--- title: Bill de Blasio Learns in Italy How to Eat Pizza Like a New Yorker description: Proof the mayor of the Big Apple can also eat pizza with his hands canonical: https://time.com/3025336/bill-de-blasio-pizza-italy/ author: Denver Nicks article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-07-23T20:24:21.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T07:48:42.079Z og:title: Bill de Blasio Learns How to Eat Pizza Like a New Yorker...in Italy og:description: Proof the mayor of the Big Apple can also eat pizza with his hands og:url: https://time.com/3025336/bill-de-blasio-pizza-italy/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt42808659ed152fd2/69869ce21eebf7b8ea371f87/bill-de-blasio-pizza-italy.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 3072 og:image:height: 1728 og:image:alt: New York mayor Bill de Blasio (L) eats a pizza made by Napoli's pizza chef Gino Sorbillo (2nd from L) in Naples, Italy on July 23, 2014.. og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Bill de Blasio Learns How to Eat Pizza Like a New Yorker...in Italy twitter:description: Proof the mayor of the Big Apple can also eat pizza with his hands twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt42808659ed152fd2/69869ce21eebf7b8ea371f87/bill-de-blasio-pizza-italy.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Bill de Blasio Learns How to Eat Pizza Like a New Yorker...in Italy > Sponsored content. 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Every edition is assembled by TIME editors rather than generated automatically. ## Video: Al Roker Rips NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio For Not Cancelling School [Watch (HLS stream): Al Roker Rips NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio For Not Cancelling School](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/cz27unEG.m3u8) (1:14)  _Published 2014-02-13. TV Weatherman Al Roker called NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio’s decision not to close public schools in the city a “big mistake.” The area is facing a snowstorm that could drop about a foot of snow on the city._  by [Denver Nicks](https://time.com/author/denver-nicks/)  ## Denver Nicks Jul 23, 2014 8:24 PM UTC  New York mayor Bill de Blasio (L) eats a pizza made by Napoli's pizza chef Gino Sorbillo (2nd from L) in Naples, Italy on July 23, 2014. New York mayor Bill de Blasio (L) eats a pizza made by Napoli's pizza chef Gino Sorbillo (2nd from L) in Naples, Italy on July 23, 2014. Pietro Avallone—Zuma Press  by [Denver Nicks](https://time.com/author/denver-nicks/)  ## Denver Nicks Jul 23, 2014 8:24 PM UTC New York City is a place famous for welcoming inhabitants of all stripes and persuasions—”Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free”—but the one thing New Yorkers will not abide, it seems, is a mayor who eats his pizza with a fork. No New York City mayor—in recent memory, at least—has had his pizza eating style critiqued quite so much as Mayor Bill de Blasio. Within days of his election in January, de Blasio was fending off verbal barbs from irate denizens of the Big Apple after he was caught on camera eating pizza with a fork at a pizzeria in Staten Island. (The Boston-born, Italian-lineage de Blasio [later said](http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2014/01/10/mamma-mia-de-blasio-defends-eating-pizza-with-knife-and-fork/) he was employing the methods of his “ancestral homeland.”) While on vacation with his family Wednesday in Naples, Italy — that “ancestral homeland” of his — de Blasio was [busted again](https://abcnews.go.com/International/nyc-mayor-bill-de-blasio-eats-pizza-italy/story?id=24677009) using a fork while devouring an authentic Italian pizza pie. But before your inner Yankee dusts off the old pitchfork, see this photo taken the same day—proof that Mayor Bill de Blasio is fully capable of standing upright while awkwardly wielding a handful of napkins and folding a greasy pizza slice in half before shoving it into his pie hole, like any civilized New Yorker would. ## Transcript >> In one corner NBC weatherman Al Roker and in the other New York Mayor Bill de Blasio. >> Unfortunately Mayor de Blasio made a big mistake or at least his team by not getting out ahead of this thing. >> Right. >> They're claiming that it caught them off guard; it came in earlier than predicted. >> Yes. >> No, it didn't. >> It did not. >> Roker's beef that the mayor didn't close New York's schools despite of official warnings people should stay off the roads. But Roker didn't stop there, he followed that with the series of tweets like this directed at the mayor, " Mr. Mayor, I could never run NYC but I know when it's time to keep kids home from school ." [ unk ], long range de Blasio forecast one term. Ouch. This fight is no expected to measure in the double digits; de Blasio offered an icy defense at a press conference during the storm. >> It's been a winter of very long nights and 12 hour shifts for a lot of these folks. >> Quoted by journalists who were there, de Blasio also reportedly said, " I respect Al Roker a lot, watched him on TV for many, many years. It's a different thing to run a city than to give weather on TV ." Municipal executives from Washington to Connecticut struggled Thursday off for a winter storm, dumped as many as 18 inches of snow in some areas. Thousands of flights have been cancelled and at least 15 deaths have been blamed on the storm system. 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