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The Current Transcript for July 27, 2017

Host: Laura Lynch

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Listen to the full episode

Prologue

[Music: Theme]

SOUNDCLIP

This case is about criminalizing journalism. It’s about punishing those who speak out. And if it works here today and this week, they will do it again and again and again.

LAURA LYNCH: Turkey has more journalists in jail than any other country—150 by some counts—and now 17 more are on trial on terrorism-related charges. The case comes in the aftermath of last year's attempted coup and the mass arrests that followed. For many Turks, it's a crucial test of both an independent press and an independent judiciary. After that, something lighter.

SOUNDCLIP

This isn’t a pizza. This is a mistake. Pineapple’s a fruit that needs to be roasted with vanilla, served with the most amazing coconut ice cream. Not on a pizza with tomatoes.

[Sound: Jeering and cheering]

LL: Chef Gordon Ramsay is known for serving up strong opinions along with great food, so it's no surprise he's pretty definitive when it comes to a Canadian classic pizza with pineapple. Not to his taste, but it is a culinary delight to many others. We will revisit the great pineapple pizza debate coming up. I'm Laura Lynch and this is the summer edition of The Current.

Turkey's journalists: 'We have 171 of our colleagues in jail'

Guests: Nil Koksal, Yavuz Baydar

SOUNDCLIP

In there, everybody is very strong, very cheerful, very happy. But then I go home and I cry for hours because I feel my [sighs] human dignity is being attacked.

LL: That’s Zeynep Oral, a columnist with Turkey's oldest newspaper, Cumhuriyet, and president of the human rights group PEN in Turkey. This week, 17 of her colleagues are on trial. They're charged with aiding and abetting terrorist organizations. Those charges are completely groundless, according to their journalistic peers. But it's a tense time in Turkey. It's been a year since last summer's coup attempt. And the Cumhuriyet newspaper is fiercely independent and afraid of criticizing the government of Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Many of the newspaper’s journalists have been imprisoned for months under harsh conditions. Tomorrow, a judge will determine whether they can be released on bail. If they are found guilty, they could be sentenced to up to 43 years in prison. Nil Koksal is CBC's foreign correspondent in Istanbul. Hello, Nil.

NIL KOKSAL: Hello to you, Laura. Good morning.

LL: What's at stake for Turkey in this trial?

NIL KOKSAL: Well, the supporters of the Cumhuriyet 17, as they've come to be known, really say that this is not just about independent and free journalism. It's also to them about democracy and the state of Turkey's judiciary as well because as they've been dissecting what's in the indictments against these 17 Cumhuriyet staff members. They keep using the words “hollow”, “empty”—“absurd” in another word some people use—that the range of accusations leveled against these journalists, it shows that the state of the judiciary in Turkey is in a bad state. It's how they're saying it. They're very concerned that the judiciary is no longer independent. They feel that these charges are politically motivated and that the judges involved in this case and similar cases are doing what they think the government wants them to do.

LL: And I want to get into the details of how the government justifies the charges in a moment, but I just want to get another sense from you what the scene is like. You've been there at the courts. Who's there?

NIL KOKSAL: So lots of supporters and family members, other Cumhuriyet staff, as well as Zeynep Oral as you mentioned. Independent observers as well from other press freedom organizations. European parliament members were there on the first day. They really want to give the sense—they've been telling me—that these journalists are not alone and that the world is watching. But I did ask them all, you realize that this government and President Erdogan doesn't always respond very well to international pressure. But they said it doesn't matter how the president responds necessarily. They feel that they have to be there, that they don't have a choice, any other choice but to do what they're doing and to continue supporting these journalists. So it's been packed. You know people were almost trampling each other trying to get a seat in that courtroom on Monday—courtroom number 27 in the Palace of Justice in Istanbul in the Çağlayan neighbourhood. And they've been applauding whenever the journalists get up to testify. They've been passing them food because they know they haven't been getting food during very long days. It's sweltering in Istanbul right now, 30, 40 degrees. It's very hot in the courtroom and they're in there under those conditions, but trying to keep a light feeling inside. You heard Ms. Oral mention that they want to keep the morale of these journalists up.

LL: Tell me then, how does the government justify the charges? What does the government say is going on?

NIL KOKSAL: Well, they have said—President Erdogan specifically—just earlier this month, even speaking to journalists at the G20 said that these aren’t journalists in jail, that they are supporting terror. And he made a point of mentioning that he understands freedom of thought because he himself was jailed years ago, when he was mayor of Istanbul, just for reading a poem. But they don't get further into answering the question as journalists push well, why do they need to be held in custody pending the outcome of this trial? But the government's line through and through, throughout all of this and long before this case in particular, Laura, has always been, “They're not journalists. They say they are journalists but they're not. They support terror.”

LL: How is this trial being viewed by people in Turkey?

NIL KOKSAL: You know a few people—I thought it interesting—outside the courthouse were wondering why there was so much attention and when we told them that it was the Cumhuriyet’s trial, they nodded. They didn't say much. There is a lot of interest from people who believe that this is a dangerous threshold being crossed with this paper in particular being targeted, even though it's been a target in the past, not to this degree. And then there are people who feel that there's this Western bias, that the fact that there's so much international attention when a case like this comes, shows that the West is only interested—and people have said this to me as well—you're only interested in portraying Turkey and its president as paranoid and crumbling. And that's not the case and they don't understand why there isn't more attention paid to the trials that have come up in the aftermath of the coup, people who are believed to have been involved in that coup. When I spoke to some of the international advocates who were there, I posed them that question and they said we do think those cases are important and that there should be attention paid to them, but we can't take all of these charges seriously when there are so many of them and in their words, “absurd.” These particular ones, we can't take what the government is saying at face value when there's cases like the Cumhuriyet case before the courts. So they agree that the coup was a very bad thing for Turkey and that people should be punished for trying to overthrow the government. But they're concerned that all of these kinds of cases, like the one that the Cumhuriyet journalists are facing, are distracting from the important issues that Turkey’s facing.

LL: And you've mentioned the attempt to coup. Now I just wonder if you could give us just a little bit of context about what happened with the coup and in the aftermath and how it affects what's going on with this trial.

NIL KOKSAL: So July 15th is now an infamous day in Turkey's history. Last July 15^th, a small faction in the army attempted to overthrow the government. It failed, President Erdogan called his supporters, called his people to the streets and people of many different backgrounds, even different political stripes did take to the streets to try to take back their country and they succeeded. What's happened since, people on the Cumhuriyet staff and many others who support them in Turkey say what happened in the days after that constitutes a different kind of coup. The state of emergency that was brought in by the government. The tens of thousands—approaching 200,000 in fact—detentions, arrests, those kinds of things and firings of people have created a different kind of coup environment. So they're concerned about what's happened since. The government says this kind of action is necessary to weed out the people who were behind the coup and they believe that Fethullah Gülen—Turkey's most wanted man now who lives in self-exile in Pennsylvania—was behind this and some of the Cumhuriyet staff are accused of supporting Gülen. But they've dissected and taken apart those allegations and their testimony, saying we in particular, the Cumhuriyets, had been warning Turkey and President Erdogan about how much power Gülen and his movement, his Hizmet movement, his Jamaat or congregation, have been amassing over the decades in Turkey, being very close to governments including President Erdogan, but previous governments as well. So they’re saying we asked all of these questions and in some cases you jailed us for asking those questions and now you're saying we're supporting them. So that's what's swirling around this trial and Turkey right now. Yes, it's been a year now since that attempted coup, but many people feel that there's an intense crackdown still at play.

LL: Nil, thank you very much for your time.

NIL KOKSAL: Thank you, Laura.

LL: Nil Koksal is a foreign correspondent for the CBC and she joined us from Istanbul. According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, Turkey jails more journalists than any other country. In fact of all the jailed journalists in the world last year, a third of them were in Turkey. Yavuz Baydar is a Turkish journalist who has managed to avoid that fate. He left the country after last year's attempted coup and he is now a columnist for the German newspaper, Süddeutsche Zeitung. We reached him today in Europe. We have agreed not to reveal his exact location. Hello.

YAVUZ BAYDAR: Hello, good morning.

LL: When did you first start to think that Turkey was becoming more hostile to journalists?

YAVUZ BAYDAR: Well, there are a group of four corp, independent corp of journalists that have been following intensely the story of Turkey since ever since AKP took over. And we realized that things were turning upside down, more or less, roughly about when the Gezi protests broke out in 2013.

LL: Gezi Park in Istanbul.

YAVUZ BAYDAR: Gezi Park protest in Istanbul which spread over 79 out of 81 provinces. A youth resistance, if you will, a cultural resistance manifestation. And from then on, the engineering mechanisms of the media started from Erdogan’s side, directly calling editors, changing a news ticker there and a headline here and asking for columnists who are critical to be fired, basically acting as if a defacto chief editor over the Turkish media. And from then on, the machinery started rolling and firings and sackings have become a pattern which have been, I think, the most severe punitive measure that have been imposed in any country in the world in the past four years. Nine thousand of my colleagues, according to the Turkish Journalists Union, found themselves sanctioned in that sense. It's corresponding to more than half of the journalist corps in Turkey. So as much as it went that far, also another punitive measure which is traditional punitive measure of jailing journalists, started to hike geometrically and at the moment, we have 171 of all of our colleagues in jail from various parts of the Turkish media.

LL: When did you know that it was time for you to leave?

YAVUZ BAYDAR: Well, we knew this—I and some other colleagues for example, Kadri Gursel, on trial with Cumhuriyet today. We had close contact and we agreed more or less, four or five months before the coup that something severe was about to happen, that we had no longer any future as media professionals in that country. And then when the coup started rolling, I had my senses very clear that no matter who would be coming out as a winner in that coup attempt, we would be the ones paying the price, regardless of the results. So I left in a matter of days after the coup and ever since then, I am in Europe and I think about 100 colleagues of mine—Turkish and Kurdish journalists—are now assembled in Turkey as well as some in Quebec and some in Toronto.

LL: We've agreed not to reveal your location. What are you afraid might happen if your whereabouts were made public?

YAVUZ BAYDAR: Well, there is this fear of, particularly in Germany, that the Secret Service operatives and also this sort of informing network will jeopardize the presence of journalists in several countries. And this is a matter of safety and also—

LL: I don’t understand. When you say jeopardize , do you mean that you feel that you're physically under threat or that they might try to remove you?

YAVUZ BAYDAR: I have not been physically under threat, but I have heard stories from other colleagues. For example some in Netherlands and some in Germany, as I mentioned, have been feeling the threat through messages and also personal verbal attacks on the streets. I will not mention the name of a colleague, but he was in Berlin where the Turkish presence is heavy, was subjected to more than once, verbal attacks by people who are supporters of the AKP.

LL: How much do you know about the 17 journalists who are on trial in Turkey right now?

YAVUZ BAYDAR: Well, at least four or five of them are my friends because I worked in Cumhuriyet during the 1980s after the military coup. And as I mentioned, Kadri Gursel is a very close friend of mine, not only a colleague of mine. And those are small but very intense corp of honourable, independent free journalists who would really go to the very best to defend the honour of journalism. As much as the others, many, many others among those 117 jailed, those were the buns selected to pay the price because what they did in terms of patterns was particularly going in for investigative journalism, exposing the corruption in depth, that implicates at times the very family of the president and also those, as in the case of Cumhuriyet, going in for scrutinizing the transportation of weaponry into jihadist groups in Syria. And those are the no-go areas for any Turkish journalists and the price to be paid is jail.

LL: We did invite Selçuk Ünal, Turkey's ambassador to Canada to be on the program today. He’s not available but we did receive the following statement regarding the trial. It reads in part, “Journalism cannot be used as a shield against any criminal investigations. In fact, current investigations are not due to journalistic work but due to their acts in alleged support and link to terrorist organizations. This is a judicial criminal process initiated before the 15th of July, the date of the coup attempt. It is related to terrorism-linked charges.” What is your reaction to that statement from the Turkish government?

YAVUZ BAYDAR: It’s as simple as that. If journalism is created as a profession to dig in the truth and honestly convey what it is to the public, in the term in the interest of public, and if it is declared as criminal activity by a government which has absolutely no tolerance for such activity, then be it. But journalism is a necessary tenet of any democracy and this is what is missing in Turkey at the moment. What the official narrative has been for months and months, ever since Gezi Park protest actually, was that journalism is a criminal activity, more or less. So this is a discussion that we will not have. We will continue to defend the honour of our journalism, no matter where, as Ahmet Şık in the trial of Cumhuriyet said yesterday, you think that we will be afraid, those of us inside or outside. We will not be. We shall not be afraid.

LL: We have just about a minute left and I want to ask you what you think of the international response to what is happening in Turkey and its journalists.

YAVUZ BAYDAR: Well, I'm afraid the international community has reacted belatedly when this machinery started rolling. I belong to those who have been warning month after month that this is where we are going and that something should be done. It may be too late from the international community, even from the European Court of Human Rights side. I think it is now time to engage the civil societies like adoption of each and every jailed journalist or dissident or academician in Turkey, by each and every city in the West like in Canada, Germany, Spain. And this honorary citizen, individual should be followed by the city, town or municipality so that the civil societies of the West have a say, saying that we care for these people. And not only professional organizations such as Reporters Sans Frontièresor or Committee to Protect Journalists, but we as civil societies, locals, natives of towns care for these people and we will not let go and we care for their families, their financial well-being, et cetera.

LL: Mr. Baydar, thank you.

YAVUZ BAYDAR: You’re welcome.

LL: Yavuz Baydar is a Turkish journalist. He's a columnist with the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung. I'm Laura Lynch and you are listening to the summer edition of The Current.

[Music: Bridge]

LL: Okay. We have a moment now to let you know about a puzzling segment coming up on tomorrow's edition of The Current. Ian Scheffler is really, really good at solving the Rubik's Cube. In fact, he's a Rubik's Cube master—I didn't know there was such a thing—and he's sharing some insight into the confounding cube with his book Cracking the Cube: Going Slow to Go Fast and Other Unexpected Turns in the World of Competitive Rubik's Cube Solving. I didn't know there was that either. Ian Scheffler spoke to host Anna Maria Tremonti about meeting the inventor of the cube, Erno Rubik.

SOUNDCLIP

I like to think of Mr. Rubik as the Willy Wonka of Eastern Europe. He's very wealthy, very reclusive, very creative. It took me two years to get a one-hour sit down interview with him which was easily one of the most surreal hours of my life. And it was surreal in some ways because I had the experience of learning that Mr. Rubik is like his own puzzle. If you ask 10 people who've met him the same question, they're liable to give you 10 different answers. Not all of which can possibly be true. So he's a bit hard to puzzle out. But it was very interesting to get to meet him. It's sort of one of the major storylines of the book is the quest to understand like where did this puzzle really come from. He's many things. He is a licenced practicing architect. He also taught design for many years at a university in Hungary and he has been trained in sculpture and many other arts. His father was an engineer and his mother was a poet, so he's kind of literally the union of art and science.

LL: Hear Anna Maria’s full conversation with Ian Scheffler tomorrow on The Current.

[Music: Bridge]

LL: The CBC News is next, then something on the lighter side. How do you feel about pineapple on your pizza? A delightful topping or a culinary crime? It's a debate set off by none other than Iceland's leader this year and we are digging in. The great Hawaiian pizza debate after the news. I'm Laura Lynch and this is the summer edition of The Current.

[Music: Hula Blues]

ENCORE | Pizza protocol: Should pineapple be banned as a topping?

Guests: Giacomo Pasquini, Massimo Capra, Carol Helstosky

LL: Hello, I’m Laura Lynch and you’re listening to the summer edition of The Current.

[Music: Theme]

LL: Up next, something sweet that leaves many people sour and the extra-large controversy it’s given rise to.

SOUNDCLIP

Just because something is legal doesn't mean you should do it, which is always the argument I've used against pineapple on pizza.

[Sound: Crowd laughing]

It's legal, but it's immoral.

[Sound: Crowd laughing]

LL: Much like religion and politics, ideas about whether pineapple belongs on the face of a pizza pie are far too entrenched to broach diplomatically. It’s a lesson none other than the president of Iceland learned this February, when he spoke out about the controversial pizza topping. As Iceland's ambassador to Canada Sturla Sigurjónsson explained, it started innocently enough.

SOUNDCLIP

Well, I think he was probably caught a bit off guard. As I understand, he was at an event at a university in Iceland and got this whimsical question about his views on pineapple as a topping on pizza and he responded in a lighthearted way that he thought that they should be forbidden. And then the whole storm started, as you know.

LL: Well, since then the debate over pineapple’s presence on pizza has bubbled up like hot cheese around the globe. And Canada, of course, has an important stake in the debate. We are, as you may or may not be aware, supposedly the birthplace of the Hawaiian pizza. Yes, a chef in the Great White North—not Naples, not Honolulu—thought to toss some chunked pineapple together with ham on a pizza. In fact, if you ask Italians about pineapple on pizza, there’s really no controversy at all. Reporter Megan Williams visited a pizzeria in Rome where she dared to ask customers and the chef their thoughts on the subject.

SOUNDCLIP

[Music: Accordion song]

VOICE 1: No, no, no, no. [Italian speaking language]

VOICE 2: In 40 years, nobody has asked for a pizza with pineapple.

VOICE 3: I've worked in a pizzeria with some Neapolitan guys and they were talking about it like it’s the devil.

[Sound: Laughing]

VOICE 3: Can't really tell though. Never had it.

VOICE 4: I’m Italian, so I don't think that pizza is a true destination for pineapple. But I've never tried.

REPORTER: Would you ever order it?

VOICE 4: No.

REPORTER: It's called Hawaiian pizza. Do you know where it comes from?

VOICE 4: It has to be the US. They're always doing this strange stuff with pizza, messing it up. [chuckles]

REPORTER: Canada.

VOICE 4: Canada? I’ve never had it. I don't think I will ever have it. I mean, pineapple is a fruit.

VOICE 5: There are sweet pizzas, but we use it with Italian stuff. Pineapple isn't exactly an Italian fruit, so.

VOICE 4: it's never going to take off in Italy that's for sure, because Italians, we’re really proud about the pizza, how it's made and how it has been done like this for years. So they will never accept it.

REPORTER: Well, so why can you have Nutella pizza and not pizza with pineapples?

VOICE 4: Because Nutella is Italian.

REPORTER: Ah.

[Music: Accordion and trumpet song]

LL: And that was freelance contributor Megan Williams in Rome. Well, earlier this year on The Current, I waded into the debate with two Toronto chefs. Chef Massimo Capra is the owner of Capra’s Kitchen and Giacomo Pasquini is the executive chef of Terroni. We first brought you this food fight back in February.

LL: Hello to you both.

GIACOMO PASQUINI: Good morning.

MASSIMO CAPRA: Hello.

LL: Giacomo Pasquini, let me start with you.

GIACOMO PASQUINI: Yes.

LL: People in Rome clearly do not like pineapple on their pizza. What do you think?

GIACOMO PASQUINI: Thank God. [laughs]

LL: [laughs]

GIACOMO PASQUINI: I don’t.

LL: Why not?

GIACOMO PASQUINI: Well, as the Italian guy said, I don't think it belongs on the pizza topping. And I think Italian pizza is so simple and the three ingredients that you can pick is tomato, mozzarella, and basil and extra virgin olive oil. So it's a fruit, pineapple, I don’t think it belongs in there. I clearly and honestly, I don't like the taste on it. [laughs]

LL: Wait, wait, wait. So have you tried it?

GIACOMO PASQUINI: I don't know if I want to say that. [laughs]

LL: [laughs]

GIACOMO PASQUINI: Well I did, actually.

MASSIMO CAPRA: You probably did, come on.

GIACOMO PASQUINI: I did, I did. Well, I have to try it, right? [chuckles]

LL: Uh huh, tell me about that. What was it like the first time you tried it?

GIACOMO PASQUINI: It was the first and last time, let me tell you. [chuckles] It’s something that I'm not enjoying. That’s it. I'm not going to order. I have no thought to go back and order. And that was it. That was the first and last time.

MASSIMO CAPRA: Really, eh?

GIACOMO PASQUINI: [chuckles]

LL: And Massimo Capra, I can hear you wanting to jump in. What do you think of pizza and pineapple together?

MASSIMO CAPRA: [chuckles] Well, I had it only once, maybe 35 years ago. And then travelling throughout Italy and seeing some pizzerias that are really modern and the new style of pizzerias because there are new things happening in Italy all the time. I actually saw a pizza with pineapple with ham, with pickled onions, with a little bit of grainy mustard, with a ricotta base that was absolutely delicious. And not what we know and what we see. But, you know, I've seen some bad things happening in Italy too.

LL: [chuckles]

GIACOMO PASQUINI: [chuckles]

MASSIMO CAPRA: I mean, like French fries on pizza for instance. I mean, I've seen that.

GIACOMO PASQUINI: Yup.

MASSIMO CAPRA: And I know that there is a movement to change things and that starts in Italy, not really abroad. But I am not against putting pineapple on pizza if the flavours are combined right. You know, after all, it is bread based, it’s not, I don't know why we are making a sanctuary out of pizza.

LL: [laughs]

MASSIMO CAPRA: I mean, this is a bread base, it’s an Egyptian bread. You know, I mean, it’s stretched same way, it’s done the same way. The dough is done the same way. It came to Italy and when 200 years ago we found tomatoes and we put them on it, and then it became a big deal. So there is room for change and improvement and betterment. I mean, and this is coming from a guy that only eats margherita pizza by the way.

LL: [chuckles] Alright.

MASSIMO CAPRA: [laughs]

GIACOMO PASQUINI: [laughs]

LL: Alright, you two, the battle is joined between you. Giacomo, you heard what Massimo’s opinion is, is there ever room?

GIACOMO PASQUINI: Yeah, if I go in his restaurant, I’m not going to order the pineapple pizza.

MASSIMO CAPRA: [laughs]

LL: But is there ever room for change, Giacomo?

GIACOMO PASQUINI: Um, personally, I like things, to keep it very traditional to be honest. I always like the history behind the dish. I always like the history behind the ingredients. So I'm a traditional guy. Absolutely. I love when stuff, yes, gets a little bit out of control with different ingredients. But I am a guy that always go back to the tradition. Definitely. So.

LL: What would you do if somebody came into your restaurant and ordered, and said to you, would you mind putting some pineapple on the pizza?

MASSIMO CAPRA: [laughs]

GIACOMO PASQUINI: I don't think I’m going to answer that. [chuckles] It's not going to happen. It's very clear. So it's—I don't think we have a pineapple in the restaurant actually in the fridge.

MASSIMO CAPRA: Yeah, I don’t think so.

GIACOMO PASQUINI: So it’s not going to happen. I’m not going to go to the market. I’m not going to go out of my way to the market to get a pineapple.

LL: OK, so that makes it an easy answer. I want to ask both of you, what did you think when you heard that the president of Iceland said he’d ban pineapple on pizza if he could?

MASSIMO CAPRA: That was awesome. That was actually very good, because I've seen some strange things in Iceland. And I love that place and I can't wait to go back, but I mean, that was amazing that he would do that.

LL: OK.

MASSIMO CAPRA: Yeah.

LL: Giacomo?

GIACOMO PASQUINI: I think it was awesome. I was reading the article when it came out and it was funny when he said that I don't have such a power, but if I could I would.

MASSIMO CAPRA: [laughs] Let’s do small steps. Don’t put cheese on spaghetti with clams.

LL: [laughs]

GIACOMO PASQUINI: Definitely. Definitely.

LL: Oh, right, so there's other lines to draw here as well? Alright.

GIACOMO PASQUINI: Yes.

MASSIMO CAPRA: Absolutely. Stop using a spoon for crying out loud. Learn to twirl.

GIACOMO PASQUINI: Exactly.

LL: But Massimo, you heard Giacomo say that he sounds like he would absolutely say no to somebody if they came into his restaurant asking for pineapple. What would you say if someone wanted that?

MASSIMO CAPRA: Well, you see the best thing to do is really not to have the ingredients in house, otherwise you're going to get ridden with guilt, right?

GIACOMO PASQUINI: [chuckles]

MASSIMO CAPRA: So if you don’t have the pineapple, I'm not going to go out and buy pineapple for you. I mean, come on.

GIACOMO PASQUINI: [chuckles]

LL: [chuckles]

MASSIMO CAPRA: You know what I mean? So I don't have pineapple and I don't have French fries in my restaurant. I mean, that's as simple as that.

LL: Well, listen, it doesn't get much more traditional than La Scuola Italiana Pizzaioli, I'm trying my best to pronounce this correctly, near Venice.

GIACOMO PASQUINI: [chuckles]

LL: That is Italy's oldest pizza school. I didn't know such a thing existed. I should have.

MASSIMO CAPRA: Yeah, me neither actually.

GIACOMO PASQUINI: Yeah. [chuckles]

LL: [chuckles] And listen now, this is Caterina Orlandi, she teaches there. This is what she says about pineapple on pizza.

SOUNDCLIP

CATERINA ORLANDI: Yeah, in Italy, our pizzerias offer this kind of pizza. Usually this is eaten by tourists. This is not a traditional pizza, but we can consider this pineapple pizza as a dessert pizza. For example, our school, Scuola Italiana Pizzaioli, offers dessert pizza courses. And we have seen before many combinations of fruit, you know, or sweet food on top of pizza. So this has to be considered as a sweet pizza, a dessert pizza and a non-traditional pizza.

LL: OK.

MASSIMO CAPRA: Wow.

LL: There you go from pizza school. Giacomo Pasquini, what do you think of dessert pizza?

GIACOMO PASQUINI: Um well, that’s hard. You know what, if you put Nutella, I’m into it because I love Nutella. As bad as it sound. But definitely, dessert pizza with—no. [Italian speaking language]

LL: Wow.

GIACOMO PASQUINI: Yeah.

LL: You are so strict.

GIACOMO PASQUINI: Yeah. I'm a traditional guy. So if I go out for pizza, I'm not going to start thinking I want a pizza with the fruit salad on top. No, I'm not ready for that. I’m sorry.

LL: And Massimo Capra?

MASSIMO CAPRA: I couldn't agree with Giacomo more. I wouldn't eat a pizza for dessert if you paid me to. Too much bread not, you know, I mean, it's just not built as a dessert. I don't care how much Nutella you put on it, it's just not built as a dessert. It’s a savoury dough. I mean, to me, it's just a silly way to end a meal.

GIACOMO PASQUINI: Yeah.

MASSIMO CAPRA: I really don't like that.

LL: Well, wait a second, aren't either one of you worried about getting left behind in the world of fusion cuisine?

MASSIMO CAPRA: [laughs]

GIACOMO PASQUINI: That’s not a fusion. I don’t think that it’s a fusion pizza.

MASSIMO CAPRA: OK. Let me put it down this way, if I was in Hawaii, and the pineapple is local and it's beautiful, and I have beautiful ham and then yeah, I would put it on pizza. Fusion cuisine, maybe it is. But you know what, it’s using local ingredients. In Toronto, to put pineapple on pizza from a can or even fresh, diced and all that is disgusting at best.

GIACOMO PASQUINI: [laughs]

MASSIMO CAPRA: Unless you do it properly. To eat dessert, as a pizza dough as dessert. I mean, yeah it's a novelty. But I don't know. I just don't understand people that actually take that and enjoy it, with their battle against sugar and all. I mean, it makes no sense. You know, I mean, a pizza dough is a pizza dough and a sweet dough for a dessert is a sweet dough for a dessert.

GIACOMO PASQUINI: Yeah.

MASSIMO CAPRA: So they need to be made differently.

LL: I want to play one more piece of tape from Caterina Orlandi. Each year, the pizza school holds an international pizza contest. And here she is talking again about innovations in pizza toppings.

SOUNDCLIP

CATERINA ORLANDI: In our school, we have seen so many combinations of food, you know, different toppings on pizza before. For example, during the past edition of the world pizza championship, we have seen a pizza with insects on top. So crickets. In different parts of the world, such as Thailand, Mexico and Algeria, their main dish is insects. So they thought of combining our most, you know, famous dish with their most famous dish.

MASSIMO CAPRA: Hm.

GIACOMO PASQUINI: Wow.

LL: I guess that's sort of what you were saying about you go local. [chuckles]

GIACOMO PASQUINI: [laughs]

MASSIMO CAPRA: Yeah, you go really local.

LL: Maybe after that, pineapple on pizza doesn't sound quite so bad?

MASSIMO CAPRA: No, that's right. You know, but I mean, I’ll tell you one thing though about innovation. I, you know, I created a beet risotto about 30 years ago and I've been making it ever since. When the first time that I made beet risotto, it was in a competition here in Toronto from the consortium of rice growers of Italy. And everyone looked at it and it’s beautiful and red and everybody knows it, because it is delicious and it’s sweet and salty and all. And they all, all the Italian chefs looked at me and they went this is gross, this is disgusting, it will never take on. That recipe went in the book because I participated in the event. The book went around the world. And now you can see that beet risotto is apparent everywhere. So even in Italy they are making beet risotto, they actually have dehydrated beet in a risotto bag and they are making it.

LL: OK.

MASSIMO CAPRA: So excuse me, innovation can happen.

LL: OK. Well, and then last word to you, Giacomo Pasquini. Do you have any kind of a favourite sort of a mash up of cultures in a dish, a fusion of anything?

GIACOMO PASQUINI: We're talking about pizza? [laughs]

LL: I'm letting you take on the world here.

GIACOMO PASQUINI: Well, I agree on innovation with Chef Capra definitely. I like to be creative and I worked in creative places, yes. But still, I’ll always go back to the tradition. And you can be still creative, local, use a combination of, we can call it fusion, absolutely. But I think the traditional way has to play a big role in the dish. And that's, I believe, I strongly believe in that.

LL: Well.

GIACOMO PASQUINI: Yeah. [chuckles]

LL: Both of you, I hope, I wish you happy days in the kitchen as you head back to work.

GIACOMO PASQUINI: Thank you.

LL: And I hope you don't have any nightmares about pineapple on pizza.

MASSIMO CAPRA: [laughs]

GIACOMO PASQUINI: I did last night. [laughs]

MASSIMO CAPRA: I might study some new recipes for it, never mind.

LL: Thanks, gentlemen.

GIACOMO PASQUINI: Thank you.

MASSIMO CAPRA: You're welcome, thank you.

LL: Chef Massimo Capra is the owner of Capra's Kitchen, and Giacomo Pasquini is the executive chef of Terroni. They were both in our Toronto studio.

[Music: Italian]

LL: Now, for more on the history and traditions of pizza I am joined by Carol Helstosky. She is an associate professor of history at the University of Denver and the author of Pizza: A Global History. She is in Denver. Hello.

CAROL HELSTOSKY: Good morning.

LL: What crossed your mind as you listened to the two chefs?

CAROL HELSTOSKY: I absolutely loved the phrase that Massimo used, that he is not interested in making a sanctuary out of pizza. [chuckles]

LL: [laughs]

CAROL HELSTOSKY: Terrific. I would point out, I found this most interesting and looking at the long range history of pizza, the first thing I would point out would be pizza never had that great a reputation throughout much of its history. As people tried pizza, it had its origins in Naples, right, in the 17th century. And as people outside of Naples, even other Italians or foreigners, tried pizza they reacted with absolute disgust. I believe American inventor Samuel Morse, when he visited Naples and tried pizza, he described that as a type of nauseous cake.

LL: [chuckles]

CAROL HELSTOSKY: And that it was like a piece of bread that had been taken, reeking out of the sewer, because it was covered in pepper and tomatoes and little bits of fish, and people were absolutely disgusted by pizza. So I find that interesting that nowadays we're talking about toppings that make us feel sick. [chuckles]

LL: Yeah, no kidding. But how did it come to be that pizza ended up with these traditional ingredients that we know now?

CAROL HELSTOSKY: In Naples, there were several different types of pizza, but mostly pizza was consumed by the poorest of the Neapolitans—soldiers, workers, families who didn't have access to kitchens and purchased cheap street food. This was also a place where people could eat pasta street side, and so pizza would be a cheap takeaway snack. And so the pizzaiolo would make pizza out of whatever ingredients he happened to have on hand. Near Naples, tomatoes were certainly popular but also fish. And then some mozzarella made out of buffalo milk, fresh herbs like basil or oregano. Whatever was on hand would be sprinkled on top of a pizza.

LL: And this is linked to poverty, is it not? That's sort of how it came about?

CAROL HELSTOSKY: Very much so, yes. The history of Italian cuisine is also the history of, what I call a cuisine of scarcity. Where you have limited ingredients and you seek to combine those ingredients in creative ways. And over the decades and then over a century, you sort of embed those practices in a series of, I would call them informal rules. I think you can always bend them a little bit. But we see definitely by the end of the 20th century, I think, in the 1980s, with the growth of slow food in Italy and also the association of authentic Neapolitan pizza makers in the eighties, a real effort to preserve a cuisine of scarcity and to preserve those rules.

LL: That's interesting. So the history is important to today's respect for the rules, even though those rules were sparked by what people didn't have?

CAROL HELSTOSKY: Oh, I think very much so. I mean, I'm an American and I live in the West where I think the majority of my students at university wouldn't blink twice about eating a Hawaiian pizza and put God knows what else on their pizzas. [chuckles]

LL: [chuckles]

CAROL HELSTOSKY: Because they love all kinds of toppings. And I think a lot of my students would look at Italians and say hey, what is their problem? Why are they so strict? Why do they even care, right? Pizza’s for experimenting and you have fun with it, and it's a playful food. What they don't understand, really, is when some Italians—not all Italians—but when some Italians get really upset about bending the rules or trying out this or doing that with a pizza, what they’re really talking about is their culinary heritage. They're talking about, essentially, history on a plate.

LL: Well, so you heard Caterina Orlandi talk about how Italians are now innovating with dessert pizza. What do you think it'll take for that to gain common acceptance in Italy, given what you just said about traditions?

CAROL HELSTOSKY: I think there's always a bit of experimentation that goes on for customers, for consumers, whether they're tourists or new residents to Italy or immigrants to Italy. I think that that will change. I think you will always encounter, at least in my research, I found that you tend to have pizza purists and then pizza experimenters. I think those two populations exist mostly peacefully. [chuckles]

LL: [chuckles]

CAROL HELSTOSKY: Except at moments, [chuckles] where someone talks about banning pineapple on pizza, then maybe these conversations explode. But I think some Italians will be accepting of innovation, sure.

LL: Is it generational?

CAROL HELSTOSKY: I don’t know. I think you always have new generations of people and this isn't just an Italian phenomenon. You always have new generations of people who go back, when they become chefs or innovators, culinary innovators, and they seek, they look in history to sort of seek out what those traditions are. We certainly see this in Italy, where new generations of pizza makers really seek to preserve these older traditions. So I don't really think it's something—pizza traditionalism isn't something that's going to die out with a certain generation. There’ll always be new groups of pizza makers who will look back and try to preserve those traditions.

LL: OK. Before I let you go, do you eat pizza with pineapple on it?

CAROL HELSTOSKY: Oh, I am not a pizza purist. [chuckles]

LL: [chuckles]

CAROL HELSTOSKY: I will try anything once, though I’m going to have to draw the line at insects on pizza.

LL: [laughs]

CAROL HELSTOSKY: I’m not sure how that's going to taste. I have had pizza with pineapple. It was OK. I'm not a big fan of the sweet-sour combination, like that kind of sweet savoury combination. So I tend not to like it. But like I said, I have a teenager who really does like pizza with pineapple and olives of all things.

LL: OK.

CAROL HELSTOSKY: Yeah.

LL: Another strange combination.

CAROL HELSTOSKY: [laughs]

LL: Thank you very much.

CAROL HELSTOSKY: OK. Thank you.

LL: That was my conversation with pizza historian Carol Helstosky. She is an associate professor of history at the University of Denver and the author of Pizza: A Global History. And there’s a footnote to this story. Sam Panopoulos, the Canadian inventor of Hawaiian pizza died this year at age 83. He owned the Satellite Restaurant in Chatham, Ontario where he first had the idea in 1962 to add canned pineapple to pizza. And now it’s over to you. Should pizza be dressed with pineapple or enjoyed only in its classic ways? Whichever way you slice it, let us hear about it. Tweet us @TheCurrentCBC or me @LauraLynchCBC, post on this segment on our Facebook page or email us by clicking on the contact at www.cbc.ca/thecurrent. And that is our program for today. Stay tuned to Radio One for a new episode of Short Cuts from the BBC. This week, host Josie Long explores body language, from the melody of your speech to the brush of skin on skin. You’ll hear about secret codes sent through walls, a sudden bodily change which left a woman feeling like a stranger to herself, and the importance of touch. Finally today, after our conversation about pineapple on pizza and whether it’s an insult to Italian cuisine, we’ll leave you with a scene from the 1996 comedy that served up some similar fare. That would be the movie, Big Night. I’m Laura Lynch. Thank you for listening to the summer edition of The Current.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE 1: Is this what I ordered?

VOICE 2: Yes. That is a risotto.

VOICE 1: Oh.

VOICE 2: It’s a special recipe that my brother and I bring from Italy. It’s delicious, I promise.

VOICE 1: But I get a side order of spaghetti with this right?

VOICE 2: Right. Well, no.

VOICE 3: I thought all main courses come with spaghetti?

VOICE 2: Well, some yes. But you see, risotto is rice, so it is a starch. And it doesn’t go really with pasta.

VOICE 1: But I don’t—

VOICE 3: Honey, honey. Order a side of spaghetti, that’s all.

VOICE 2: Just make me a side order of spaghetti please. For the lady with the risotto.

[Sound: Clattering]

VOICE 4: What? Why?

VOICE 2: She likes starch, I don’t know. Come on.

VOICE 4: Who are these people in America?

VOICE 2: Make the pasta. Make it, make it, make the pasta. Come on. Let’s go.

VOICE 4: How can she want? They both are starch. Maybe I should make mashed potatoes for on the other side.

VOICE 2: Primo, look.

VOICE 4: No. She’s a criminal. I want to talk to her.

[Music: “Mambo Italiano” covered by Dean Martin]

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July 27, 2017 full episode transcript

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