By: Jeanine Brancato
Posted on Wednesday, June 1, 2022
Food has a way of bringing people together. There can be that one special dish that meant the most to your family. For the Fehn/Brancato families there has been a tradition that started all the way back from their late ancestors. The Little Pizza recipe holds a special place from their heritage and it may be the easiest recipe in the world, but to this family the Little Pizza recipe is what home is. I decided to call a couple of members of the Brancato/Fehn family and ask what this recipe means to them.
I asked Carol Fehn first who is the Grandma of the Brancato/Fehn family a few questions first. I asked Carol, “What was your favorite home cooked meal growing up, and who made it?” She said, “My favorite meal growing up was Little Pizzas. I loved Little pizzas because everyday after school me and my friends would walk to the pizzeria my parents owned in Brooklyn and they would make them for us. It made me feel as if I was home away from home. I knew my parents cooked it best, and I loved showing it off to my friends.” Seeing how the easiest meal her parents knew how to make meant so much to her shows how important family really is.
Seeing if this meal meant that much to Carol I wanted to know how she learned how to make these little pizzas herself. She answered, “When I was around 10 years old I started to help my parents work at their pizzeria. I was in the back with my grandmother and sometimes my parents spreading out dough. My parents would sit sometimes for a few minutes out of their days of work teaching me how to make the proper pizza. To the proper size, to how to fry it, to how to properly place the sauce and cheese. It was the easiest few step recipe, but doing it with my family was the best part.” Most of Carol’s family originated from Italy, so making a pizza was passed down from before she was even born.
Since Carol now has a family of her own I wanted to know when she knew it was the right time to share this recipe with her kids. She said, “When my kids were around 11 years old we moved to Brooklyn, and near the area where my parents owned the pizzeria. It wasn’t there anymore, but I did want to show them where our family had history. The day I showed them my second home I decided to make that night a Little Pizzas making party. We sat as a family and made homemade little pizzas. I will remember that day and night forever.” This answer led up to the next person I interviewed, and that was her daughter Carol Brancato.
Carol Brancato is Carol’s daughter, and yes she did name her daughter after herself. Carol Fehn said that was a tradition when they had girls back in the day where she grew up. I asked Carol’s daughter if she remembered the first time she ever ate a little pizza? She said, “I remember being almost 3 years old and having chopped up pieces of Little Pizzas in a bowl. I have had Little Pizzas since I could remember. I always loved them, and I knew how much it meant to my mom seeing me enjoy them as well." Seeing how important it was for her to make her mother happy really makes me happy that I even have such a close bond with my family.
I began to think to myself that eating pizza so much must have been tiring. So I asked her what was so special about eating these pizza’s so often? She said, “To me it felt like home. When I began to make them for myself growing up, and even now for my kids It makes me feel that I am making my family proud. That it brings my Italian side to life. It showcases that our family has something that makes us closer. And sometimes people may think pizza bringing people close together is weird, but that is what my family is. It showcases our weird family history and love for one another.”
Seeing how this recipe got brought down from Carol Fehn's parents to her, and then from Carol Fehn herself to her kids, it made me wonder when Carol Brancato was going to pass down her recipe to her kids. She said, “I feel this recipe will just begin to grow on my kids. I have made it for them so many times that I believe they know the recipe themselves. They are all adults now, and I figure when they have their own kids someday I will actually give them the written copy of the recipe to give to them.” Hearing how they even have written down such an easy recipe, but find it important to pass it down physically is a beautiful tradition.
To continue working along the family tree I then interviewed one of Carol Brancato’s kids Nicole. She is now 21 and has eaten a lot of little pizzas. So I wanted to start off her interview with an easy and fun question. I asked her, “Who cooks Little Pizzas the best?” Nicole said, “This is a very hard question to answer, and only because I have eaten three generations of Little Pizzas. I am only going to say my mom because that is the first real time I ever ate them. Also because she is my mom, and if I don’t say her she can yell at me.” I thought it was sweet to give her mom as her answer. Also the fact that she has eaten every generation of the Little Pizza must make it really difficult to compare.
Being an adult now must make it hard to remember the first time you have ever eaten something. I thought it would be interesting to see if Nicole remembered exactly when she ate her first piece of Little Pizza. She said, “I do not remember the exact date or year, but I do remember I was quite young. My mother says I was still in a height chair when I first ate it. I do remember seeing pictures years back of me eating it, and I had sauce all over my face with a big smile. That made me assume I really did like it even at a young age. Nicole’s family no longer has this photo due to losing it during hurricane Sandy, but her description of the picture can pop up exactly in my head.
I then ended the interview by asking Nicole if she plans on continuing the tradition with her own family someday. She said, “Well hopefully when I do learn how to properly cook I will show my husband and kids this recipe. It can be a fun family night making pizzas, and It can be a night where I can bring in family history. I would love to show my own family how important my family was to me.” It was a very similar answer to what her family answered with. It is beautiful to see a pizza making experience was created from this family recipe.
Family is one of the most important things in my own life, and seeing how a history of food can showcase a family really made me think of my own family values. It can be from sharing mac and cheese, to even having homemade spaghetti and meatballs. It is important to share some type of memory with your family that brings you close. For the Brancato/Fehn family that special thing was pizza. Now you can make yourself some pizza, and hopefully your families will love it too.
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