Blaine Parker writes & speaks about pizza and people...
Blaine Parker, Writer & Performer
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Pizza people, pizza places, and even some "Pizza! Pizza!"
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Some of the silly things I've posted in social media come complete with original photography. And there's pizza. A lot of pizza. There are also other foods more or less like pizza. Sometimes, there are jokes.
Some of the things I've written about extraordinary pizza people...
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- Peter Reinhart, pizza & bread guru on three big tips for the pizza-making newbie.
- Kristian Tapaninaho, founder & CEO of Ooni, on his defining pizza memory.
- Serhan Ayhan, the creative, award-winning amateur pizzaiolo talks about unusual toppings, and how to prevent putting your mind in pizza prison.
- Scott Weiner, founder of Scott’s Pizza Tours and Slice Out Hunger, talks about favorite pizzas past--including a poignant memory of Pizza Hut.
- Andris Lagsdin, former chef for Todd English, and founder of BakingSteel.com, on being obsessive and inspiring your kids.
- Dutch Van Oostendorp, award-winning pizzaiolo and co-founder of TriBecca Allie Café--a stunning little Neapolitan-style pizzeria hidden in the Mississippi Delta. (Yes, he really built his own wood-fired oven, which he uses daily.)
- Kevin Godbee, the best-dressed, most eclectic man in the world of professional food blogging who believes everyone should try making pizza in their home oven, and suggests that the pizza oven makers are going to hate both of us.
- Chef Tuan Tran, the eclectic and creative Cordon Bleu-trained chef behind DuMa Pizza and F.A.T. TACOS.
Some of the things I've written about surprising pizza places...
Some of the things I've written about surprising pizza places...
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- Portland Pizza, and why best-of lists are not always your friend. After hitting some "listed" favorites (Scotty's, Lovely's, Apizza Scholls and Red Sauce), I stumbled onto a New Haven-style apizza done better than New Haven. (Yes: blasphemy!)
- Pizzeria Bianco & California Pizza Kitchen, and why not limiting one's definition of "pizza" is a big deal.
- Pizza Pi VI, a surprisingly good pie from the Caribbean’s only pizzeria on a sailing yacht. Pizza Pi VI is also the subject of my article about how to build a world-famous cult brand.
- City Crust pizza catering, and how a medical-devices salesman is following his professional, wood-fired fever dream at night and on weekends.
- The Famous King Of Prussia Pizza, the actual original one that still refuses to take your credit card.
- Secret Pizza Los Angeles, the famous and formerly hidden pop-up by a professional musician with a pizza problem.
You may have heard me sell you things on TV and radio.
I've written thousands of broadcast commercials and voiced many of them. I've also been a regional voice for Little Caesar’s, and I spent about two years as the national voice for Papa John’s in the UK.
Those pizza-chain credits are kind of ironic for a guy who prides himself on making a decent artisan-style pizza at home. That said, I also do a pretty good voiceover. So, it's like the artisan pizza of voiceover for the big pizza chains.
Those pizza-chain credits are kind of ironic for a guy who prides himself on making a decent artisan-style pizza at home. That said, I also do a pretty good voiceover. So, it's like the artisan pizza of voiceover for the big pizza chains.
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While I did not write these commercials, it was a lot of fun recording them. One of the most entertaining parts of the Papa John’s gig was the first recording session.
I go into a session with a bunch of Brits I've never met who are 4,800 miles away, and they ask me if I have any questions.
I say, "Yes, I do have a question. I've heard the other spots you've produced with the English voice talent. Do you want me to pronounce these words as, 'BA-zil,' 'tom-AH-toe' and 'or-eh-GAH-no'?"
The good news is, they all laughed. And the consensus was a resounding no. “Say it just as you would as an American.” Phew.
Over the years, I've created advertising for various packaged food brands, food events and local restaurants.
One of the most wildly successful campaigns was for an Italian restaurant. The place was very quiet around noontime. They wanted more lunchtime traffic.
Well, I knew a couple of affable suits who were enthusiastic about the joint. They’re also unique individuals. They’re foodies. And they tend to finish each other’s sentences.
So I put them behind a microphone, had them talk about the food, and edited their conversations into something short and sweet and delightfully ridiculous.
The resulting campaign always ran in the 11am hour. Pretty soon after, you couldn’t get a seat in that place at lunchtime.
Columbo's: "That Fabulous, Zingy Sauce"
I've also created campaigns for Bloody Mary Mix, Barbecue Sauce, Basmati Rice, Frozen Shrimp, Tortilla Chips and Craft Beer (to mention just a few), and been a regional and national voice for Ice Cream, Big-Brand Beer, and a famous, meat-centric fast-casual restaurant noted for the expansive real estate of its salad bar.
(Those TV spots for the sizzling steak place would run in the 10pm news where I was living. I'd often nod off in the first segment of the news, then wake up during the commercial break to my own voice selling me the glories of sizzling hot, all-you-can-eat baby back ribs.)
But wait! There's more! Try the veal!
I'm presently a writer/producer on a food & travel documentary series that's in development for one of the big streaming services.
Since it's still in development, we're required to be tight-lipped about it. But let it suffice to say that this show is about comedians and food. (What could go wrong there?) It all sounds important. We're looking forward to when it actually IS important. (Such is the ephemeral nature of Hollywood.)
I've written copy about kiln-dried oak for wood-fired ovens. That came out of left field. I was doing work for an asphalt manufacturing company, and one day the guy says, "I'm starting a business that sells wood for ovens. Write me something for that." He also had me writing copy for hardwood cutting boards and a proprietary "board butter."
He was worried that the copy for the butter might be too suggestive. That's when I realized how some people can infer meanings that just are not there. I removed exactly one word, asked him to take another look, and he loved it. Writing ad copy is an unusual business, and the human mind is an unusual organ. (Yes, I said "organ." Now someone's going to read that and make inferences, saying this page is too suggestive.)
He was worried that the copy for the butter might be too suggestive. That's when I realized how some people can infer meanings that just are not there. I removed exactly one word, asked him to take another look, and he loved it. Writing ad copy is an unusual business, and the human mind is an unusual organ. (Yes, I said "organ." Now someone's going to read that and make inferences, saying this page is too suggestive.)
Then there's this thing: Free The Pizza: A Simple System For Making Great Pizza Whenever You Want With The Oven You Already Have.
I knew so many people who were buying pizza ovens that ended up in the garage covered in dust. I thought, Let's write a book that removes the pizza oven from the equation.
Let's focus on the home oven. Let's take the reader from zero to pizza with purpose and intent.
Well, it worked.
In the process, it climbed to #1 on the Pizza Making list at Amazon, and snagged a Gold Medal at the Living Now Book Awards.
An unusual feature about this book: while available in both paperback and hardback, it was designed with the Kindle reader in mind.
The book links hidden pages on this website, where there are printable kitchen worksheets and online videos for making dough balls and shaping pizzas.
Favorite fan mail: one woman wrote to thank me for the book. It had stopped her husband from getting so angry that he would be hurling scorched discs of half-baked pizza dough off his peel into the back yard. (I never intended this book for owners of outdoor pizza ovens, but a surprising number of them have thanked me for it.)
I knew so many people who were buying pizza ovens that ended up in the garage covered in dust. I thought, Let's write a book that removes the pizza oven from the equation.
Let's focus on the home oven. Let's take the reader from zero to pizza with purpose and intent.
Well, it worked.
In the process, it climbed to #1 on the Pizza Making list at Amazon, and snagged a Gold Medal at the Living Now Book Awards.
An unusual feature about this book: while available in both paperback and hardback, it was designed with the Kindle reader in mind.
The book links hidden pages on this website, where there are printable kitchen worksheets and online videos for making dough balls and shaping pizzas.
Favorite fan mail: one woman wrote to thank me for the book. It had stopped her husband from getting so angry that he would be hurling scorched discs of half-baked pizza dough off his peel into the back yard. (I never intended this book for owners of outdoor pizza ovens, but a surprising number of them have thanked me for it.)
And yes, I have even consulted to pros on pizza making as part of the brand exercise.
For instance, I was talking to a chef and restaurateur in Nashville about using his restaurant in a TV shoot.
But when he learned I’d written an award-winning pizza cookbook, he did a quick pivot: “I want to talk to you about that.”
Uh…OK.
He was running a high-heat, wood-fired pizza program—and also using a dough at 70% hydration. I told him he was courageous. He replied, "Yeah, I guess so."
I also wondered if it was the right fit with his otherwise casual, neighborhood-y New American brand.
Might it feel better and feel more on-brand to lower both the temperature of the oven and the hydration of the dough, and have a more familiar, artisan New-York-ish thing going on?
Not to mention that it would be easier on his (often inexperienced) pizza crew to work a dough that’s more like 60 to 65%.
At the other end of the spectrum, an American pub owner in Mexico asked for input on pizza ovens. He was launching a low-volume, pop-up pizza program. He wanted to know which inexpensive outdoor ovens to buy.
I was pretty clear: forget the outdoor oven.
Given his cook’s level of pizza experience (none) and his customer’s expectation for pizza (low), there was a way to go that was less expensive, more user-friendly, and would deliver a product that was both on-brand for him and familiar to his customer while also being an excellent product.
Since they were already using a gas grill, they agreed to go with a pizza-oven insert. From the moment they popped up, the pizza program began crushing it.
The pub owner was effusive. He proclaimed this was a far better tasting pizza then he ever imagined he could deliver from such limited resources.
(I always tell people: It's not about the oven.)
But at the end of the day, I'm not a restaurant consultant. I've also done a lot of crazy things in kitchens, including cooking a full pork-chop dinner with gravy while underway in the cramped galley of a small sailboat somewhere in the North Atlantic.
I've cooked whole pigs on a mountaintop. I once installed a half-ton wood-fired pizza oven in my kitchen only to learn that, at 8,000 feet elevation, it takes 3 hours to reach 900 degrees.
I've slow-cooked melty cheesy sandwiches on the raging hot dashboard of a pickup truck in the Utah desert. (People lose their minds on that one. They love those dashboard sandwiches.) I've eaten pizza from the only sailboat-based pizzeria in the Virgin Islands. (It was a surprisingly good pie--and an even better cult brand, which was the point of my branding article about them.)
And on occasion, things get fancy. While working in the south of France, I once had a Thanksgiving dinner at a white-linen bistro, eating the most astonishing bouillabaisse you can imagine. It was deep and rich and lovely and bristling with ancient spiny and leggy crustaceous comestibles and no, the turkey was not missed that day. (I'm sure somebody will now demand I surrender my American Man Card.)
The most unusual meal I've ever had was probably the Molecular Gastronomy dinner at Viet Pham's now defunct Forage in Salt Lake City. My wife took me there for my birthday. The entrance was in the back of the restaurant, which meant walking past the kitchen on the way to the dining room. There were people in there, focusing intently on plates of food while using tweezers. We laughed, and joked about how after dinner we could go get a sack of burgers.
It was one of the single most memorable meals of my life. And for the people who sneer at "ridiculous small portions and overpriced," know that the flavors are mind-bending, and you do not leave hungry.
Also memorable? Fried grasshoppers. I’ve eaten them from a galvanized bucket on the streets of Cholula Puebla. (Hello, food safety standards!) Know what they don't taste like? Chicken. More like fried shrimp shells.
Really, a fried grasshopper seems mainly to be a crunchy delivery system for salt and hot sauce. Not sure I'd try them on a pizza. (Of course, the second you say that, you start thinking about how it might work. And I think I'd start with a pizza blanca, and probably a béchamel sauce.)
And one of the five best pizzas I've ever eaten (a list that includes Bianco, Lombardi's, Beddia and Zuppardi's) was at a stunning little place in central Utah. I'm also not going to give up the name. But it was excellent, and I always stop in when I'm passing through. (If you really want to know where it is, send me an email.)
Pizza makes people happy. Even me. I tell stories about pizza. And I enjoy the people in the pizza business.
I've interviewed some of those pizza people for my blog, written about some of the famous (and not so famous) pizza places, and generally just tried to share my purpose and intent philosophy with the home pizzamaker. And maybe make them laugh in the process.
Some of the fan mail has been fun. And it's always nice to know you've helped rescue someone who had been angrily flinging scorched black pizzas into the yard.
I've even read all of Modernist Pizza cover to cover, and written a 50,000-word review for anyone who wants to know more about it before plunking down a few hundred bucks for the heaviest pizza book known to man. (It's about 32 pounds. Seven pounds of that is ink.)
I've also been a source on a couple of pizza articles in PMQ Pizza Magazine. One time it was novel ways of using pork on pizza. Since I now live in the south, I use products like hog jowl, boudin, andouille and Tasso as pizza toppings.
Another time, it was dessert pizza. I'd started making ricotta at home, and there were fresh blueberries in the yard. So I'd concocted a blueberry ricotta pizza with chopped almonds that was fantastic, if I do say so--and I don't even like dessert pizza. But don't tell them that.
Oh, and one afternoon I decided to drive 5 hours from the Mississippi Gulf Coast up through the Delta into the hill country, where I ate one of the finest Neapolitan-style pizzas I've ever had. Tri-Becca Allie's in Sardis, Mississippi is a rare find. Go there. You'll love it.
Anyway, if you've got any questions related to the strategic telling of your story or the stories of others, feel free to ask.