In 1880s Naples, pizza was a staple food for the working class, although the nobility turned up their noses at it. It didn’t really catch on in the rest of the country until the newly crowned Queen Margherita paid a visit to the seaside town in 1889. One night, the legend goes, she grew tired of fancy meals and asked for some local cuisine.
Pizza chef Raffaele Esposito made the queen three pizzas, including what we know now as the Margherita pizza — tomato, basil, and mozzarella for the three colors of the Italian flag — and hand-delivered them. Legend has it the queen took one bite of that pizza and said it was one of the best things she had ever eaten, which is how it got its name.
It’s entirely possible that more informal pizza delivery happened in town before this, but it’s certainly the first one that went down in history. There is some controversy about whether this story is actually true, but regardless, the pizzeria where Esposito worked, Pizzeria Brandi, still displays a royal thank-you note on its walls.