Aurelio's Pizza / Facebook (Left), Pope Leo XIV by Catholic Church England and Wales / Flickr (Right)
CV NEWS FEED // A pizza restaurant called Aurelio’s in Homewood, Illinois, just a few miles from Pope Leo’s childhood home, named his favorite pizza order on the menu after him and set up a special table to honor him.
Tasting Table reported that a few months before the pope was elected, he was in town visiting family and ordered a thin-crust pepperoni pizza, which the restaurant’s president, Joe Aurelio, has now put on the menu as a “pope-eroni” pizza.
In addition, the table where Pope Leo sat is now set up as “the Pope’s table,” with a presider’s chair from a local church.
Tasting Table adds that Aurelio’s is one of the oldest restaurants in the area, and has now grown into to a chain. Each of the restaurants will sell the “pope-eroni” pizza.
Other Chicago restaurants have also honored the new pope: the hot-dog chain Portillo’s renamed their Italian beef sandwich “the Leo” for the month of May, and other restaurants have sold pope-themed cookies.
