While they did contain a rotary blade, Morgan’s improvement allowed for easier use with a single hand and that factor lends the device perfectly to the use by pizzerias. Prior to this patent, wallpaper trimmers were bulky two-handed affairs. But that’s irrelevant because he invented a “roller-knife for trimming wall-paper,” not a pizza slicer. Morgan of Asheville, North Carolina, probably never saw a pizza in his life. Look familiar? It’s essentially the modern pizza wheel at a time when pizza was barely a blip on the country’s culinary radar. This wallpaper trimmer is a dead ringer for the modern pizza wheel. In the case of the pizza wheel, it all starts with wallpaper. At that time, simple table knives were used to divide pies (ie Delorenzo’s Tomato Pies in Trenton) but powerful alternatives lurked within unrelated industries. As previously mentioned, there was no need to quickly dice up a pizza into even units until slice culture rolled around in the middle of the 20th century. The wheel uses the same perpendicular impact method to puncture its prey but does so with a circular blade rather than the more cumbersome long blade of the mezzaluna. The development of the pizza wheel is much more schizophrenic than its larger counterpart, but the principle is identical. The task of splitting such a thick product is obviously a job smaller tools aren’t cut out for. The image above shows a modern version of the mezzaluna used for cutting deep dish pizza, a style which didn’t emerge until the 1940s. While it may not be as popular as its wheeled counterpart, the mezzaluna certainly predates it. Pizzerias in the Midwest now employ larger versions to cut both thick and cracker-thin pizzas quickly and evenly. Originally available in small sizes with either a single or double blade, the mezzaluna was initially intended for vegetable and herb chopping. This pizza knife is a modern version of the mezzaluna, aka rocker, aka machete, in use at Pequod’s in Chicago. This creates a clean incision without disrupting the material being cut. While most standard knives cut by dragging across their subject, the mezzaluna has a rounded blade that impacts its target with a downward motion as it rolls across. He was the Ron Popeil of his time, having invented something extremely simple to make food preparation easier. There’s not much information floating around about this fellow, but we can safely assume he was born and lived on the Italian peninsula, the southern region of which birthed our beloved pizza. Our journey begins with the invention of the mezzaluna (half moon) by Silvio Pacitti in 1708. The concept of serving pizza by the slice is fairly new (post-WWII) but the genetic material for the contemporary circular pizza blade can be found scattered across the past three centuries. The mere sight of a circular blade cradled in a handle holds no mystery as to its use, however the story of its evolution is far more layered. In the world of food gadgetry, no piece of gear is more iconic than the pizza slicer. NOTE: This article contains images from the US patent archive.Complete patent documents are linked in the caption following each photo.Ī clear ancestor of the modern pizza slicer, patent was submitted in 1897 for use in trimming cigar wrappers.
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