ROUSES_JanFeb2020_Magazine_Pages

Letter from the Editor by Marcy Nathan, Creative Director

Marketing & Advertising Director Tim Acosta

Creative Director & Editor Marcy Nathan

Art Director, Layout & Design Eliza Schulze

We ate so much pizza for this issue you’d think I’d be sick of it,

Illustrator Kacie Galtier

but I’m eating a cold slice as I write this. I have a terrible habit of eating at my computer even though I know I shouldn’t. When I took it to be repaired recently they degunked the keyboard and found a whole cat’s worth of fur and an entire bag of SmartPop!. I like popcorn. I love pizza. I honestly cannot count the number of Totino’s Party Pizzas and Stouffer’s French Bread Pizzas I bought from the 24-hour Munchie Mart at Vanderbilt, where I majored in drinking. There is a man — a fellow by the name of Dan Janssen — who claims that he has eaten pizza nearly every meal for the past 25 years. I’m not there yet, but I did spend a summer in New York during graduate school when I ate almost nothing but street-corner slices. Texas has hold ’em; New York has fold ’em. I quickly learned that the trick is to fold your slice in half lengthwise to make it portable. That keeps the runaway cheese, toppings and tomato sauce (mostly) on the crust as you walk and eat. Last year around this time, I was lucky enough to represent Rouses at a food show in Italy. You won’t be surprised to hear I squeezed a lifetime of eating pizza into one week. I ate thin and crispy Roman pizza; pizza al taglio — pizza by the cut, which resembles focaccia; and true Neapolitan pizza, which is made according to strict rules to ensure both quality and authenticity — it even has to be certified by the Associazione Verace Pizza Napoletana. I snuck a whole bell of Provolone cheese back to the United States in my suitcase. I’d have snuck the pizzaiolo from Pizzarium if he’d have fit in my bag. Food, as we’ve said before in these pages, is about people. Like pizzas, they can be thick or thin, but none are quite like the ones you grew up with. I will always have fond memories of Pizza Hut, because that’s where my parents took us when we were kids. Now, I know Pizza at the Hut has about as much resemblance to authentic Italian pizza as gumbo with carrots does to Dooky Chase’s, but back then it was one of the only pizza places in town. My sisters and I loved it. One particular visit stands out in my memory. We were enjoying a typical, kid-friendly pepperoni pizza. The couple a few tables away ordered what must have been a supreme pizza; it was covered with lots of exotic (to us kids) toppings. After they ate a few slices, they got up and left. The rest of the pizza was just sitting there, untouched. My father reached over and snatched it. My mother clutched her pearls. But just as Dad was finishing his first piece of “adult” pizza, the couple returned. FROM THE BATHROOM. My parents ended up buying them a whole pizza to replace the slice my dad ate. We tease my dad about it to this day. The moral of the story? No matter how serious the case of food envy, do not take leftover food off another table…unless you are absolutely certain the other party has departed the restaurant.

Production Manager McNally Sislo

Corporate Chef Marc Ardoin

Photo Director Romney Caruso

Copy Editor Patti Stallard

Advertising Amanda Kennedy Harley Breaux Marketing Stephanie Hopkins Robert Barilleaux

Nancy Besson Taryn Clement

JANUARY | FEBRUARY 2020

(llustrated titles to come)

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