Ian Roesler is a senior creative writing major and writes “The Gaggle” for The Daily News. His views do not necessarily reflect those of the newspaper.
Pineapples are among my favorite fruits — not my most favorite, but they’re in my top five. Nonetheless, I love ’em.
Another thing I enjoy that starts with “pi” is pizza. I don’t have many particularly strong opinions on it except that pineapple doesn’t belong on pizza. It’s unnatural, like those creatures from the 1997 horror film “Aberration.”
Biting into pizza and discovering there’s pineapple on it is like walking in the woods on a warm, sunny day, and, whilst walking, you turn your head to look at some frolicking geese. In this brief moment, you walk right into an eastern tent caterpillar nest and feel hundreds of cute, fuzzy caterpillars swarm you.
It’s a day-ruiner.
Pineapples are good. Pizza is good. Combined, however, they are not. It’s a culinary aberration, the likes of which has been normalized in Western society and ingrained itself into the hearts and young minds of impressionable individuals.
So, I, the shining beacon of righteousness amidst a world gone mad, must now educate the philistines and bring them to a higher plane of existence.
One reason why I detest pineapple on pizza is I abhor that sickly sweetness. It overpowers every other aspect of the pizza, from the toppings to the crust and sauce. All that is left is this candy-like sweetness. People say it isn’t all that bad or that I’m overexaggerating. I believe everyone is entitled to their own opinion — even if it's wrong — but what is wrong with these people's taste buds that they don’t find the pineapple’s flavor too overpowering?
I also don’t like the texture pineapple becomes when it is cooked on pizza. It’s this mushy nonsense that’s somewhere between already chewed and stringy. If there were two hypothetical pizzas — one pineapple fresh out of the oven and the other regular but someone immediately vomited pineapples on it and spread them around — I guarantee you couldn’t tell the difference. You bite into a pineapple chunk on a pizza expecting a solid, or at least soft, piece, and, next thing you know, you’re biting through what feels like a partially digested, stringy mess.
Like many fears and abhorrences, my issue with pineapple on pizza stems back to my childhood. Whenever my family ordered pizza, we always got two. My mom and I shared one — half-sausage and half-mushroom — and my grandparents got one — either supreme or Hawaiian. The next day, I’d usually be the one eating the leftovers. If it was supreme, I’d just take the mushrooms off, and it’d be a regular pizza. If it was Hawaiian, I’d take off the pineapples, and, even though they were gone, the taste lingered wherever that pineapple piece had been.
One bite of this, and I knew it was wrong — something vile. I tried eating around where the pineapples had been. I tried removing the cheese from the affected area. I tried sprinkling red pepper flakes. It was no use — the taste persisted.
If you’re still on the wrong side of liking pineapples on pizza, I offer my final reasoning: Pineapple pizza looks like a horrible medical condition. I used to, and sometimes still do, get poison ivy. Especially after scratching, these yellow, almost translucent bumps form with this clear liquid roughly the same color as pineapples. When I look at pineapple pizza, those pineapple pieces remind me of those fluid-filled bumps.
Is it a coincidence pineapple pizza looks like horrible, cellular death? No, it is not. It is the universe’s way of saying such an infernal abhorrence ought to not have been birthed and allowed to proliferate.
So, I say unto thee, let us not waste pineapples any longer. Rather, let us find those who would ruin them and pizza and dissolve them in pineapple juice.
Contact Ian Roesler with comments at icroesler@bsu.edu) or on Twitter @IanRoesler.