Hawaiian pizza is one of the most divisive things in the world. Some people love it, while others are repulsed by the thought of adding pineapple on a pizza. Personally, this writer enjoys a good slice of Hawaiian, and is happy that there are people who hate it (more slices for him)!
However, there’s one national leader who doesn’t share this writer’s sentiments. Icelandic president Guðni Th. Jóhannesson was at a high school in Akureyri City, where a student asked if he liked pineapple on his pizza. He said that he is “fundamentally opposed” to it, and that he would ban it if he had the power to pass laws.
The news was met with such outrage on social media that he was forced to release a statement on his official Facebook page, called “A Statement on the Pizza Controversy.” In his statement, he said:
I like pineapples, just not on pizza. I do not have the power to make laws which forbid people to put pineapples on their pizza. I am glad that I do not hold such power. Presidents should not have unlimited power. I would not want to hold this position if I could pass laws forbidding that which I don´t like. I would not want to live in such a country. For pizzas, I recommend seafood.
It became so widespread that the inventor of the Hawaiian pizza spoke up about it. Canadian Sam Panopoulos told CBC Radio:
He can have whatever he wants — I don’t care. Listen, I don’t get nothing out of it. He can do whatever he wants as far as I’m concerned.
He was also asked how he thought of the unique concept:
That was back in the late ’50s, the ’60s. Pizza wasn’t in Canada — nowhere. Pizza was coming in through Detroit, through Windsor, and I was in Chatham then, that was the third stop. We had a restaurant there. We went down to Windsor a couple of times, and these places, and I said, “Let’s try a pizza.”
Then we tried to make some pizza. Along the way, we threw some pineapples on it and nobody liked it at first. But after that, they went crazy about it. Because those days nobody was mixing sweets and sours and all that. It was plain, plain food. Anyway, after that it stays. We sell pizzas in Chatham and in London for the next 40, 45 years.
Coincidentally, Filipina Miss Universe 2015 Pia Wurtzbach was conducting an #AskPia interview on Twitter the day before, and she was asked by @_gabdlcrz if she liked pineapple on her pizza.
Her response?
Yes!! Drown that with pineapple!!! ???????????????? https://t.co/Ld5KD8EgfZ
— Pia Alonzo Wurtzbach (@PiaWurtzbach) February 20, 2017
We don’t deserve Pia.
*Pia Wurtzbach photo from Cosmopolitan magazine
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