Pizza vending machine prompts curiosity and horror in Rome
- Customers can watch the ‘Mr Go Pizza’ cook their food behind a small glass window in just three minutes, but not everyone is impressed
- The new vending machine offers four kinds of pizza costing from US$5.20 to US$7.20
Raffaele Esposito, the 19th century Neapolitan credited with inventing Italy’s most famous type of pizza, may be turning in his grave: Rome has a new vending machine which slides out freshly cooked pizzas in just three minutes.
Buyers using the flaming red “Mr Go Pizza” machine can choose from four different kinds of pizzas costing from €4.50 to €6 (US$5.20 to US$7.20). The machine kneads and tops the dough and customers can watch the pizza cook behind a small glass window.
Reviews by customers on Thursday of the machine, one of the first in Rome, ranged from “acceptable if you’re in a hurry” to outright horror.
“It looks good but it is much smaller than in a restaurant and there is less topping,” said Claudio Zampiga, a pensioner.
People have been eating forms of flat bread with toppings for millennia, but it is generally accepted that pizza was perfected in Naples, where it was a street food for the poor.