Street Food
Neapolitan friggitorie ... when the diet is done with quality.
Quality is in quantity!
The Neapolitan people have always been full of inventiveness and obviously the first symptoms of this vivacity have poured into the food. Pizza is considered “THE” street food for its excellence.
And this very practical way of folding it and eating it while walking has contrasted and still contrasts the legendary “SABRET” carts that sell hamburgers and fries or hot dogs … but, more ancient and traditional, there is still Pizza Fritta; its lesser spread is due to the fact that not everyone has the pan full of oil always boiling, where it is dipped and cooked and continuously turned with the forks and then put to pour on the «colapizza» (place for drying pizza from extra oil).
In the true Pizzerie, today as many years ago, there is the hot service display cabinet of various sizes, from potato croquettes (panzarotto), simple paste cresciute – “grown pasta» (pastacrisciute or zeppulelle) or with tufts of borage (marine algae) dipped in pastetta (vurracce), white or red rice balls (palle ‘e riso) with sauce, eggplant (mulugnàn), fiorilli (sciurill), zucchini flowers with pastetta and a triangle of polenta (scagliuòzz or tittoli), fried appetizers of macaroni (macaroni frittatas), etc. etc…
Currently, in our area, there are still «friggitori» who offer those “sfizi fritti” (fried delicacies) in the famous “cuoppo”, a thick paper cone that keeps the pan-fried delicacies warm and absorbs the oil … and this was our idea … and not the only one! They are all here but, if you call us, they will also come to your house!
Yesterday
Street food has very ancient roots. In fact, since the time of the Romans most of the population consumed meals standing, quickly, stopping in semi-open premises adjacent to the road. Of these structures important vestiges in Pompeii remain in the province of Naples.
Here the taverns were both a destination for passing travelers and a place where the poor had their food warmed up because they did not always have their own stove at their home.
The urban classes knew the pleasure of eating only the evening meal at the table.
As was the case in ancient Rome, both in the Middle Ages and in the Modern Age, the urban classes lived most of the day away from home, where they ate their meals buying products in shops or street vendors.
Today
Simple in preparation, linked to the agro-food traditions of the territory to which it belongs, street food is probably the most “honest” among the different forms of gastronomic offer, the one least subject to the influence of passing fashions.
Street cooking violates openly many of the “home” rules.
Having meal becomes at the same time a private matter (often consumed alone, unlike when you go to the restaurant or bar) and a public event, because it happens on the street or in premises open to everyone’s eyes, therefore linked to the community.
You are alone and together at the same time and this creates an atmosphere of complicity among the patrons, so often two words are exchanged, a joke, because the situation induces a sense of uncommon confidence. In short, street cooking is an art of communication.