for the invitation. Homemade pizza, of course, is an entirely different thing from the stuff consumed by most people who responded to this study. I wonder how many photographers make a living taking those lush photos that appear on frozen pizza boxes. It’s pizza porn.

Laura adds:

In related news, a British study has found that much of commercial mozzarella is only half cheese and the ham used on pizza is often not ham at all but “meat emulsion.” Duh! Another useless study.

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