Pepperoni, Salami or Nduja: What Those Red Slices Really Are
Three names for three different things. You are allowed to have never sorted them out.
Pepperoni is an English word
Merriam-Webster records pepperoni as a borrowing into American English from the Italian peperoni, the plural of peperone. In Italian, peperone means a capsicum, the vegetable. The Vocabolario Treccani lists it that way too.
So the word travelled and changed jobs. In the United States it became the name of a cured, finely ground, paprika red sausage sliced thin over cheese. In Italy it stayed a vegetable. Order peperoni in Naples and you may get peppers on your plate.
This is not a trick question or a test. It is just a word that means two things in two places, which happens more often than menus admit.
Salami is a family, not a flavour
Salame is the Italian word for a cured sausage that is seasoned, packed into a casing, fermented and dried. There is no single salami any more than there is a single cheese. Regions across Italy make their own, with their own grind, their own fat, their own spice.
Some are mild and coarse. Some carry chilli or paprika and are called piccante. The red slice most people picture on a pizza sits near that spiced end of the family: fine grind, strong colour, cut thin so the oven heat can work through it fast.
When a slice curls up at the edges in the oven, that is the casing and the fat reacting to heat, not a sign of quality one way or the other.
Nduja does not slice
Nduja, often written 'nduja, is a Calabrian pork salume that is soft enough to spread. Treccani places it in Calabria, and it is associated above all with Spilinga in the province of Vibo Valentia. It is heavily spiced with local chilli, which is where the colour comes from.
Because it is spreadable, it does not arrive as a disc. It goes on in small spoonfuls and loosens in the heat, so it runs into the tomato instead of sitting on top of it. That is the practical difference at the table: salami stays a slice, nduja becomes part of the sauce.
If you have never eaten it, the honest description is: soft, salty, warm with chilli. Nothing more mysterious than that.
What is under the slices
Whatever goes on top, it lands on the same base here. Our dough is a biga, fermented 48 hours at 77 per cent hydration. The tomatoes are San Marzano and the mozzarella is fior di latte, both from Italy. The oven is copper, gas fired, and runs at 400 degrees.
At that temperature a pizza is in and out quickly, which is why a thin slice of cured sausage behaves differently from a spoonful of something soft. Daniele, our pizzaiolo, was born in Naples in 1989 and has been reading that oven for a long time.
The Associazione Verace Pizza Napoletana publishes its Disciplinare Internazionale, and what stands out in it is how short the classic Neapolitan list is: Marinara and Margherita, built on tomato, oil, basil and cheese. Neapolitan pizza was never a pile of toppings, which is part of why the red slice question comes up at all.
Come and ask
We are at 1 Aristotelous in Larnaca, open Tuesday to Sunday from 18:00 to 22:00, closed on Monday. If you want to know what goes on a pizza tonight, ask at the table or send us a message on Instagram at @filomena.pizzeria.napoletana. Our natural wine list changes, so the person pouring will know more than any page can.
Questions people actually ask
Q.Is pepperoni an Italian thing?
The word is Italian, the product as most people know it is American. Merriam-Webster traces it to the Italian peperoni, plural of peperone, which means capsicum.
Q.Is nduja just spicy salami?
No. Nduja is a Calabrian pork salume soft enough to spread, so it is spooned on rather than sliced. It loosens in the oven and mixes into the tomato.
Q.What wine goes with something spicy?
Our natural wine list changes, so we do not name a bottle on a fixed page. Each bottle or grape has its own page on this site, and you can ask when you sit down.
Q.Do I need to know any of this to order?
No. Saying you do not know a word is a normal thing to do in a restaurant, and it is usually the fastest way to get the right plate.