The highly entertaining Twitter account @ItalianComments has more than 100k followers and they post everything that has to do with Italian food. Especially food that is so far from the traditional cuisine that you can only vaguely see the resemblance.
Of course, the dishes that attract the most attention are pizza and various pastas. The screenshots @ItalianComments posts almost always contain comments made by Italians mocking the food and expressing their expert opinion on the matter.
Italian cuisine is the most popular in the world. YouGov actually conducted a survey in 24 countries asking 24,000 people which foods from 34 national cuisines they've tried and which of them were their favorite. The research revealed that surprise, surprise, Italian cuisine was preferred by the majority. 85 percent of the people agreed that they liked Italian food, especially pizza and pasta.
The nation that liked Italian food the most, with 99 percent of the representatives in the survey, was Italians. They are their culinary tradition’s biggest fans and they will defend it when they see it being mistreated.
The account has been active since 2015 and has blessed its followers with more than 1,500 tweets. You can find some patterns in the content @ItalianComments shares. The photos often are of weird food combinations of pasta, for example with rice, and of course, the sacrilege of sacrileges that makes an Italian's blood boil—pizzas with pineapples on them. Share your opinion—is pineapple on pizza appropriate or are you with the Italians?
The comments under these photos are as entertaining as the photos themselves. The Italians are not holding back and are critiquing the dishes without mercy. They compare the food in the photos with puke and other nasty things, expressing their disbelief that someone actually eats this and go as far as to say that what they are seeing is a crime. Of course, we understand that they are mostly joking, but knowing their passion for their food, part of an Italian's soul probably is truly suffering seeing things on pizza that they consider should never be put on it.
It is not surprising that the Italians are so passionate about their own food. It’s part of their national identity; they have a whole culture surrounding it. Eating is a pleasure, dinner is considered quality time with family, and their food traditions go way back. Did you know that modern pizza developed in the 18th or at the beginning of the 19th century? All those circumstances explain why Italians are so attached to their food and why seeing others making the dishes barely recognizable provokes heated reactions.
