National Pepperoni Pizza Day Honors Classic Favorite

For over 100 years, the pepperoni has dazzled, tantalized and satisfied pizza lovers all over the world. In fact, pepperoni is so popular that according to the National Association of Pizza Operators reports that pepperoni is the most popular pizza topping in the U.S., amounting to a whopping estimated 250 million pounds consumed annually.

Pepperoni is so beloved that there is a day dedicated to its mouthwatering honor, National Pepperoni Pizza Day, and it’s coming up Sunday, Sept. 20. LloydPans’ pizza pans and tools are designed to serve up the highest quality pizza on menus across the U.S., and while you’re baking your pepperoni creations, why not have a conversation about the day with some of the LloydPans’ innovation team’s favorite fun facts. 

1. Pepperoni’s origins aren’t Italian. Pepperoni started as a practice of curing meats with salt and other spices as a way to preserve them, a practice, Dogtown Pizza found, dates back to the Roman Empire. 
2. The first mention of pepperoni in the U.S. occurred in 1919, perhaps as no surprise in New York City delis and pizzerias.
3. Pepperoni was considered “an ethnic Italian dish” until the 1950s, when commercialization of the gas pizza oven and WWII’s end made pepperoni pizza more popular.
4. Pepperoni means large peppers in Italian. 

Pepperoni gets its color from a powder made from ground red pepper pods, chili peppers and sodium nitrate, which is used to cure the meat.