Et might seem a bit Spanish that Americans are reporting on Germans in Italy. CNN Travel found a Munich couple in the Ligurian no man’s land who emigrated there and now runs a pizzeria.
Decades ago, Thomas Hartke and Irene Horbrand “fell in love” with Italy, and they kept visiting the village of Airole in Liguria. Then, 23 years ago, they finally turned their backs on Germany. Since 2016 they have been selling pizza at their restaurant A Teira (“The Earth” in Ligurian). 450 people live in Airole, 150 of whom are foreigners, writes CNN.
Mr. Hartke serves, his wife bakes up to 60 pizzas in the evening. The restaurant offers just ten tables, 50 people can be seated here.
“Locals come here too”
The biggest challenge was making the pizza so good that it would be accepted by locals. “We knew that serving pizza to Italians would not be easy. It’s such an untouchable, sacred food, but we were never afraid to try it and our bravery was rewarded,” says Hartke. “Customers really appreciate our pizzas. Locals come here too.”
As a tribute to her origins, Irene Horbrand also tops the pizzas with sauerkraut, sausages and veal knuckle. But the most popular is pizza with salmon, we learn from CNN. One of the pizzas is called Pizza Thomas (simple tomato sauce, capers, tuna and ham, but no mozzarella as her husband Thomas doesn’t like mozzarella). A bit unorthodox: In Italy, fish and meat are rarely eaten together. Not so in Airole.
In the village, a good hour’s drive from the Ligurian coast, the German emigrants’ restaurant has apparently become the “place to be”. In spring and summer you have to book early, in winter only one restaurant is open apart from the Munich pizzeria, which offers regional cuisine – but not pizza. Only in summer does a tavern become a competitor and sell pizza to take away.
Irene Horbrand told CNN, “I just love kneading the dough myself and decorating it with fresh foods that I eat on a daily basis. I never use ingredients from the fridge.” At CNN you can even learn a little German at the end: “Very good”. We say: Buon appetito!
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