Free Republic

Food companies understand that Americans are increasingly interested in buying food that actually seems worth eating. We want food that's some degree of fresh, healthy, natural or otherwise of higher quality. It's for this reason that you see images of plump fruit decorating packages of cereal bars and the greenest broccoli you've ever laid eyes upon appearing on boxes of frozen dinners. At Burger King, you don't order a mere salad - it's a Chicken Caesar Garden Fresh Salad. Those chips aren't just cheese-flavored - they're Harvest Cheddar Sun Chips, with "harvest cheddar" an entirely meaningless term. Few companies have...

Late-night cravings for pizza may soon be satisfied not by all-night delivery, but by this huge vending machine. Invented by Italians and just now arriving on our fair shores, the Let's Pizza machine actually creates the pizza more or less from scratch, and then bakes it as you watch. The future is here, and it's a bit carb-heavy. Unlike the frozen and reheated affairs you're likely to find at a 7-11, this pizza is actually created when you order it, from "fresh" ingredients. The dough is mixed and flattened, the sauce spread, the cheese and toppings sprinkled. Some items are...

Since the dawn of restaurants, mankind has been plagued with one unanswerable question: Should I eat a burger or a pizza? Kyoto pizza parlor Pizza Little Party has saved humanity countless hours of counter confusion with the new MegaBurgerPizza. It’s part burger, part pizza, and all mega. Seriously, this thing features two 11 inch pizzas, a couple of ground beef patties and weighs more than 2.5 pounds. According to Rocket News, the MegaBurgerPizza is topped with Pizza Little Party’s original meat sauce and a special cheese blend. But don’t worry, the pizza parlor knows how to make a good burger...

You’re just dying for a pizza: gooey cheese, sweet tomato sauce, blistered crust. One problem: You’re millions of miles away from a pizza place, flying in some sort of spaceship toward Mars. Domino’s definitely doesn’t deliver up here, pal, so how do you satisfy your pizza craving? Print one out. Working with researchers from the Systems and Materials Research Corporation (SMRC), a materials and technology development company based in Texas, NC State researchers are figuring out the best ways to use a 3-D printer for printing pizza in outer space. NASA, you see, wants to provide space travelers some good...

What a bunch of meatheads! New York pizza-lovers got a black eye from users of the travel megasite TripAdvisor, who rated the city’s slices a paltry fourth in the country behind outposts like San Diego and Las Vegas. Perhaps most offensive was the third-place choice of Boston, where reviewers gushed about pies with oddball toppings like shrimp scampi. “Get out of here, that’s crazy! Boston is No. 3?” said Jackson Heights resident Andrew Silverstein, 31, while enjoying lunch at famed Patsy Grimaldi’s new Brooklyn joint, Juliana’s. “I’ve had pizza in Boston, and it was a horrible experience.” Users of the...

New Yorkers would like to give the people behind these rankings a "pizza" their mind. The travel site TripAdvisor issued a list of the Top 10 cities for pizza - and New York came in fourth. The Big Apple's best pie makers - like Di Fara's, Totonno's and John's of Bleecker Street - apparently didn't stack up to the pizzas prepped in culinary destinations like San Diego, Las Vegas, and Boston, which represent the top three. Chicago didn't even make the list. But reached on the phone, the manager of Bronx Pizza in San Diego said there is no comparison.

As your personal data from hospitals, insurance companies, banks, retailers, phone carriers, traffic records and every other manner of electronic interaction is merged into massive databases, it will soon be possible for not just the government, but companies you patronize on a daily basis to know your most intimate secrets. All of this information will be used to build detailed profiles of your personal habits and qualifications for certain services. Just as your credit report is used to determine your financial worth and capability, a computer will soon determine what you are or not allowed to do. It sounds like...

A hospital had to emphatically ask people to stop sending pizza after a child being treated for cancer received more than 20 pizzas from Internet strangers in one day. Reddit user “ashortstorylong” posted a photo of a sign in the window of a hospital that said: “Send Pizza RM 4112″ with the headline: “Photo taken outside Children’s Hospital in Los Angeles. Smart Kid.” The post reached the front page of Reddit, and other Reddit users later commented and said they’d taken the liberty to send pizza to the hospital room. On Saturday, Children’s Hospital Los Angeles posted a picture of...

Charges have been filed in the death of a Cicero restaurant owner who was shot in the chest after he confronted a robber who was holding a gun to his wife's head near the cash register, police said this morning. Matthew A. Brown-Turner, 25, has been charged with murder and attempted armed robbery in the fatal shooting of Giovanni Donancricchia, 64, early Thursday morning. He is due in bond court this morning.

Domino’s Pizza has hired a creative agency called T + Biscuits to test the feasibility of octocopter drones that deliver a hot, delicious pizza to your doorstep. Heavily branded as the DomiCopter, the current prototype can deliver two, large pizzas in about ten minutes within a four mile radius of the store. While future versions could hypothetically use GPS coordinates to deliver the pie, the existing model is piloted from the ground by someone experienced in drone flight. Other names previously batted around for the DomiCopter included the Pepperdroney and the Flyin’ Hawaiian. The DomiCopter has eight spinning blades and...

"My first ever pizza 'slice'. Please note: the authentic NY fold," the Park Sloper tweeted today. How is this possible? We don't know. It is incomprehensible that a man — particularly one who has spent much of his adult life in Los Angeles and New York — could go 72 years without ever consuming a single slice of pizza. Stewart does emphasize the word slice in his tweet, so perhaps he's eaten plenty of whole pizzas. Still, though. You'd really have to go out of your way to pull that off. One guy we know went so long without having...

NASA is funding a 3D food printer, and it'll start with pizza By Aaron Souppourison May 21, 2013 07:24 am NASA is funding research into 3D-printed food. As Quartz reveals, Mechanical engineer Anjan Contractor received a $125,000 grant from the agency to build a prototype 3D printer with the aim of automating food creation. It's hoped the system could provide astronauts food during long-distance space travel, but its creator has the loftier aim of solving the increasing food shortages around the world by cutting down on waste. The software for the printer will be open-source, while the hardware is based on...

It was once an honorable artisan trade passed from generation to generation. But despite record unemployment levels, today’s Italians are too proud to make pizza. In the land that invented the calzone, the capricciosa and the margarita, there is a severe shortage of skilled pizza makers or pizzaioli. At least 6,000 are desperately needed, according to new figures from business federation FIPE. But despite youth unemployment of 35 per cent the young Italians no longer want to do the job. Because of the long hours and low pay it is seen as work for immigrants. Enrico Stoppani,of the Italian Federation...

The following was posted at the Daily Currant yesterday: Bloomberg Refused Second Slice of Pizza at Local Restaurant New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg was denied a second slice of pizza today at an Italian eatery in Brooklyn. The owners of Collegno’s Pizzeria say they refused to serve him more than one piece to protest Bloomberg’s proposed soda ban, which would limit the portions of soda sold in the city… “Hey, could I get another pepperoni over here?” Bloomberg asked owner Antonio Benito. “I’m sorry sir,” he replied, “we can’t do that. You’ve reached your personal slice limit.” Get it? They...

New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg was denied a second slice of pizza today at an Italian eatery in Brooklyn. The owners of Collegno's Pizzeria say they refused to serve him more than one piece to protest Bloomberg's proposed soda ban,which would limit the portions of soda sold in the city.....

London Pizza Named Most Delicious Food, Beating Italian

Graffiti artists The Yok and Sheryo swear they’re not on drugs. “It seems like we’re just taking acid and putting all this s--- together, but it really is a collection of what we’ve seen,” The Yok said. The duo, who now live in Brooklyn, just put up a city-commissioned mural along 16th and Morgan streets as part of 25th Ward Ald. Danny Solis’ public art initiative. The viaduct wall now sports a Vulcan-eared monkey eating deep-dish pizza along with a sunglasses-wearing skeleton head wearing a hat that says “Zap Rap.” The Yok and Sheryo won’t give their full names because...

Because of the events of the day at the Vatican, perhaps it would be nice to bring back this classic. FIND THE POPE IN THE PIZZA

INDIANAPOLIS - A 15-year-old is in critical condition after being shot by a pizza delivery person, later identified as Michael Andrews, police said. Police were dispatched to the 3600 block of Richelieu Road, near Franklin Road and East 38th Street, around 7:15 p.m. Friday. Metro police said the shooting happened during an apparent attempted robbery.

Papa John’s pizza has been hounded by the media for comments supposedly made in response to Obamacare — that food prices were on the rise, that franchises would face closure due to escalating health care costs, that workers’ hours and positions would be sliced. Only problem: The comments, attributed to CEO John Schnatter, were never made. That’s according to a Politico report about the efforts of Papa John public relations firm Sitrick and Co. to track down bloggers who’ve covered the supposed comments and ask for edits.