Last night we went to what my friend Ali claims is the best Italian pizzeria in Zurich. Hungry after an afternoon of sitting in a pub watching the US get their butts kicked by Ghana, I entered the pizzeria with reasonable expectations (as an aside – 2 years of living in Italy have kind of turned me into a pizza snob). The pizzas on the menu had authentic-sounding Italian names, and the ingredients listed, for the most part, sounded right (with the glaring exception of quark, listed as an ingredient on a couple different pizzas. I should have jumped ship right then.)
Steering clear of the quark, I ordered a simple pizza verdura. Now you usually don’t know exactly which veggies will appear on a pizza verdura, but chances are it involves grilled eggplant, zucchini, and peppers, and maybe some sort of red lettuce, fennel or arugula. May sound a little strange to people used to American-style pizza, but trust me, it’s always delicious. At least in Italy. Forgetting which country I was in, my mouth watered in anticipation of the pizza.
So apparently there isn’t a lack of baby carrots in Switzerland, as Sara would have us believe. But rather the baby carrots that do exist here are evil and like to show up in all the wrong places. Like on my pizza verdura.
When the Swiss think ‘vegetables’, the only two things that must ever come to mind are frozen carrots and broccoli. As a vegetarian, I am constantly being served dishes with these things. I guess they are cheaper than fresh veggies? Or the Swiss are too busy to prepare fresh vegetables, except to wash lettuce for a salad? The ridiculous part is, restaurant meals cost at least 50% more here than they do in Milan (one of the most expensive cities in the world), but the quality of the food is significantly lower. Even the eggplant slices on my pizza were from frozen! Why do the Swiss put up with this?
When the waitress came at the end of the meal and asked the obligatory ‘did it taste good?,’ I replied simply, ‘Pizza and carrots do not belong together.’
OK, rant over. I think I need a vacation in Italy.
sooo, where did they get them from???? where are the swiss hiding the carrots?????
I must say, the worst pizza verdura I ate in Italy. The best I eat in Zurich, at Da Amici, at Guggastrasse. It has eggpland and pepperoni, and zuckini. Delicious. I never had your experience. I tend to thing you have got wrong advisers. I would be very happy to tell ou about nice places in Zurich. Have a nice time in Zurich, in the best city of the world (after New York)