Pizza as a health food

[DrakeRemoray]

On topic at least:
Pizza as health food? Food chemists say yes - Yahoo! News
This says hotter oven temps (they mention 400-550 degrees) and long dough fermentation as supplying extra antioxidants.
But...the study used only whole wheat dough.

Drake

[james]

Re: Pizza as a health food

The Caputo folks always point out that Pizza Napoletana has a fraction of the fat and calories of chain pizza. It is only flour, tomatoes, light cheese and a splash of olive oil. That can't be bad.

Personally, I've been betting on the health aspects of olive oil for some time now; sure hope I'm right.
James

[maver]

Re: Pizza as a health food

On topic at least:
Pizza as health food? Food chemists say yes - Yahoo! News
This says hotter oven temps (they mention 400-550 degrees) and long dough fermentation as supplying extra antioxidants.
But...the study used only whole wheat dough.

Drake

Boy, those are some high oven temperatures!

It's interesting that they are looking at trying to enhance antioxidant levels to improve health, when all they have to do (as James points out) is cut back on the cheese and pepperoni (mmm, pass me some more nitrates!). Tomato sauce is plenty healthy enough for me that I'll just forego the whole wheat. We also have medical literature recently looking at people fed antioxidants as supplements showing that what we thought would help is sometimes actually harmful. 'Eat low fat. No, Atkins says eat fat, just no carbs.' The conflicting advice makes telling people what to eat almost impossible. I've resorted to telling my patients to just try not to eat anything for which it's creation is beyond your own understanding. Food shouldn't be complicated. If you don't understand where it's from, it's suspect.

[CanuckJim]

Re: Pizza as a health food

Maver,

Don't want to push this into the philosophical realm. I'm not organic insistent or a "natural" foods cheerleader. Quite the opposite, really. My bread baking "philosophy" goes like this: simple, pure, the best you can get, the freshest you can find. Bread--or pizza dough--is, on the face of it, a pretty simple concotion: flour, yeast of some sort, salt, water. Make those four things the best you can get and then it comes down to matters of technique, experience, time, hands. Getting it right can be difficult, but when it is right, it's very rewarding.

Jim

[maver]

Re: Pizza as a health food

I hope that didn't sound like an organic food only post - not my leaning at all. I took a year of organic chemistry in college so I have a pretty large range of what I'll eat

I actually meant more that the stuff in the center aisles of the grocery that is designed for shelf life and engineered to be easy to eat while you watch TV, mindlessly 'snacking', the food doesn't have to taste like anything real as long as it's easy to eat without looking - that's what I'm concerned about. I think the convenience idea of food is what's most wrong with our American diet. Eat in the car, eat at the TV, don't spend any time working with the food, don't sit down to share a meal. That's part of why knowing your food works - you invest some time in it, you're inclined to look at it, really taste it.

The problem with a chemist breaking down the health properties of pizza is the inclination to look for health at the expense of really enjoying the food.

[jahysea]

Re: Pizza as a health food

I'm confident pizza is much healthier when consumed with a moderate amount of red wine. But I recommend a lengthy study on the topic involving a very large sample size.....

I had lunch at a new place in Carneros called Farm today, nice place. One of the folks in our group got the pizza, it looked OK. Had Potatoes on it, reminded me of a recipe one of you posted a week ago or so. Gotta try it, looked healthier than Prosciutto.

[james]

Re: Pizza as a health food

Everything in moderation. Which is good -- that makes you get to have everything.

JC -- it's the Ital-Franco paradox. Red wine and pizza, and you will live forever.
James