Deep-fried pizza is a dish available in many chip shops

Fish and chips

Fish and chips is a popular take-away food in the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand and Canada...

 in Scotland

Scotland

Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...

. It originated in the late 1970s and typically consists of the cheapest of cash and carry

Cash and carry (wholesale)

Cash and carry wholesale represents a type of operation within the wholesale sector. Its main features are summarized best by the following definitions:...

 pizzas, though a choice of "toppings" is often available, usually plain (cheese and tomato), mushroom

Mushroom

A mushroom is the fleshy, spore-bearing fruiting body of a fungus, typically produced above ground on soil or on its food source. The standard for the name "mushroom" is the cultivated white button mushroom, Agaricus bisporus; hence the word "mushroom" is most often applied to those fungi that...

 or onion

Onion

The onion , also known as the bulb onion, common onion and garden onion, is the most widely cultivated species of the genus Allium. The genus Allium also contains a number of other species variously referred to as onions and cultivated for food, such as the Japanese bunching onion The onion...

. Served as a "Pizza Supper" (with chips) or single (without chips) in whole and half pizza portions. A common accompanying beverage is Irn-Bru

Irn-Bru

Irn-Bru is a carbonated soft drink produced in Westfield, Cumbernauld, Scotland. It is made by A.G. Barr of Glasgow since moving out of their original Parkhead factory in the mid-1990s and at a second manufacturing site in Mansfield, England...

, a carbonated soft drink.

Whole pizzas can be served cut in half with chips in the middle, creating a pizza and chip "sandwich

Sandwich

A sandwich is a food item, typically consisting of two or more slices of :bread with one or more fillings between them, or one slice of bread with a topping or toppings, commonly called an open sandwich. Sandwiches are a widely popular type of lunch food, typically taken to work or school, or...

".

In the south-east of Scotland they can be served with "Salt and Sauce"—with the pizza smothered in brown sauce

Steak sauce

Steak sauce —brown sauce —is a generic term for a dark brown sauce commonly served as a condiment for meat.The two terms are similar but not identical...

 before being folded in half. In the west they are generally served with "salt n vinegar and brown sauce" which is self explanatory. Most chippies will not fold the pizza in the west. They may put the pizza on top of chips before wrapping in paper but they will serve the meal in a pizza box on request.

This pizza is deep fried without batter

Batter (cooking)

Batter is a semi-liquid mixture of one or more flours combined with liquids such as water, milk or eggs used to prepare various foods. Often a leavening agent such as baking powder is included to aerate and fluff up the batter as it cooks, or the mixture may be naturally fermented for this purpose...

, although another variation known as a "Pizza Crunch" consists of a large, battered pizza/half-pizza deep fried, usually served with chips. However in Fife it is quite common for the whole pizza to be fried in batter.

In Italy, there are two local versions of deep fried pizza. The most elaborated recipe consists of two layers of pizza dough sealed one on top of the other with a filling of tomato, cheese, meats and other ingredients in the middle.
The simplest, but most popular nationwide, recipe consists of a plain disc of pizza dough taken and deep-fried without any topping, and flavoured with salt (or sugar) after it's cooked. This recipe has received many names across the county (pizzarella in Rome, avvoltolo in Perugia, ciaccia in Arezzo, gnocco fritto in Bologna, torta fritta in Parma and so on) with slight modifications for each recipe. For example, Gnocco Fritto and Torta Fritta are modeled in little squares of dough that swell in the middle during cooking, to allow the addition at will of ham or salami when served.

External links

• For Scotland, deep fried pizza is the taste of home (Daily Telegraph)
• Ah, Scotland! The Moors, the Braes, the Fried Pizza (New York Times)
• Deep-Fried Candy Bars: Scotland's Worst Food? Discussion of research into Scottish fried foods, including deep fried pizza