Courtney Luciana photo
Colin Caplan and Kevin Gagliard display Pepe’s’ trademark clam pizza.
YouTube
Bill baker Dillon at hearing.
Pizza is one pie closer to becoming the official state food, as New Haveners pitched state lawmakers on recognizing the local culinary delicacy’s role in fostering community, uplifting small businesses, and satisfying taste buds.
On Friday, the state legislature’s Government Administration and Elections Committee hosted a public hearing on the proposed legislation House Bill No. 5656: An Act Designating Pizza As The State Food. The committee’s virtual public hearing was held online via YouTube.
No one spoke against the bill at the hearing. Now the committee is to vote on the bill, then advance to the full legislature for final votes.
Not surprisingly, the bill was baked and is being served to passage primarily thanks to elected officials and advocates from the delicacy’s birthplace of New Haven.
Co-sponsored by New Haven State Rep. Pat Dillon, New Haven State Sen. Gary Winfield, and Waterbury State Rep. Geraldo Reyes, and initially proposed by New Haven food writer and local historian Colin Caplan, the bill would make pizza the state food to “recognize the contribution of pizza to the state’s cuisine and economy.”
“Pizza in Connecticut is a craft,” Dillon said on Friday during her testimony in support of the bill. “It is high quality. It is small business. And individual pizzerias have their own following. When I was first approached by a friend in New Haven to raise this bill, it was at a low point in the pandemic, and I was excited to think that this was an opportunity to celebrate what is joyful and good in our lives, and also to promote small businesses.”
The public hearing came just hours before Vice President Kamala Harris’s secret service detail picked up 15 pies from Sally’s Apizza in Wooster Square during the veep’s New Haven visit. The vice president also picked up pies from West Haven’s Zuppardi’s Apizza.
The bill has also sparked a bit of a regional debate as to which state is indeed home to the most satisfying and historic pizza culture.
Thomas Breen photo
A “veggie bomb” pie from Modern.
On Friday, Caplan testified that New Haven — and Connecticut at large — takes the cake. As it were.
“The whole idea is to support the community of families we have here as well as the amazing economy produced by pizzerias,” he said. “The pizza business is an amazing testament to this town and this whole state.”
Caplan said Connecticut has the highest rated pizzas, the oldest pizzerias, the largest number of pizzerias per capita, and the most independently owned pizzerias of any state int he country.
“Connecticut has its own word for pizza: apizza,” pronounced “ah-beetz.”
He said New Haven can also boast being the birthplace of the pizza box, the pizza vending machine, the home pizza making set, and the white clam pizza.
“New Haven-style pizza is internationally recognized,” he said. The documentary Pizza: A Love Story focuses exclusively on New Haven. Whenever presidents or vice presidents come to New Haven, they almost always stop in New Haven for a pie.
“It’s something that connects us, not divides us,” he said. “It was brought by Italians, now it’s eaten by every ethnicity, culture, race.”
WNPR radio show host Chef Plum (pictured) also weighed in in support of the bill.
(When asked by Killingly State Sen. Mae Flexer to testify under his real name, Plum, a bit perturbed and perplexed, said that that is his real name. “Just Chef Plum, even in my wedding vows. Good luck looking that one up!”)
“New York State has its state muffin: the apple muffin,” he said. “Delaware has a state pie: the peach pie. Oklahoma has a state steak: the ribeye. Missouri has a state dessert: the ice cream cone.”
Connecticut has two state songs, he continued, but no state food.
“Pizza belongs to the people of Connecticut. Real apizza lives here, and it’s time to bring it home officially.”
And in written testimony submitted to the committee, Mayor Justin Elicker also backed the state pizza bill effort.
“Family-owned pizza restaurants are at the heart of our city, and their contributions to our community and economy go far beyond the flavor and excellence of their specialty dish,” he wrote. “During a time when it is difficult to feel a sense of community, the uniquely delicious qualities of New Haven pizza brings us together, even when we’re physically apart.”
The committee state legislators who spoke up on Friday threw their support behind the New Haven-backed pizza bill.
“New Haven pizza is a treasure,” Stamford State Rep. Matt Blumenthal (pictured) said, “and I believe without equal.”
Flexer agreed. “This has been a very dark time for all of us,” she said. “This bill has given me a smile all year.”