Cheese Laden Pizzas

Argentineans are very proud of their pizzas. As so much as to say, that if you even mentioned that the pizzas in Italy are better than theirs, then you are facing a heavy duty argument. Which in simple terms means that they will scream and shout at you for hours on end. Hands waving around, aggressive overtones, faces getting all red. It’s the Italian blood in them. You kinda get the picture.

The pizzas here are pretty good I have to say. But wether they are as good as in the “Home Country” is another matter.

Since we have been here, we have had quite a few of them to sample. I can only eat so much meat in one day. The one thing that Argentineans love is mozzarella, or muzzarella as they call it here. As it’s not the freshly made balls of buffalo cheese that melts like heaven and looks like puddles of snow after it comes out of the oven. As in Colombia they use a processed version, which comes in large blocks. The Argentine version is better than the soulless, tasteless one from Colombia, but it’s still not fresh as in Italy.

No matter what pizza we have ordered they all come with a heavy covering of this processed cheese. Actually every pizza on every menu has muzzarella as one of the main ingredients. They love it.

On a cool San Martin de Los Andes night, it works a treat. Kinda fills you up in a comforting way. On a hot sultry Buenos Aires night in a hot restaurant with a broken air conditioner. It’s hell. The heavy cheese sits on your stomach like a brick. It’s not a good thing. It’s the only time a pizza has made me feel a little ill. Not a good thing.

My favourite tipple with pizza is beer. I can see that some wine would go well with pizza, but beer or Belgium to be precise is my preferred type. But a couple of litres of Quilmes goes down a treat.

I am a finger eating pizza person. I am a big anti knife and fork pizza eating person. I think it is wrong. For me eating pizza with a knife and fork is a crime against food. It’s not right.

There is a chain of pizza restaurants in England that tries and sells itself as a gourmet pizza place. Pizza for the posh folk. Every time I walk past I cringe as I see people cutting up their pizzas and eating small bits. Sometimes I want to scream.

Thankfully in Argentina everyone is in on my side and eats their cheese laden pizzas with their hands. Phew.